County hotels are already full
By Ethan Smith
Published in News on May 15, 2015 1:46 PM
It is 10 a.m. on Thursday -- the last day before Goldsboro will be flooded with travelers attending the Wings Over Wayne Air Show -- and hotel desk clerk Michelle Berot is on the phone.
"I'm sorry, unless somebody cancels we don't have any more rooms available," she tells the person on the other line.
Every hotel in Goldsboro has been booked solid for this weekend, with hundreds of thousands of people expected to attend the weekend's main event.
Ms. Berot, who works behind the desk at Comfort Suites on North Park Drive, said people began booking rooms for the air show a month ago -- and the reservations have been rolling in since then.
"We've had to turn a lot of people away, more people than we would like to, definitely," Ms. Berot said.
Comfort Suites has 83 rooms, all of which are filled as people have swarmed the hotel's system with a flurry of online and call-in reservations.
At Quality Inn, which neighbors Comfort Suites on North Park Drive, the story is much the same.
"We have 66 rentable rooms," Quality Inn's General Manager Tamika Goff said. "People started booking them in the beginning of April and it hasn't stopped since. We're filled up."
And just a few roads over on Spence Avenue, Best Western Plus and Hampton Inn's Sales Director Ashlin Glatthar said her hotels are full, too.
"Both hotels are full, and I manage both of them," Ms. Glatthar said. "We have 111 rooms at this one (Hampton Inn) and 120 rooms at Best Western Plus."
Ms. Glatthar said people began booking rooms at her hotels the moment the air show was announced in December.
"Rooms started getting booked back when it was announced, and as far as performing acts getting their rooms booked, that was done by the end of April, and now our rooms are full," Ms. Glatthar said.
Ms. Glatthar said Hampton Inn and Best Western Plus are usually busy one weekend every month for various military events, but the air show did cause more of a spike in traffic than usual.
"This is an extra special military weekend with a lot of people coming into Goldsboro from a lot of places," Ms. Glatthar said.
Holiday Inn Express, on Sunburst Drive, is also booked solid, making every hotel in Goldsboro full for the weekend.
"Yes, we are full," General Manager Lyn Hagerty said. "We have 92 rooms that have all been booked."
Each hotel manager said they have continually had to turn people away.
"The only issue we've had is having to turn people away," Ms. Hagerty said. "We don't want to overbook and make people mad when they come to Goldsboro, so we make sure to tell them we're full."