The Estancia La Jolla Hotel & Spa, part of Destination Hotels, took in its employees, firefighters from the front lines and evacuees of the wildfires as early as last Monday morning, said David S. Gerdes, regional director of marketing.
“Our rooms start at $250 and up,” said Debbie Graham, an employee of the Estancia who stayed at the hotel for two nights after waking up to flames creeping over a nearby hill toward her home.
The La Jolla hotel offered evacuees of the San Diego wildfires a discounted rate of $99.
Their sister hotel, L’Auberge Del Mar Resort and Spa, also offered a discounted rate and stayed open during the voluntary evacuations in the Del Mar area.
“Tuesday was pretty tenuous. We accommodated emergency personnel, and L’Auberge never evacuated,” Gerdes said.
The Estancia sheltered many emergency workers along with their families as well as their own employees affected by the fire, giving them free room and board at the posh hotel.
As early as 8 a.m. Monday. Oct. 22, the chain realized the severity of the situation and offered the discounted rate immediately. As of Monday night, 80 rooms were filled with various firefighters, rescue workers, employees and their respective families, not to mention people who fled from fires in the area, Gerdes said.
“Our main concern was, ‘Were we going to be able to service our customers?'” Gerdes said. “But nobody was hurt, we remained fully operational, we started cleaning last night (Oct. 25) and it feels somewhat normal now.”
The hotel took care of its employees, including Gerdes, who stayed at least one night.
Other employees were evacuated from as far away as Chula Vista, Poway and Rancho Bernardo, Gerdes said.
“We were pretty fortunate,” he said. “We’ve worked together to keep things as normal as possible.”