The Do it Best Corp. Fall Market runs September 25 to September 28, 2026 at the Indiana Convention Center in Indianapolis. The venue forecasts 12,000 attendees. Whoever books for a retailer or franchise buying group carries the block, and the block is a contract.
September 25, 2026 falls on a Friday. September 28 falls on a Monday. The window runs across a weekend, and that shape decides the room nights.
What the venue publishes
The Indiana Convention Center sits at 100 South Capitol Ave, Indianapolis, IN 46225. The venue lists the market as September 25 to September 28, 2026 and forecasts 12,000 attendees. Its page links to the market's own site for event details.
The venue publishes four numbers that shape the block. Downtown holds 7,100 hotel rooms. Skywalks connect 4,700 of those rooms to the Convention Center. Downtown holds 200 restaurants within walking distance. Indianapolis International Airport sits 15 minutes from downtown.
A four-night hold that starts on a Friday
A group arriving Friday September 25 and releasing Tuesday September 29 holds four nights: Friday, Saturday, Sunday and Monday. Run the arithmetic before you send the count. A block built on the event dates alone returns three nights, because the market closes on Monday the 28th.
Ask for the nightly rate on each of the four nights separately. The window spans a weekend and a weekday, and one blended rate hides which night carries the cost.
Ask the property to confirm whether the group clears on Monday evening or Tuesday morning, and which of the two the contract counts.
When the group is not one company
A buying group books as a group and signs as a collection of independent businesses. That difference decides the contract.
Ask who the property will name as group contact, and whether that person can add and remove names without a signature from each business. Ask what the rooming list looks like when every business books its own people: one file or one file per business.
Ask what happens when one business drops out of the block. Ask whether its rooms return to the group or to general inventory, and who pays for the gap. Ask before the list is built, not after.
Who signs, and what the signature carries
The signature on the contract carries the attrition. Ask the property to name the signing entity in writing before the block is drafted, and separate the group contact from the guarantor where those are two people.
Where the buying group holds no entity of its own, ask what the property requires instead: a guarantee from each business, a deposit from each, or one party taking the whole liability. Get the answer before you collect a single name.
Who settles the bill
Two billing models produce two contracts. Under a master account the group pays for the rooms and the property sends one invoice. Under individual cards each guest settles on departure, and the group carries no room revenue.
Ask which model the property will write, then ask what the group owes for unfilled rooms under each one. A master account moves the shortfall to the group. Individual cards move the risk to the property, and the rate reflects it.
Ask where incidentals land, whether a guest can charge to the master account, and who authorises that. Ask whether the group pays for rooms only while guests pay for everything else. Put the decision in writing.
Deposit, attrition and the cut-off
Ask for the deposit as an amount, a due date and a destination: applied to the first night, spread across the stay, or held separately. Ask who signs for it.
Attrition is the payment a group makes when it uses fewer rooms than the block promised. Ask for the percentage, the date it is measured, whether it counts rooms or room nights, and the rate the shortfall is charged at.
The cut-off date returns unsold rooms to general inventory. Ask for the date, the time of day, and the person who can extend it. Ask whether a late name still receives the group rate afterwards.
The one confirmation to get in writing
Before you commit, ask the property to state one thing in a single written reply: who is liable for the rooms the group does not use, and the rate that liability is charged at.
Send the request by email and keep the reply with the signed contract. On a group assembled from independent businesses, that one sentence decides who pays.