Albuquerque hotel guests will soon pay more to help advertise the city

By T.J. Wilham

Click here for updates on this story

    ALBUQUERQUE, New Mexico (KOAT) — City leaders are wanting more people to come to Albuquerque and to do it they are going to start charging an extra fee for everyone who stays at a Duke City Hotel.

The fees are projected to bring in more than $4.8 million a year and will allow the city’s tourism bureau – Visit Albuquerque – to advertise in other states besides those that border the Land of Enchantment.

“It is going to almost effectively double our budget that we have to tell Albuquerque’s story,” said Tania Armenta, president of Visit Albuquerque. “The message it’s going to be out there increasing the appeal of this destination.”

In order to start charging the fees, the City Council passed an ordinance to create what is called a Tourism Marketing District. That means every hotel within a boundary that mostly borders the interstates must assess that additional 2% fee to help advertise the city in more areas of the country. The boundary was designed to include all 150 hotels in the city.

Currently, if a person were to get a $100 hotel room, they are paying about $14 in taxes and fees. Under the new ordinance that will go into effect in July, there will be $2 added to that.

That brings the total taxes and fees hotel guests would have to pay is going to be nearly 16%. Tourism officials said that is about the national average; however, it is more than what guests pay in Phoenix, Salt Lake City, and Santa Fe.

At $6.5 million currently, Albuquerque’s tourism budget ranks second to last when compared to 12 other cities in the region. Santa Fe has about $3.5 million more to spend than the Duke City.

With the new money from the fees, Albuquerque will move up on the list passing the City Different, Tucson and Tulsa. But at $11.3 million, it’s nothing compared to the $38 million in Denver or the $35 million in San Antonio.

“We are competing with other cities that spend a lot more than we do on advertising their cities,” said Prakash Sundaram, who manages five hotels in the Duke City.

In order to create the new district and the fees, the majority of hotel owners had to approve it.

Sundaram said he voted yes.

“We just have so much to offer in this city, and I think it’s high time we let people know about it.”

Please note: This content carries a strict local market embargo. If you share the same market as the contributor of this article, you may not use it on any platform.