Priceline Hotel: 3* Chicago (Millenium Park-Loop-Grant Park) Club Quarters Central Loop

[momof2b0ys]

My husband and I are planning a trip to Chicago in September. Two things we plan on doing on our trip is the White Sox halfway to St. Patty's game on 9/12 and we'd like to see Wicked sometime while we are in town. We would prefer to stay in the thick of things (the Loop, Mich. Ave), but I haven't been able to find any good deals yet with PRICELINE or HOTWIRE. Is it too soon to be searching for a deal?

I've searched Priceline a few times, following your guidelines on rebidding, and have come up short, bidding up to $120 on a 3* and 4* in the Loop area and Mich ave. area. With hotwire, nothing has came up under $200/night.

Am I just jumping the gun, or is there something else I need to do with my search?

Thanks for all your help in advanced!

And yes, I've been using your links to search for hotels. :)

[thereuare]

Welcome to BetterBidding!

It may just be early, but there are also many times when it takes more than $120 to be successful... and based upon current rates i'm guessing this is likely going to be one of those times. Do you know if something (event, conference, etc) taking place on these dates as quite a few hotels are showing sold-out and others are $400+ per nite.

What is the best rate you're able to find thru coventional methods? (use our BetterChecker to assist in your search)

What is your maximum bid for this stay?

Thanks for using our PRICELINE and HOTWIRE links to begin your searches.

[momof2b0ys]

I'd like to spend no more than $100 a night if possible.

The cheapest I have found conventionally has been $214 for the Club Quarters, Chicago Central Loop and Crowne Plaza Hotel for $199.

I bid up to $100 on Priceline for 3* and 4* and was rejected. I didn't want to go higher than that with having as much time as I have to find a hotel.

There is a Celtic Convention or something like that going on that weekend unfortunately.

Thanks for all your help!

[Suburbanite05]

Unfortunately, there's the The International Manufacturing Technology Show (IMTS) being held at McCormick Place with an expected 91,000+ attendees being held 9/8 - 9/13. The later you wait, I can only expect the prices to go up as more rooms wil fill up. Plus, there are also a few smaller conventions around your dates with anywhere from 500-1000 attending.

You can try a suburb like Evanston, but then you have to commute into the city. It's just the law of supply and demand, unfortunately.

The convention / event calendar link can be found here (not sure how to do that hyperlink) : Chicago Convention Calendar

[AaronJB]

When someone is staying in the city for a couple of days, I generally don't like to recommend staying in the suburbs, as you want to spend as much time as you can downtown.

However, prices can often be very high during conventions.

In this case, what I'd recommend is the Courtyard Marriott Deerfield via Hotels.com for $79. Best case scenario, you find something downtown closer to the date and can cancel (although be sure to read the fine print for the exact cancelation policy on Hotels.com)

Worst case scenario, you are at a nice Courtyard under budget in a really great area. There's also a Metra train station (metrarail.com) down the street and the beautiful Chicago Botanic Gardens (chicagobotanic.org; despite the name, it's in the suburb of Glencoe) is a few miles away.

[momof2b0ys]

I really appreciate all of your help, although the information about the huge IMTS is disheartening. In this case, I might go with the courtyard in Deerfield, and keep looking just in case something comes up. Does anyone know the train system well and if the trains from Deerfield go straight into the downtown area?

Thanks again for all your help! :)

[AaronJB]

The train from Deerfield goes to Union Station, which is in the West half of the Loop area downtown, which is primarily a business area (the Sears Tower is 2-3 blocks East of the station.)

The Metra trains are large, two-level trains that have bathrooms and conductors to collect tickets (versus the turnstyle card fares of the CTA trains). They are much more comfortable than CTA trains. They resemble Amtrak trains, if Amtrak trains were meant for shorter distances.

The Courtyard is 800 Lake Cook. The nearest train station (Lake Cook) is 601 Lake Cook - it's just a little ways down the road. There is a grocery store down the street, a small mall down the street, a larger/more upscale mall a mile East and the Chicago Botanic Garden is about 2.5M East.

Metra station: http://www.metrarail.com/Sched/md_n/lakecook.shtml

The Metra trains run once every hour during the middle of the day during the week. During rush hour (morning and evening) on weekdays, they do run express trains and trains do run somewhat more frequently. Trains come less often on Saturday and Sunday and usually run every 2 hours.

If you do book the Courtyard via Hotels.com, it would be greatly appreciated if you could use the link to Hotels.com (click the Hotels.com) as it does help support the site.

[momof2b0ys]

I checked on Priceline again tonight (of course through your PRICELINE link!), and since there was a huge tradeshow in town when we were wanting to go to Chicago, I decided I would have to raise my price if we were to stay where we wanted. After three tries, I finally got one. This is what I tried:

1st-$120 4* NMA

2nd-$120 4* NMA and Loop

3rd-$120 3* and 4* NMA and Loop

hopefully I did this the best way possible? :) I had tried $120 yesterday and came up short....

3* (Millineum-Loop-Grant) Club Quarters Chicago-Central Loop

$120.....9/11-9/13

I would have liked to have gotten the other Club Quarters, on Wacker and Michigan, but at this rate, I'll take it!

Thanks again for everyone's help! :)

[thereuare]

Congratulations on your win!

1st-$120 4* NMA

2nd-$120 4* NMA and Loop

3rd-$120 3* and 4* NMA and Loop

hopefully I did this the best way possible?

Few thoughts regarding the above...

A better approach would have been:

4* NMA

4* NMA + re-bid zone

4* Loop

4* Loop + re-bid zone

4* Loop and NMA

4* Loop and NMA and re-bid zone

Then starting a complete new bid at the 3* level at lower bid amounts (rather than starting at $120... see If You Lower Your Star Rating Then Lower Your Bid Amount). Given the difficulty of these dates i'm not sure how much the above would have changed things, but important things to note for any future bidding.

Thanks for sharing your win with the board and for using our PRICELINE links to begin your bidding.

Enjoy your stay.