In Which I Thoroughly Research the “Groundhog Day Hotels Cost More Than Super Bowl Hotels” Story

It’s weather-predicting marmots vs. superb owls.

I went looking for a Groundhog Day money story this morning, and did I ever find one:

Here’s the deal: Hotel site Trivago ran some data indicating that hotels in Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania, home of Punxsutawney Phil, are charging $450 per night, on average, for rooms booked on or around Groundhog Day. After Groundhog Day, room prices drop considerably.

Meanwhile, if you want to book a hotel in Houston on Super Bowl LI weekend, you’ll only have to pay $340 per night on average.

Therefore, groundhogs are more popular than the Super Bowl? (No.)

Therefore, hotels in Punxsutawney cost more, on average, than hotels in Houston, when comparing for two different sets of dates surrounding two different cultural events? (Yes.)

Therefore, people are paying more to stay in Punxsutawney over Groundhog Day than they are to stay in Houston over the Super Bowl? (Maybe.)

Remember: just because someone puts a price on something doesn’t mean people are buying it at that price. We’ve looked at this before:

American Girl Dolls Are Still Expensive (But Not As Expensive As They Could Be)

You may have seen Buzzfeed’s recent OMG post This Is How Much Your American Girl Dolls Might Be Worth Right Now, which, um, Buzzfeed? If you’re showing me an image where the eBay seller is asking for a starting bid of $1,990 but the listing has zero bids, this is less “what your American Girl dolls are worth” and more “let’s look at how these eBay sellers are deluding themselves.”

So I did some more digging. I tried to book a hotel room in Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania for tonight, Groundhog Night. I had two questions:

1. Were all the hotels sold out, implying that people were in fact booking all the rooms in Punxsutawney to see a groundhog predict the weather?
2. If there were available hotel rooms, how much would they cost me?

Trivago indicates that there is only one hotel available in the entire town of Punxsutawney (population 5,394) for tonight: the Cobblestone Hotel and Suites, which appears to be a former La Quinta with a different sign on the roof, and which is booking rooms at $388 per night.

If I wanted to stay at the Cobblestone Hotel and Suites tomorrow—which I’d call Groundhog Boxing Day but that would imply that we’re making groundhogs fight each other and I don’t want that—it would cost $126.

Interestingly, Trivago only claims that two Punxsutawney hotels have availability on Friday, February 3 (the other option, the Country Villa Motel, is booking rooms at $80 a night) which leads me to believe that there just aren’t that many hotels in Punxsutawney, and no wonder they’re going to try to get as much out of their one big moment in the sun and/or shadow as they can.

So. One more search. How many Punxsutawney hotels have availability a week from now?

Once again, Trivago says two hotels are available: the Country Villa, at $80, and the Cobblestone, at $116. Trivago does claim that there are nine hotels total in the Punxsutawney area, which makes me wonder what is going on at the other seven hotels.

But I can’t worry about that; I need to cross-check all of this data with Hotels.com, just to make sure Trivago isn’t hiding anything from me.

Hotels.com is offering the Cobblestone at $120 for Thursday, February 2— although they note that they’re marking it down from $400, maybe because I’ve been a faithful Hotels.com member for years and because I’m already logged into my account, and maybe because they saw me checking out Trivago.

Either way, I’d save $268 or so, once fees and taxes are added in, by booking through Hotels.com.

Interestingly, the Cobblestone jumps up to $130 if I booked it on Friday, February 3; it drops back to $120 if I want to book on Thursday, February 9. The Country Villa is never shown as an option, and Hotels.com claims that all other nearby hotels are in the town of DuBois (population 7,693), 20 miles away from Punxsutawney.

So. What have we learned?

Trivago wasn’t kidding about Punxsutawney hotels charging more for Groundhog Day. (True, at least when booked through Trivago.)

Booking through Hotels.com, especially if you’re already a member, might save you money. (Maybe.)

Booking through another hotel site, if you’re already a member, might also save you money. (Maybe. I’m getting really speculative here.)

There aren’t a lot of hotels in Punxsutawney. (This seems pretty evident.)

Therefore, even if hotels in Punxsutawney cost more, on average, than hotels in Houston—for two separate cultural events happening on two different dates—people are still paying more in total to attend the Super Bowl. (True. Also, we probably already knew that in our hearts.)

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