Iconic hotel famous for hosting rock stars to shutter todayheadline

At this point, it’s hard to believe that we’re five years out from the pandemic.

Many of us no doubt remember the days of wearing masks to buy groceries and having to hang out with neighbors six feet apart on lawn chairs.

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Those weren’t fun times. And even though society has pretty much gotten back to normal since then, the impact of the pandemic has extended well beyond 2020.

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The annoyingly persistent inflation we’ve all been dealing with? That was pandemic-induced.

Lawmakers had to pump stimulus funds into the economy to help it recover from its drastic decline in early 2020. Consumers got checks at a time when supply chains had slowed, creating an imbalance between supply and demand.

The pandemic also battered a number of key industries, from retail to hospitality. A number of well-known retailers filed for bankruptcy and closed their doors permanently following the events of 2020.

Similarly, since 2020, consumers have had to say goodbye to far too many restaurants to count, from local favorites to popular chains. Many of those filed for Chapter 11 or simply shuttered without even trying to see if bankruptcy protection would help.

An iconic hotel famous for hosting rock stars will shutter.

Image source&colon; Shutterstock

The pandemic did a number on hotels

In 2020, travel virtually came to a halt. That resulted in a massive wave of hotel closures. Costar reports that 714 hotels shuttered that year alone.

Things didn’t get better in the years that followed, though. In 2022, 699 hotels closed their doors.

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By 2023, things had improved modestly, with fewer hotels shuttering.

But while the travel industry as a whole has largely recovered from the events of 2020, there have been enough disruptions in the hotel space to make ongoing closures likely.

The broad availability of private vacation rentals through sites like Airbnb and VRBO has caused hotels to fall out of favor among many consumers. Why pay $250 a night for a cramped room when you could pay $250 a night for a lakeside cottage or mountain chalet, complete with a fully functional kitchen?

And as more travelers shift away from hotels, closures could increase.

Famous San Francisco hotel loved by rock stars to close

David Bowie. Kurt Cobain. Neil Young. These are only some of the big names who have stayed at the iconic Phoenix Hotel in San Francisco.

Now, the famous 44-room motor lodge is making plans to close its doors for good. The location will shutter permanently at the end of the year.

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The Phoenix was originally a pay-by-the-hour joint called the Caravan Motel that was transformed into more of a hotspot in the late 1980s, drawing in some of the biggest names in the music industry.

For context, it was widely reported that at the time of his death, Kurt Cobain was found with a note written to wife Courtney Love on Phoenix Hotel stationery.

More recently, the hotel was home to Pride parties and daytime raves fans would flock to.

But like many other hotels, the pandemic did a number on the Phoenix, and the location has been losing money ever since.

A general decline in San Francisco tourism hasn’t helped matters, either.

Visitors have been less eager to spend time in San Francisco given the uptick in crime and homelessness in recent years. A number of well-known retailers have abandoned downtown San Francisco in light of these trends, exacerbating the situation.

It’s unclear what will take the place of the Phoenix once it closes its doors to guests. But Chip Conley, who bought the hotel in 1987 and has been running it since, said that rooms have been booking up quickly since he revealed plans to shut down.

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