San Francisco Hotels Anticipate Business Boost During APEC Conference

As California tourism looks to rebound in the years following Covid, hotels, which have faced a slow economic recovery, are gearing up for business increases — thanks to the upcoming week-long Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation conference, which begins Saturday.

Over 20,000 conference attendees, including President Biden, other heads of state, their staff, CEOs, journalists and security personnel, translate to roughly 55,000 booked hotel rooms across the city, according to Cassandra Costello, chief policy and external affairs officer for the San Francisco Travel Association, which helped secure San Francisco’s bid to host APEC.

“The economic impact here is $52 million,” she said. “That includes not just hotel stays, but also food and beverage, retail and recreation. Visitors are really accessing our entire city and supporting our small business and lifting up our communities.”

For hotel managers, like Clifton Clark, who runs the four-star Westin-St. Francis Hotel at Union Square, preparations started several months ago, as APEC named San Francisco the host city last November.

“It’s not like this hotel is not used to preparing for dignitaries and heads of state,” Clark said. “The first president to stay at this hotel was McKinley, and every President up through Obama has stayed at this hotel, except for two.” (Those two Presidents were Harry Truman and Donald Trump.)

Clark said APEC attendees, including delegations from two Asian countries, are staying at the hotel, which is sold out for the next week. He can’t reveal which ones for security reasons, but he told KQED that President Biden won’t be among the hotel’s guests.

There will be tightened security around Moscone Center, the conference’s main hub. This “secure zone” has created some logistical hurdles for hotels — including delivery times, employee access and clearance, parking availability and even garbage collection.

Due to the national security measures required for the event, San Francisco Mayor London Breed recently announced that the city is working closely with federal government agencies, including representatives from the U.S. Secret Service, State Department and the White House, to ensure safety measures and minimize disruptions to the public, whenever possible.

“We’ve been having those meetings on a weekly basis and feel that we’re very well prepared,” Clark said.

Beyond keeping the businesses afloat, hotel owners hope APEC can help improve San Francisco’s image. Recent media coverage has portrayed the city amid a “doom loop,” a negative feedback loop marked by remote work and reduced foot traffic, resulting in heightened concerns about crime and public safety.

The Union Square area has also seen the departure of retail giants, like Nordstrom and Old Navy, whose downtown stores closed in the past year.

“If we do it right, you have the mixture of the leaders of their countries, and probably their own media staff, who are going to go back to those countries, and they can help us change the narrative,” said John Handlery, owner and manager of the Handlery Union Square hotel, which sits right across the street from the Westin-St. Francis. “From an image standpoint, nothing compares.”

Handlery expects to welcome overflow guests, some of whom plan to attend APEC, along with tourists visiting San Francisco during one of the city’s busiest weeks.

Compared to other large-scale events, like DreamForce, which brings in tens of thousands of visitors to San Francisco for the annual Salesforce conference, APEC has a different cache, serving as the premier platform for the United States to advance economic policies in the Asia-Pacific region, according to Alex Bastian, president and CEO of the Hotel Council of San Francisco.

“People who are decision makers will look at San Francisco through the lens of investments,” said Bastian, hoping APEC will encourage leaders and visitors to return to the city and the Bay Area.