December 27, 2006 (Published December 23, 2006)
View From Florida
(Part I)
(c) copyright View from Silicon Valley, 2006. All rights reserved.
Prior
to moving to Silicon Valley, Florida was "home" for over 15 years. We've been gone seven-plus years now, and almost
feel like we're beginning to become California "insiders," but we feel like we still "know" Florida. The following are
observations from the past week back in the sunshine state:
Our flights to Florida were both jam-packed. No spare
seats anywhere. However, the airline had already canceled our original flight selections a couple months ago and booked
us onto different (earlier) flights. Upon arrival at San Jose Monday morning, we discovered our "new" Monday departure
was canceled and we were already re-booked again, complete with a four-hour layover through a different airport.
Instead of an eight or nine hour day of flying, we suddenly had a 12-hour day.
Don't you wonder how an airline has
"mechanical" difficulties but still magically re-books all the passengers to their destinations? On the same day?
I admit to being somewhat paranoid and a conspiracy theorist but this strikes me as just too convenient. Instead of
four San Jose flights that were 75% full, United Airlines had three San Jose flights that were all 100% full. If I was
United Airlines, I would be trying to have "mechanical difficulties" every day.
By the way, good luck trying to ever
change airlines back to your second choice if this happens. Airlines are permitted to jerk passengers
around like then refuse to book you onto another airline with a better solution than the one they are foisting upon you.
True story: I had a customer service supervisor (in India, of course) start off a call apoligizing
for the poor customer service from his underling. At the end of an incredibly aggravating 70 minutes, he agreed I could
not get to my destination the next day on ANY of his airlines' flights the next day AND that he would not book me onto another
airline. Unforutnately, his supervisor did not take calls...
Even if you buy refundable tickets, the airlines' cash management system will only refund
your money verrrrry slooooowly. You will have to buy replacement tickets and then generate a dispute with your credit
card company if you don't want to pay for both and hope the refund arrives the following month.
We finally arrived,
the Orlando airport, except for the press of passengers from our flight, seemed eerily empty.
Despite re-confirming
our Orlando rental car during our four-hour Chicago layover, our rental car agency did not have the car we requested
available when we finally arrived. They dismissed our complaint and tried to book us into an "equivalent" which they
insisted was the only requirement from our reservation. Their "equivalent" was somewhat smaller but the price, of course,
was not.
Fortunately, car rental companies are not able to leverage your money to the same degree as airlines.
While one of us occupied the clerk, I walked down to another agency's desk (at ~8:00pm on a Monday, a week before Christmas
there was nobody(!) trying to rent a car at any of four or five different rental agency's desks).
The "new" agency
was more than happy to rent any of several vehicles matching and exceeding our originally-reserved choice at a lower price
than our original agency. No problem, we walked away from the reservation, took an upgraded vehicle AND saved ~5%.
(Based on the complete lack of activity, we could easily have gone back and forth for an hour and shaved another 5 -10% off
the bill.)
The manager at the second agency claimed their explicit was to hold web reservation rates high and steal
walk-up business from their competitors. He claimed the "quality" of their walk-ups (i.e., length of rental, size of
car, profitability, etc.) was better than the average from their web site. This seemed plausible when we walked out
to their portion of the parking garage and saw a row of larger cars and SUVs ready to be rented.
Continuing our survey
of Orlando business activity, the next night we had reservations at a popular restaurant. When we arrived the place
was virtually empty. By the time we finished dinner (maybe 7:30pm?), they were still mostly empty. Keep in mind
this is prime snow bird and tourist season in Florida. (The local paper says Orlando alone gains ~800Ku visitors
over the age of 55 this time of year.) If these businesses don't get busy in late-December, when will it ever
happen?
The next day we departed for our old stomping grounds in Tampa -St. Petersburg. ("St. Petersburg, God's
Waiting Room" or "Home of the newly wed and the nearly dead.") We had reservations on the beach and looked forward to
(measuring the crowds while) playing in the sand and sun.
Truth be told, I was looking forward to re-living a little
of my childhood when a week or so in Florida during December was the highlight of our mid-west winters. I remember my
sister and I meeting and playing with packs of kids from Ontario, Quebec, Michigan, Ohio, etc. during our Florida winter vacation.
Incredibly,
St. Pete Beach was deserted! Our hotel was less than one-third full. Two days by the pool yielded only one other
child near our daughter's age. We stopped in for dessert in the hotel's revolving restaurant one night and found
only two or three other parties in a place built to accommodate dozens.
The beach hotels fall in between the airlines
and the car rental agencies in money management. They require a 50% deposit paid in advance (before tourist taxes) but
you can still get a full refund up to 72 hours in advance of arrival. we ended up in a suite with a gulf view for
only ~6% above the average Santa Clara County hotel room rate (which was $134 last month).
Driving around, the streets
were not busy. (Oh come on! Even in summer time it used to be a hassle to drive up and down Gulf Boulevard or
Blind Pass Road.) We saw several hotels even less occupied. We saw several condo-hotels, each with only
one or two cars (or none!) in parking lots big enough to hold dozens. Keep in mind this was four and three days before
Christmas!
We stopped at a couple souvenir shops but the customers were out-numbered by the clerks. The
St. Pete Pier (an upside down pyramid on Tampa Bay) was not at all crowded. The various lunch places were all deserted,
even at noon and 1:00pm. (It's still great fun to feed fish to the Pelicans!) The Dali Museum is another jewel
on the bay side and it was moderately busy. (It was very disappointing to discover some of Dali's seminal works such
as "Geopoliticus Child Watching the Birth of a New Man", "Daddy Long Legs Of The Evening, Hope!", "The Persistence Of Memory"
and, "The Disappearing Bust Of Plato" we ALL out on loan --apparently to Tokyo?)
At dinner the nexet evening, we asked
our waiter if this was a typical crowd? (We were the only party he was serving that evening.) He claimed
to be newly in town from Colorado but understood the real "season" doesn't start until January 1st, at which point it is supposed
to busy until spring (aka the first weekend after Easter).
As long-time residents, we can confirm rates do indeed go
up January 1 but the weeks leading up to that point are typically packed as well.
Conclusion:
It
will be interesting hear the official statistics but, based on our experience, we expect airlines may be profitable (despite
the miserable service) but not much of anybody else. We know sales and tourist tax receipts are vital to Florida’s
government. We expect they will be down, probably significantly, in this 2006 tourist season.
Perhaps as a sign
of the times, the only business above which might be construed as a reasonable investment (the airlines) is also the business
we would be least willing to patronize.
Next up: The "guts game" going on in Orlando-area real estate.
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The above is not intended as advice to buy, sell or hold any stock, bond, real estate nor any other financial product
or service. Invest at your own risk.
