PAGENEWS SITE STRAP
Should DMC’s be charging for creating proposals? The events sector of the hospitality has an ongoing struggle with trying to define ‘what is fair’ to charge a client when quoting for a piece of business. By Tes Proos, Site Africa president.
D
estination Management Companies (DMCs), globally, often come across scenarios whereby they find their resources and intellectual property (IP) literally being copied by clients. Some examples include clients who use their services to receive quotes and ideas, then take the same quotes and ideas to a competitor and ask for a cheaper quote. In other cases, the client themselves, go directly to the suppliers and book everything directly. This is clearly an absolute waste of resources and daylight robbery
when it comes to a DMC and their supplier’s intellectual property. How does one prevent this? On 27 June 2022, a healthy discussion was moderated by Padraic Gilligan, chief marketing officer of SITE Global, with highly experienced panellists including Mike Waller, chief executive officer of award-winning DMC Dragonfly Africa; Aoife Delaney, immediate past president of SITE Global as well as Lorenzo Pignatti, chief executive officer of Terra Events Italy. Padraic explored between the three organisations as to how they quote and where do they draw the line.
Several interesting case studies were discussed and some pertinent points emerged including the following: • DMC fees may vary from client to client and may well vary depending on the regional origin as well as business sector of the client. • Some would quote nett rates and add a management fee. • Some would mark up line items and quote a management fee. • More clients are using large
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40 Business Events Africa July 2022
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