EUREKA SPRINGS : Worried hoteliers offer gas bargains
Posted on Wednesday, April 16, 2008
Some innkeepers are offering gas cards or rebates to visitors in hopes of luring travelers worried about the escalating cost of getting there.
In Eureka Springs, one inn is dangling a price break for making the trip in a Toyota Prius.
“The minute the gas prices started to spike, a lot of inns started pitching the refunds,” said Michael Dolan, spokesman for the Web site bnbfinder. com. The online bed and breakfast directory lists a handful of Arkansas inns promoting gas rebates from $ 25 to $ 35. All are in Eureka Springs.
“It’s so they’re saving a little bit of money so they can afford — at this point — half a tank of gas,” said Keith Hubbard, owner of the 1908 Ridgeway House Bed and Breakfast.
Hubbard said he rolled out the “Tanks for Staying With Us” promotion last month after the idea came up at a meeting of the city’s Alliance of Better Bed & Breakfasts.
Hotels around the country are playing on traveler angst about high pump prices by dangling rebate deals or gas cards good at certain local filling stations.
Regular gasoline is averaging $ 3. 39 a gallon nationally and $ 3. 27 in Arkansas, according to AAA. The U. S. Energy Department recently predicted gasoline prices could average $ 3. 60 per gallon this summer and could spike as high as $ 4.
At Arsenic and Old Lace, a bed and breakfast named after the 1939 stage play and 1944 Cary Grant film, owner Doug Breitling said he has offered the gas deal for three years.
“The gas prices have always been high,” he said. “Just not as high as this year.”
Red Bud Manor owner Deborah Stroup said it’s a first for her, however. She’s offering $ 25 for gasoline to visitors who stay for two or more nights during the week. The gas special runs through the Memorial Day weekend.
For travelers whose energy worries go beyond gasoline, there is always Red Bud Manor’s “carbon neutral package.” Stroup said it includes a box of compact florescent light bulbs, a donation to the Natural Resources Defense Council, a pair of trolley passes and — for those who arrive in a Prius or other hybrid vehicle — $ 20 off the bill.
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