LAKE GENEVA, Wis. — With the Republican National Convention (RNC) rapidly approaching, many local hotels — both in and around Milwaukee — are working overtime. Many are offering a unique experience to attract convention visitors.
The Abbey Resort is about an hour south of downtown Milwaukee, situated on Lake Geneva. Its general manager, Dan Dolan, said despite the commute to the RNC, he has something special to lure in the delegates.
“Lake Geneva is absolutely a beautiful gem here in southern Wisconsin and our resort is set just off of the lake. These beautiful outdoor areas are utilized by our groups and the RNC will be using these for the breakfasts,” said Dolan.
Dolan said the Abbey’s 340 rooms have been booked by the RNC, hosting more than 700 people.
“Which is right where we can handle a group, so it’s really not abnormal to have the resort full. Every single weekend this resort is at a higher capacity than when the RNC will be here,” said Dolan.
Dolan said revenue for the Abbey’s third quarter will still be up by 12% over last year. That’s because the convention falls mid-week, which is a typically a slow time of the week for the resort.
Dolan said he and his team have re-worked all of their normal schedules to accommodate the convention.
“There’s going to be a little bit of a difference in how the schedule works; convention hours are late afternoon into the evening, so most of our groups and conventions that do come here have more normalized hours, so we are adjusting our schedules,” said Dolan.
“In terms of staffing, we are already fully staffed because this is our in-season period,” he added.
Tim Somerville is the resort manager. He’s been with the Abbey for 33 years. He said he hasn’t seen anything like this since the 90s.
“In the 90s, we had a governors convention here. The difference is that the entire governors convention was done here at the resort,” said Somerville.
Somerville said he and his staff are ready to welcome the RNC guests.
“We’ve done extra training to make sure they’re filled in on everything that’s going on with the RNC. We’ve made sure we’ve ordered our product earlier. We make sure that our housekeeping staffs — and all staffs throughout the resort — are staffed correctly to make sure every piece of this conference goes perfectly,” said Somerville.
Dolan said when the RNC is over, one of his major goals is to have some of the visitors come back again.
“What we are hoping is that having their first experience on this lake will hook them and they’ll want to come back with their families in future months and future years. People come here generationally to The Abbey Resort, so we are hoping we have some new fans,” said Dolan.