ConferenceDirect APM 2012 - Day 3

Bonjour!  Tourism Montreal hosted our breakfast this morning, which was followed by a variety of breakout sessions. I attended one that provided updates on the wide range of additional services being offered by ConferenceDirect to our clients, the most popular being full conference management, and housing and registration.

At the coffee break I joined in the Zumba team and pumped it up a bit!

Lunch was hosted by Fairmont Hotels & Resorts, Raffles, and Swisshotels. At the end of the meal they showed a couple of videos: on the magestic Faimont Hotel in Banff,  and one from Travel Alberta that blew everyone away.

The first part of the afternoon was spent meeting with hotel partners again, as well as other suppliers offering solutions to our client's meeting planning challenges. Then at a joint General Session of ConferenceDirect associates and our partners (~1000 people) the Canadian Tourism Commission presented a coast-to-coast snapshot of what's happening in the hospitality industry in Canada, including the recent or soon-come openings of four luxury hotels in Toronto: Ritz-Carlton, Trump, the *new* Four Seasons, and the Shangri-La.

InterContinental Hotels Group CEO Mike Fegley made a short presentation, and mentioned the launch of two new brands under the IHG umbrella: one that will offer a luxury experience to the Chinese traveller, and Even Hotels - for road warriors who want to maintain their healthy lifestyles while away from home.

IHG also sponsored a speaker from MMGY Global who gave a fascinating and entertaining talk: Emerging Lifestyles and Travel Trends - getting into the reasons behind some of the things we're seeing and making some very plausible predictions about what to expect.

The highlight afternoon, though, was the "fun nun" who spoke on behalf of Sisters of Charity and the work they're doing to protect children from being forced into prositition and sexual slavery.  It was a paticularly poignant message to that audience since much of the abuse takes place in hotels around the world.  She spoke about training programs for hotel staff to recognize the signs and what steps to take. ConferenceDirect and IHG made a generous joint donation to ECPAT USA (End Child Prostitution and Trafficking).

That evening Team Canada was hosted by Lina Farrell of the Sheraton Niagara Falls to dine at celebrity Chef Todd Eglish's bluezoo restaurant, (at the Swan and Dolphin) followed by a private boat ride on the Epcot Lagoon to watch the fireworks.

 Dessert was served aboard the boat - sweeet!!

ConferenceDirect APM 2012 - Day 2

Breakfast was hosted by Omni Hotels & Resorts, accompanied by a presentation highlighting some of their newer properties and renovation plans, including the $30 million going into the Hotel Omni Mont-Royal in Montreal. They unveiled a new mulit-year agreement incentive and reminded us again of their unique guest loyalty program - free to join, and avaialable to groups - that provides guests with complimentary morning coffee delivery.

Our General Session opened with a words of welcome from the Peabody, thanking ConferenceDirect for our support. ConferenceDirect CEO Brian Stevens provided company updates, and we learned about new standard contracts in place for our customers with MGM Resorts and Hilton worldwide (Europe, Middle East, Africa). There was a lively panel discussion on "Lead Spam".

VP Training and Development Jim Vandevender and Director of Operations Kini Akaka announce ehancements to our inhouse booking system.

We boarded Disney busses that took us to the Renaissance Orlando at Seaworld for lunch, hosted by Marriott Hotels, and learned about that brands's global growth (including the opening of a reservation call centre in China), their Autograph Collection (including the Cosmopolitan in Las Vegas), and the acquisition of the AC brand in Spain, Italy, and Portugal.

Back to the Peabody we met with hotel suppliers all afternoon in a "reverse tradeshow". 

Canadian colleagues Mary Beth Holmes, Kelly Cyr.

 

Dinner was off-site, again, at the beautiful Waldorf Astoria Orlando, attached to the Hilton at Bonnet Creek, and the Peabody hosted an "Afterglow" in their popular Rocks bar.

ConferenceDirect APM 2012 - Day 1

Love this kind of personalised welcome amenity - what delegate wouldn't? 

Arrived late last night and checked-in to the Peabody Orlando - the host hotel for ConferenceDirect's Annual Partner Meeting, bringing together over 300 of our associates with 500+ hotel partners for a week of training, networking, and yes, some showing off by a few of the local properties as to what they can do for our clients and their groups coming to Orlando.

The Peabody was renovated and expanded a couple of years ago, and now offers over 300,000 square feet of function space - over 100 breakout configurations. Like all three Peabody properties - the original in Memphis, and the most-recent addition Little Rock, Arkansas - the hotel carries on the more than 60-year old tradition (started as a drunken prank) of the daily Duck March.

Tonight's Awards dinner, being hosted by Starwood Hotels and Resorts, is taking place at Walt Disney Worlds' Swan and Dolphin.

Ch-ch-ch-changes

The Sutton Place hotel, a bit of a Toronto institution with a long history of welcoming movie stars and hosting the Toronto International Film Festival, is being converted entirely to residences.

I say "entirely" because there have always been rental apartments, with some tenants residing there for decades. Back in the late 1990's I was the Apartment Manager, and we converted some of the units to be used for long-stay hotel guests, similar to the Grande Residence concept at the Sutton Place in Vancouver.

Much has changed since then - obviously.

Four Guests, One Hotel, One Desire

The 4 Star/4 Diamond boutique hotel Le St. Sulpice in Old Montreal is the location (and producer) of a short film which will pemiere May 24, 2012.

You can watch the trailer here

Le St. Sulpice offers 108 spacious and stylish guestroom suites, and can accommodate up up to 48 people classroom in the largest of its three function rooms.
http://www.lesaintsulpice.com/

Checking In and Never Leaving

I heard Christopher Heard interviewed on the CBC this morning. He makes some wonderful observations about hotels and his recent book includes stories of famous long-staying guests: Warren Beatty's decade at the Beverly Wilshire and Keannu Reaves calling the iconic Chateau Marmont home for more than 14 years. Definitely on my must read list!

New and Newer

It seems like just yesterday that the 377-room Fairmont Pacific Rim in Vancouver opened its doors to visitors to the 2010 Winter Olympics. Bright and shiny and luxuriously modern - it's a bit suprising that a brand new hotel would be undergoing major renovations so soon.

Yet the configuration of the orginal meeting space (in particular two adjacent ballrooms - "hard walled") limited the size and scope of groups that could be accommodated. The solution: take down the wall and create one, large, more flexible space. 

The brand new Star Sapphire Ballroom measures 57.6 x 121.5 ft, providing 6,852 square feet of ballroom space, and 12,322 square feet of combined foyer and ballroom space.