Meetings compass
In recent years, Convention Bureaus (CBs) have significantly expanded their portfolio. They can now confidently be used as a navigation system for both meeting planning and organisation.
This year will probably not be a bad year for the meetings industry. Deutsche Bank is forecasting global economic growth of 4.1 %, while a less upbeat estimate from US investment bankers Morgan Stanley still reckons on a 3.6 % increase. Last year already, the output of goods and services climbed by around 4.8 %, a performance not witnessed for 30 years. "The generally positive business trend is marred only by a few disruptive elements," Michael Heise, chief economist at insurer Allianz, therefore also concurs. He intends to keep his eye on oil prices as a particular growth risk. So generally speaking, this means more opportunities than risks for the meetings industry, which usually depends directly on sustenance from the global economy and hence registers macroeconomic turmoil seismographically. Developed economies in particular, mindful of the shockwaves from the Asian crisis around the turn of the century that also engulfed Europe and the United States, are planning to invest more in education and the transfer of knowledge. At the same time meetings have also moved up again on the agenda of companies at which number-crunchers ran a rigid regime in the aftermath of economic downturn and the collapse of the New Economy. To be sure, planners have recently "registered a backlog in both education and classic conferences and conventions", in the words of Lutz Vogt. "Meanwhile, though, companies and associations have realised that it's no go without the exchange of information at meetings and conventions," the managing director of the German Convention Bureau adds. Vogt estimates that the volume of business in Germany last year was already up a touch on 2003, a trend industry observers expect to firm up. Companies that live by their know-how in particular are currently beginning to rediscover communication and the transfer of knowledge as indispensable tools for their own economic success.
Planning and organisation have also become considerably easier even for companies and associations that seldom stage meetings. Once upon a time, the people who contacted a convention bureau asked for and were given one thing in particular - brochures. Since then, though, the supply portfolio has been radically shaken up. Businesses and associations can now put together the suitable convention centre, hotels, the appropriate logistics and the professional congress organiser (PCO) through municipal CBs with no trouble at all. The bureaus will also mediate performers, put clients in touch with politicians or celebrities, offer free site inspections, and sometimes even help in the search for sponsors. Vogt is therefore eager to promote the facilitators between supply and demand that many companies still disregard: "CBs are actually of interest to everyone, because they have the best market overview." The meeting experts biggest shortcoming remains their low awareness level.
In the US, for instance, CBs are much better known. The reason is relatively simple: the service suppliers there are easy to find. Practically every city has its Convention and Visitors Bureau (CVB), possibly prefaced by the city name. Given this standard, it is much more common stateside to consult a CVB. In Germany and many other countries, however, the municipal tourist organisations and convention bureaus are often interlocked, which is why they have all sorts of different titles - ranging from tourist office to tourism and marketing company. This makes it much more difficult to find them. But companies at a loss can often ask the national CBs for help.
Another drag on demand for mediation services is the persistent but mostly unfounded notion that consulting a CB puts up the price of a meeting. "Our services are free of charge for clients," Hannes Schnitzer, head of the Convention Bureau Alto Adige, explains on behalf of many colleagues, "because, like most CBs, we're a non-profit organisation." And what is more: "Clients booking a meeting package through us will probably obtain a far lower price than if they were to put the services together individually." Dirk Mewis
m+a report Nr.6 / 2005 vom 23.09.2005
m+a report vom 23. September 2005