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Ross Bridge is expanding already 02/18/2005

Publication: Birmingham Business Journal
Author: Barr Nobles

With a full four months to go before its soft opening in June and a grand opening in August, the 258-room Renaissance Ross Bridge Golf Resort and Spa is in the expansion mode. Resort officials say advance bookings fueled a decision to expand meeting facilities from 20,000 square feet to 27,000 square feet.

"Having the extra room is like an insurance policy," says Joe Saling, sales and marketing director for the facility. "We found that some of the groups that are already booking needed more space, for exhibits by suppliers or vendors. And the wedding market has overwhelmed us."

Saling said the expansion will not delay the opening of the hotel, which is an investment property owned and developed by Retirement Systems of Alabama and managed by Marriott Hotels under its top-of-the-line Renaissance brand. "If we'd planned it, it couldn't have worked out better," Saling says. The additional space will come from converting a "small portion of an exterior parking lot - about 20 spaces - and two outdoor tennis courts."

"The connecting walls were not completed, so the timing worked pretty well," says Bill Lang, the Birmingham-based publicist for PCH Resorts, a division of Retirement Systems. "It is better to go ahead and do it now rather than later." The addition will be completed in September.

A small, outdoor courtyard will serve both of the two big ballrooms, one of which has a little less than 10,000 square feet and the other with 7,000 square feet of space. The larger room can seat 600 diners.

While Saling would not identify the early bookers, he did say that "we're expecting (Ross Bridge) to pay for itself pretty quickly."

One of the events that has been released is the Alabama Bureau of Travel and Tourism's Year of Alabama Food event, booked at Ross Bridge July 15-16. While the hotel has three high-end suites - named Cahaba, Vulcan and Sloss - that go for about $1,500 a night, the tourism weekend package costs $329 for a two-night stay with double occupancy and includes breakfast at the hotel restaurant Brock's.

"Given the quality of the resort and spa - and a PGA-quality golf course - we don't think the costs will seem extravagant. This is the kind of splurge you can do without mortgaging the house," Lang says.

The golf course, part of the Robert Trent Jones Golf Trail, is sited on 300 acres, about double the space of a typical course, and is 8,150 yards long, making it one of the five longest courses in existence. It is "designed for big spectator galleries," Lang says, "large enough to handle a Bruno's-type event."

The course is already drawing national attention. In the current issue of Met Golf, a magazine aimed for the New York-area golf market, there is a two-page spread illustrating the layout of the Ross Bridge course.