IndustryInsights, eh?

IndustryInsights is a ConferenceDirect educational event, bringing together ConferenceDirect clients and partners to learn and share ideas about the what's happening in the meetings industry - and what the current trends and forecasts are for the future.

For the first time last June, the event was held in Canada, at the Sheraton Centre Toronto hotel - appropriately, as ConferenceDirect's President and CEO Brian Stevens pointed out as it is exactly this type of "big box" convention hotel that meets the needs of so many of our clients so well.

(The hotel did an *amazing* job - wowing one of my clients with the "best breakfast buffet I've ever seen". )

IndustryInsights regular Mike Fegley (Vice President of Sales - The Americas of Intercontinental Hotels Group) gave a detailed state-of-the-industry presentation with special attention paid to Canadian market trends.  His fact-filled slides were sent to all attendees with a follow up survey.

A prestigious panel of industry experts fielded questions on a wide variety of topics:

• Are there any "deals" out there? and if so - where?
• Increase rooms-to-space ratios for complimentary function space
• Food & Beverage service trends (exemplified by the recent cancellation of Room Service at the Hilton New York), as well as dietary requirements and preferences
• Internet charges and costs to the hotel
• "Green" innovations
• Hotel loyalty/Rewards programs

Upcoming IndustryInsights are scheduled for Denver (June 18-29, 2014), Minneapolis (Sept.11-12, 2014), and Nashville (November 19-20). Please let me know if you would like any additional information.

 

'Tis the Season

Awards Season, that is. Meetings & Incentive Travel recently announced their Readers Choice Award Winners, having solicited their readers to vote for hotels and venues that "went over and above their groups' expectations in 2013". This year readers were asked to cast their votes by region, as well as "with bedrooms" (hotels and resorts) and "without bedrooms" (primarily convention centres)

  

...and the winners are:

  

Western Canada:

• Congratulations to beautiful The Fairmont Pacific Rim - I was just there! - for taking top place in the Venue with Bedrooms category.
• The Venue without Bedrooms winner is the Vancouver Convention Centre.

Honourable Mentions in both categories to The Westin Calgary, The Fairmont Banff Springs, Calgary Stampede and the Shaw Convention Centre in Edmonton.

 

Central Canada:

• M&IT Readers selected The Westin Ottawa as their favourite Venue with Bedrooms
• The International Centre in Toronto won for Venue without Bedrooms

The Westin Ottawa Lobby

Honourable Mentions to JW Rosseau The Rosseau Muskoka Resort & Spa, Four Seasons Hotel Toronto, Mississauga Convention Centre, and Centre des Congres de Quebec, St. Andrews Club and Conference Centre, Paramount Conference and Event Venue.

Eastern Canada:

• The recently-renovated Halifax Marriott Harbourfront was selected as favourite Venue with Bedrooms
• Fave Venue without Bedrooms was a three-way tie! Dalvay By The Sea in York, Prince Edward Island, the World Trade and Convention Centre in Halifax, and the Prince Edward Island Convention Centre, also in P.E.I.

Delta Beausejour was Honourably Mentioned in the Venue with Bedrooms category.

Congratulations to all!! 

Compact & Completely Westin

The Westin Grand Vancouver is a narrow tower of glass, standing *high* over Robson Street and the city's trendy Yaletown neighourhood, renowned for its cutting edge restaurants and fashionable boutiques housed re-purposed warehouses.

With 206 guestrooms and 4,000 square feet of meeting space, the Westin Grand is considerably more "compact" than her big sister, the Westin Bayshore - though they share the same family traits: Heavenly® Bed and Bath, thoughtful guest amenities, WestinWORKOUT®, and an overall sense of luxury and well-being. This is the brand, after all, that promises: "every element of your stay is created to leave you feeling better than when you arrived."

Deluxe Corner Suite

Three distinct guestroom and suite categories cater to a primarily corporate clientele, and three meeting rooms (scheduled for renovations) offer high ceilings and an abundance of natural light. Ideally suited for groups o 10-60 people;  the pool terrace can accommodate up to 100 outdoors, overlooking the architecturally celebrated Vancouver Public Library.

Like the Bayshore the Westin Grand is about a 15 minute walk to the Vancouver Convention Centre, and a five-minute walk to the Vancouver City Centre station for the Canada Line airport train. (Rather unbelievably I made it from the hotel, to the station, to YVR, and through airport security for a domestic flight in less than an hour!!)

Market-Ability

Just got back from attending Tete-A-Tete in Ottawa, an annual tradeshow hosted by the Ottawa chapter of CSAE, the Canadian Society of Association Executives. 

I decided to stay at the Courtyard by Marriott Downtown located in the heart of Ottawa's historic Byward Market.  My guestroom - one of 183 in total - was beyond spacious, with an ultra-comfy king-sized pillow-topped bed, awesome work space (complimentary internet), and enormous flat-screen television.

The staff were universally cheerful, friendly and helpful; GM Nancy Champagne must be doing something right.  And how do I know the hotel General Manager's name?  There's a laminated letter posted by the elevator thanking guests and inviting comments and requests by phone or to her personal email address.

Loved the location, surrounded by great little restaurants and specialty food shops. It was a brisk (we're talking Ottawa in February, remember) seven minute walk to the snazzy Ottawa Convention Centre.

Home of the famous "Obama-Cookies"

Ice Sculpture in Progress for Winterlude

The sprawling lobby/bistro area is cunningly broken up into a variety of seating areas, with a double-sided fireplace - a welcome winter feature - and an outdoor terrace for the summer months.  The space can also be used for informal, though not private, functions - in addition to the hotel's 11 meeting rooms (5,000 total feet of meeting space).

"I DON'T LOOK MY AGE"

 

Awesome little piece of collateral from the Fairmont Chateau Frontenac announcing the "Renaissance of an Icon" and an additional 15,000 square feet of meeting space - coming in Spring of 2014 - for a total of 40,000 square feet at Quebec City's "castle".

Located within the walls of the +400-year old city, the hotel offers 613 guestroom and suites including 61 prestigious Fairmont Gold rooms and "inspiring views from any one of our 23 meeting rooms".

Growing older graciously, indeed.

A Different Kind of Railway Hotel

When I think of railway hotels I think of The Royal York Hotel in Toronto, the Queen Elizabeth in Montreal, The Palliser in Calgary.....Originally CP Hotels (Canadian Pacific - as in the railway) and now flying the Fairmont flag these "Grand Dames" were built to accommodate the railway travelling public, thereby encouraging rail travel: putting bums in seats and as bodies in beds.

Adjacent to arguably the most famous railway station* in the world - Grand Central Terminal - stands the towering Grand Hyatt New York, at 42nd Street East and Park Avenue.

Newly-renovated to the tune of $130 million, $90-million of it in guestrooms alone, the Grand Hyatt New York offers 707 guestrooms and 60,000 square feet of meeting space. The rooms-to-space ratio works well for a property whose business mix is 70/30 transient-to-group.

Red and blue "gobos" welcomed the United State Tennis Association (USTA) while we were there - during the prestigious US Open Tennis Championships

The wide-open and bustling lobby mimics Grand Central Terminal in encouraging efficient movement and travel. Unlike the railway terminal, though, the Grand Hyatt features welcoming seating, free w-fi, and the serene faces of Awilda and Chloe bearing dreamlike witness "encouraging the world around them to pause and perhaps join in the dream".

*Grand Central Terminal - celebrating its 100th anniversary this year,  is not really a "station", as trains do not literally pass though it - but people do.

Bricks and Mortar

 

"This is a BIG hotel. Not convention-center big, but tall and wide, like a roll of toilet-paper if the toilet-paper was skyscraper-sized, sliced in half, and covered with windows. And was made of hotel rooms instead of toilet paper."

- Liza May

I love this description of the newly-flagged Adoba Hotel in Dearborn, Michigan. All toilet roll comparisons aside, this 772-room property, with over 60,000 square feet of meeting space (formerly owned by the Ford Motor Company, and operated as a Hyatt) does in fact feel like a Hyatt.

I thought it might have been built by the famous Atlanta architect, John Portman responsible for the iconic Hyatt Atlanta - as well as the Hyatt O'Hare, the New York Marriott Marquis, the Atlanta Marriott Marquis and many other large, atrium-style convention hotels.

Detail from the Atlanta Marriott Marquis

Nope. It was built 1976 by Charles Luckman, who became an architect after a wildly successful career in business.  President of the Pepsodent Toothpaste company, later Lever Brothers, by age 30 he was dubbed "The Boy Wonder of American Business".  His diverse architectural portfolio includes Madison Square Gardens in New York, the Hyatt Regency Dearborn (now the Adoba), the Hyatt Regency Phoenix, and the Chicago Marriott Magnificent Mile.

There's a wonderful story quoted on Wikipedia about how Luckman had been drawn to architecture:

"As a nine-year-old paper boy outside the Muehlebach Hotel [currently operated as one of the three wings of the Kansas City Marriott Downtown] in Kansas City, he asked a customer about the pretty lights and was told they were called "chandeliers". Then he asked, "Who does...Who decides on things like that?" "An architect", came the reply. "He designs the hotel and says to put the chandeliers there."  Luckman wrote in his memoir, "Right then and there I decided to become an architect."