The tiers
The Portland Winter Light Festival runs February 5 to 13, 2027, across nine nights of free light art in Portland. The festival's Call For Hotel Partners page publishes three cash rungs: Official Hotel Partner at $5,000 or more, Hotel Premium Partner at $2,500 or more, and Hotel Partner at $1,000 or more. The $5,000 rung carries the note Exclusive - 4 available.
The page prints Deadline Extended above the application control and prints no date beside it. A hotel buyer has no closing date to work against. Ask for the new date in writing before the file reaches a general manager.
What the $5,000 rung buys
The $5,000 rung lists lead logo recognition on the Plan Your Visit page and logo recognition on the festival's main homepage with 780,000 views in 2026 printed beside it. The homepage figure attaches to that rung alone.
Five thousand dollars against 780,000 views works out at 0.64 cents a view. That figure prices the homepage placement and nothing else on the page.
The $2,500 rung buys Premium Partner logo recognition on the Plan Your Visit page. The $1,000 rung buys Hotel Partner logo recognition on the same page. The page prints no view count against either rung.
All three rungs carry a group social media post to 60,000 followers and about 2 million views across Facebook and Instagram.
The attendance figures
The 2026 edition drew 262,000 people and carried 219 installations. The page states that 17 percent of attendance came from outside the Portland metro region, which is 44,540 out-of-market visitors. At the $5,000 rung the fee works out at 11 cents for each of those visitors.
The homepage count measures reach. The out-of-market count measures room nights. A hotel buyer sets the fee against the second one.
Artist placement carries a condition
The $5,000 and $2,500 rungs both print this line: "Option to present your own light-based art or be paired with a Festival artist (Artists funded by Light Festival, subject to availability)." The $1,000 rung prints the first half of that line alone.
The FAQ states that artists will be notified on a rolling basis through October 30. That date sits ten days from this writing. A contract signed today commits the fee before the curatorial team finishes placing artists.
The organiser writes that it will make every effort to program an artist where a venue has none, and that it may not accommodate every venue that applies. Ask for the pairing confirmation as a condition of the invoice.
Map inclusion depends on artwork
All three rungs list inclusion on festival maps and directories if the hotel presents artwork. A hotel with no installation sits out the maps at every rung. Ask the organiser to confirm the map entry in writing for the case where no artist is placed.
The in-kind route
The page offers a cash or equivalent in-kind room contribution with this sentence: "The minimum room-night commitment starts at 5 rooms and is calculated based on the average room cost in February." The sentence uses rooms and room-nights in one breath. Ask which unit the invoice uses.
The page publishes no average February room cost. Five rooms across the opening window of Thursday February 4 to Saturday February 6 is 15 room-nights. Five rooms across the closing window of Friday February 12 to Sunday February 14 is another 15. The festival may request the full nine evenings for a single artist.
Rooms are requested from February 2 for installation work. The festival states that it settles lodging with hotels from December on a case-by-case basis.
What each rung carries beside the logo
The $5,000 rung adds a mention in press releases aimed at out-of-market publications, an early group social post, an email feature in a Plan Your Visit newsletter, printed brochures for the concierge desk, four tickets to the Festival Preview Party, and an option to join the culinary program with a food or beverage specialty.
The $2,500 rung carries the newsletter mention, the printed brochures and two preview party tickets. The $1,000 rung carries the group social post and two preview party tickets.
The counter-offer
Ask how many of the four $5,000 slots remain open. The page publishes the cap and not the count. Ask for the extended deadline as a calendar date. Ask for artist pairing confirmation before the invoice, with October 30 named as the notification date. Ask for the map and directory entry in writing for the case where no artist is placed.
Ask which average February room cost the in-kind calculation uses, and whether that figure is the festival average or a citywide rate. Ask whether the preview party tickets carry a face value.
Portland General Electric returns as Presenting Sponsor. The festival page states that PGE has held that role every year since the first edition.
