The Billion-Dollar Mirage: Gaylord Pacific And The Future Of San Diego's Convention Scene

San Diego just gained a new $1.2 billion resort and convention center in Chula Vista, but not everyone is celebrating. The Gaylord Pacific Resort has been marketed as a transformative addition to the region, bringing thousands of jobs and major tourism dollars. But behind the glossy renderings and influencer hype lies a tougher truth: this isn't a San Diego institution. It's a Texas-rooted, globally managed machine designed to extract profit from the region while pulling convention business - and dollars - away from downtown and the local businesses that rely on it.

The Gaylord Pacific is owned by RIDA Development Corporation, a Texas-based developer, and operated by Marriott International under the Gaylord Hotels brand. That means much of the revenue doesn’t cycle through San Diego; it flows to outside investors and a global conglomerate. And while the Port of San Diego and the City of Chula Vista backed the project to activate a long-empty stretch of bayfront, it raises the question: who truly benefits? Conventions booked at the Gaylord are conventions not booked at the San Diego Convention Center. And that shift has ripple effects - fewer visitors spending money in Gaslamp bars, East Village restaurants, and the small hotels that built their business around San Diego's downtown convention economy.

Amid the hotel’s fanfare opening, an Instagram review by @culturesandiego cut through the noise, skewering the Gaylord with biting humor and raw honesty. The post - which has been making the rounds on social media - framed the resort as "a $400/night fever dream no one asked for." What followed was a takedown that compared its endless beige hallways to a Kubrick film set and its sports bar to "Top Golf without the golf."

Gaylord Hotel San Diego: The $400/Night Fever Dream No One Asked For

Let’s just go ahead and say what everyone pretending not to notice refuses to admit:

The Gaylord Hotel San Diego is what happens when a Vegas hotel has an underage, illegitimate child... and then abandons it on the side of the freeway to raise itself.

And unlike its flashy parent, there’s no gambling. Not even a slot machine to numb your senses. Just miles of beige, echoey regret and the sound of flip-flops smacking on laminate.

1. Influencer Reviews? Bought. Paid. Delusional.

The reviews are glowing. Influencers are posting “best weekend ever!” like they didn’t just sell their souls for a pool pass and a comped mediocre cocktail.

Let’s be honest—either the WiFi’s unstable or everyone got paid off in gift shop vouchers, because no actual human with functioning corneas would describe this place as “luxury.”

2. Hallways Built for Stanley Kubrick

The hallways? Massive. Vacant. Echoing. Ripe for a “Shining” remake, complete with ghost tricycles and a haunted conference center. If you listen closely, you can hear the whispers of executives who lost their will to network somewhere around Ballroom C.

3. The Sports Bar: Top Golf Without the Golf

“Check out our sports bar!”

Translation: It’s Top Golf… without the golf. Just flat screens, flat beer, and vibes so flat you could press a panini on them.

4. The Chlorine. The Children. The Chaos.

Before you even hit the lobby, you’re greeted by the unmistakable stench of chlorine and unparented children. It’s like walking into a YMCA that learned about branding from LinkedIn.

Final Thoughts:

The Gaylord SD is a multi-acre fever dream—not quite a resort, not quite a convention center, and definitely not quite worth your time or money. Unless your goal is to spend $19 on a sandwich while dodging sugar-crazed tweens cannonballing into your adult disappointment, steer clear.

The post resonated because it said what many locals were already whispering: the place feels soulless, overpriced, and disconnected from San Diego's cultural fabric. The comments section alone became a battleground - locals piling on with stories of overpriced food, bland experiences, and isolation, while defenders insisted "it’s a convention hotel, not a staycation spot."

The Gaylord critique isn't just about chlorine-scented lobbies or empty hallways. It’s about ownership and control. San Diego has long had to defend its economic and cultural identity against outside developers treating the region as a profit center. In this case, a corporate entity from Texas, working with Marriott and global financiers, has created a self-contained bubble - 1,600 rooms, 12 restaurants, and a water park - designed to keep visitors inside the gates and away from independent local businesses.

And unlike San Diego’s homegrown hotels or the convention center downtown, the Gaylord doesn’t funnel much of its revenue back into the city's cultural life. Instead, it pulls conventions southward, fragmenting the ecosystem that made San Diego a premier convention destination in the first place. For a city that thrives on tourism, that fragmentation matters.

The Gaylord Pacific is here, and it will host thousands of conventioneers who might otherwise have booked downtown. But San Diego has to ask: do we want to cede our convention future to global hotel conglomerates and out-of-state developers? Or do we want to invest in venues and infrastructure that keep money circulating here, supporting local restaurants, local hotels, and the neighborhoods that give San Diego its soul?

The viral review may have been funny, but the underlying critique is deadly serious.

Originally published on August 18, 2025. Headline photo from Chula Vista Living.