THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, July 31, 1996 TAG: 9607300109
SECTION: VIRGINIA BEACH BEACON PAGE: 02 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY TOM HOLDEN, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: 62 lines
A Virginia Beach company has found its own gold near the countless parties and sharp-eyed vendors that have taken over Atlanta's Olympic Village.
Affordable Tent Rentals, an Oceanfront company that has served the resort city for 12 years, has rented out about 100 tents to help keep the blistering Southern heat at bay during the two-week event.
``We were fortunate to get involved,'' said Boots Daugherty, a co-owner. ``We've had crews down there for about 3 1/2 weeks. Our tents are at eight different sites, with three of them outside the Olympic stadium.''
Before the games began, EMMA, a Dallas-based company, bought or leased large sections of downtown Atlanta that had previously been used for parking and were scheduled for vendors' sites this month.
``They leased the tents from us,'' Daugherty said. ``Everyone from food vendors to entertainers. It seemed there weren't enough tents on the East Coast to meet the need. I was just down there. There are hundreds of tents set up. It's unbelievable.''
Given the huge throngs now in the Peach State, it's not surprising that Olympic prices are the norm, but even Daugherty was surprised when he saw just how much money was changing hands down there.
``A 10-foot-by-30-foot space was leasing for $50,000,'' he said.
By comparison, in Virginia Beach the same space might rent for $400 to $500 for the Neptune Festival, he said.
``I asked a T-shirt vendor what kind of business they were expecting and he said $300,000. Then I asked him what his rental costs would be and that's when he told me $50,000. It's just amazing.''
Given the intense demand on his company's products, Daugherty and his partner, Fred Lee, were a little concerned about the impact it might have on the local supply, especially since the company serves customers from Fredericksburg to Cape Hatteras, N.C.
``At first we had no idea what effect it would have since the initial contracts took up a lot of our inventory and then we got more orders, right up until last week,'' he said.
But the contract was so lucrative that Affordable Tents was able to double its supply of tents - special orders were placed to its California supplier - so the Olympic rental essentially paid for the company's doubling of its stock of tents.
``This was a once-in-a-lifetime deal,'' he said. ``We have a lot of loyal, local customers and a lot of commercial accounts.''
Affordable Tents came into being in an unusual turn of events. Daugherty and Lee started out selling plants that they brought up in tractor trailer lots from greenhouses in the deep South.
``We had a problem keeping the sun off them so we rented a tent from Norfolk Tent. Then we bought one. At the end of one season, someone came up to us and asked if he could rent our tent and it just started from there.''
Daugherty has been a fixture in the local ski business but with tents doing so well they have sold their stake in the local enterprise and are now converting their old ski shop on First Colonial Road into their special events office.
Daugherty still runs ski operations in Richmond and Hampton. ILLUSTRATION: Staff photo by MORT FRYMAN
Fred Lee, left, and Boots Daugherty, co-owners of Affordable Tents,
supplied 100 tents for the Olympic Village in Atlanta. by CNB