Skating sponsor feels left out in cold

As Spokane gears up for the national spotlight that the U.S. Figure Skating Championships will bring to the city, one of the major event sponsors is feeling cheated.

The Davenport Hotel signed a contract in 2003 to be the headquarters hotel for the Jan. 21-28 event. Hotel owners Walt and Karen Worthy agreed to provide 882 room nights in the historic hotel, free of charge. They also agreed to provide, at no cost, all of the hotel’s major ballrooms and meeting rooms, including the Grand Pennington Ballroom, the Hall of Doges and the Marie Antoinette Ballroom. The deal included in-house security, 50 free parking spaces, complimentary beverages for volunteer meetings, and other services.

The Davenport’s contribution has a retail value of $765,046 and a value of $457,686 if group discounts are applied, according to sponsorship materials provided by the Davenport.

In return, the Davenport was to be designated the event’s “headquarters” hotel and was to be included in “every aspect of the event,” according to the sponsorship contract. The contract calls for the hotel to be identified “as the ‘Official Headquarter Hotel’ in all uses, marketing the event.”

That hasn’t happened, Walt Worthy said this week.

“It just kind of really ticks you off,” Worthy said. “We want the community to know the hotel is being a good citizen. We would not have been able to get this event had it not been for the Davenport being here.

“They came to us first and said, ‘We have to have you on board,’” Worthy said, recalling his early meetings with Barb Beddor and Toby Steward, of Star USA, the company that is producing the event in Spokane.

Worthy pointed to a recent Washington CEO magazine advertisement that contained no Davenport logo or mention. He said his hotel has been left out of advertising time and again, over the course of almost four years.

Beddor counters that if the search terms “Davenport Hotel” and “figure skating” are entered into the Internet search engine Google, 47,200 hits come up. She said she will do anything she can to resolve the situation, but feels like Star USA has held up its end of the contract. She said her staff has given out so many Davenport Hotel brochures at trade shows that staff members joked that they felt they were promoting the Davenport, not the skating event.

She said she doesn’t feel the contract calls for Star USA to include the Davenport in all advertisements, just those that mention a “headquarters hotel.” She said that would have been impossible, because Star USA didn’t know whether it would be using magazine advertising at the time the contract was signed.

“We are so committed to and so appreciate Walt Worthy and so appreciate what he has done and we want to make him happy,” Beddor said. She added that the Davenport was the headquarters hotel for Skate America in 2002 — also produced by Star USA — and asked why, if Worthy was unhappy, would he have agreed to be part of another event?

Worthy said he’s questioning that decision himself. He said the same thing happened during Skate America and he was repeatedly assured it wouldn’t happen again.

Lynnelle Caudill, managing director of the Davenport, said she was reluctant to speak about the hotel’s concerns because everyone there wants the event to be a huge success for Spokane. But, she said, as each advertisement has appeared with no mention of the hotel, the disappointment has deepened.

“This agreement started in ‘03,” Caudill said. “It’s too late. There’s no opportunity to re-do four years of advertising. The event is 90 days away.”