Small Market Meetings March 2020

CRISIS MANAGEMENT | LINCOLN, NEBRASKA | INDIANA MEETING GUIDE MARCH 2020

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IN HIGH-TECH DESTINATIONS

SToneleIgh: a naTural garDen

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The Inn aT SwarThmore

rooms & blooms The Drexelbrook evenT CenTer

ChanTICleer: a PleaSure garDen Photo: Visit Philly, Jeff Fusco

Delaware County, Pa makes it easy to meet exactly where you want to be.

Plan your next corporate event alongside America’s Garden Capital and explore 36 Gardens within 30 miles. Located conveniently to all major highways and the Philadelphia International Airport, Visit Delco PA delivers meetings your team will remember.

Meeting ideas that excite: visitDelcoPa.com/meet

VisitDelcoPA

G ET R E A DY TO EXP ER I EN CE G RE AT ER Z ION !

The FAM on June 10-13th will introduce you to a meeting destination not measured in square footage, but in pure inspiration.

BREATHTAKING VIEWS AT RED MOUNTAIN RESORT

NEXT-LEVEL CUISINE AT CLIFFSIDE RESTAURANT

BROADWAY-STYLE SHOWS AT TUACAHN AMPHITHEATRE

JOIN US JUNE 2020 AND EXPERIENCE IT FOR YOURSELF! To register go to: smallmarketmeetings.com/greater-zion-fam

HIKE THE NARROWS IN ZION NATIONAL PARK

ON THE COVER: A group gathers on the rooftop of Hotel Californian in Santa Barbara, an up-and-coming technology hub in Southern California. Photo courtesy Visit Santa Barbara.

INSIDE VOLUME 21 | ISSUE 3

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IDEAS High-Tech Cities

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CITY Lincoln, Nebraska

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By Josh Metten, courtesy JH Eco Tours

MEETING GUIDE Indiana

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MEETING GUIDE Rocky Mountains

D E PA R T M E N T S

INSIGHTS 8 CONFERENCE 14 MANAGING 6Up-and-coming Get to know Crisis downtowns

Panama City Beach

Management

SMALL MARKET MEETINGS is published monthly by Pioneer Publishing, Inc., 301 E. High St., Lexington, KY 40507, and is distributed free of charge to qualified meeting planners who plan meetings in small and medium size towns and cities. All other meeting industry suppliers may subscribe by sending a check for $39 for one year to: Small Market Meetings, Circulation Department, 301 East High St., Lexington, KY 40507. Phone (866) 356-5128 (toll-free) or (859) 253-0503. Fax: (859) 253-0499. Copyright SMALL MARKET MEETINGS, Inc. All rights reserved. Reproduction of editorial or graphic content in any manner without the written consent of the publisher is prohibited.

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Brian Jewell Kelly Tyner VP & Managing Editor VP, Sales & Marketing

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kyle@smallmarketmeetings.com Donia Simmons Creative Director

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A sheriff, a shriner, a cattleman, and an executive walk into a bar...

( There’s no punchline, we just host a lot of events. )

Kearney, where the Heartland gathers.

Every year Kearney hosts more than 1,350 events. Everything from the Shrine Bowl to conferences large and small, heck even half a million Sandhill Cranes make sure to meet in Kearney every year. You know why? Because Kearney has the best facilities between Denver and Omaha, experienced staff and wonderful volunteers that make sure every event that comes to town is taken care of.

If you’re looking for a host city for your next event make sure you look at Kearney.

WheretheHear tlandGathers.com

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INSIGHTS WITH VICKIE MITCHELL

DOWNTOWN RENAISSANCE

L

ook around at a lot of midsize downtowns in America, and you’ll wish you owned a crane company.

A healthy economy seems to bring more of everything convention visitors look for in a city center meeting destination: new hotels with spaces to unwind, like rooftop bars and lobbies that resemble living rooms; restaurants and bars, galleries and retail stores; expanded and renovated convention centers; green spaces; and improved public transportation.

Here are five cities to watch as future convention sites.

These cities are making a strong play for the meetings market

Lexington, Kentucky

Photos courtesy VisitLex, Experience Grand Rapids, Huntsville/Madison Co. CVB, Visit OKC

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Downtown Lexington is no longer saddled with an empty city block that sat idle, stymied by a series of development stumbles. The long-awaited City Center has been built on the site and finally opened in late 2019. The center is home to two Marriott hotels, a Starbucks, a Keeneland gift shop and a Jeff Ruby’s Steakhouse.

While the transformation was a long time coming, it certainly makes Lexington a more viable convention city.

And it is just one of several completed or planned projects that are enlivening its downtown. Work should begin soon on a linear park that will stretch from one end of town to the convention center. New restaurants and bars seem to open almost weekly; an empty county courthouse is now a restaurant and bar and a massive event space.

Work is progressing also on the expansion of the Lexington Convention Center. Although the project won’t wrap up until 2022, it’s already enticing larger conventions to sign on, with 100,841 square feet of exhibit space and a 25,000-square-foot ballroom among its selling points. The 400 added rooms at City Center’s hotels two blocks from the convention center, along with those at a neighboring 21C Museum Hotel, have given a big boost to downtown accommodations, supplementing two existing hotels connected to the convention center. visitlex.com www.smallmarketmeetings.com

Palm Springs, California

Grand Rapids, Michigan

If you’re looking for a hotel room, downtown Grand Rapids might be a good bet. Having the nation’s third-best economy and No. 1 job market seems to be fueling a lot of guest room growth.

This summer, a 164-room Canopy by Hilton will open as part of a downtown development that will include a nine-screen movie complex and restaurants. A 146-room Marriott Residence Inn is also slated to open this year. A 160-room Hyatt Place Grand Rapids has opened in a tower built in downtown’s entertainment district, and a 127-year-old building has become an AC Hotel by Marriott with 130 guest rooms. One of the city’s largest new hotels is a 250-room Embassy Suites that looks over the Grand River.

There’s also early talk of adding a 400-room hotel and 115,000 square feet of meeting space at DeVos Place Convention Center and restoring the Grand River’s rapids for recreational purposes. experiencegr.com

Huntsville, Alabama

Downtown Huntsville, Alabama, is in pursuit of 1,300 downtown hotel rooms to support its Von Braun Center, and it is already making a lot of headway. An AC Hotel by Marriott has opened, overlooking downtown’s lake-filled Big Spring Park, putting another 120 guest rooms within a few steps of the convention center. Still to come this year is a 117-room Curio by Hilton. Next will be a 150-room Hampton Inn and Suites across the street from the Von Braun’s brand-new Mars Music Hall and rooftop bar and restaurant. Also planned are a 187-room Autograph Hotel and a 145-room Hyatt House.

Beyond its new music venue, the Von Braun’s renovation and expansion project has given the convention center another 14,000 square feet of breakout space, a new lobby and a 35,000-square-foot ballroom with a terrace. huntsville.org March 2020

Downtown Palm Springs seems to have awakened from a sultry desert slumber and shifted into development overdrive.

A new retail development has opened, anchored by brands like Tommy Bahama, Free People, Kiehl’s and Johnny Was. Newly opened or planned hotels are moderate in size but big on amenities, like the Kimpton Rowan, with 153 guest rooms and the city’s only rooftop pool.

A downtown park is planned across from the Palm Springs Museum of Art; another new hotel, the 169-room Dream Hotel, with 10,000 square feet of meeting and event space, is expected to open next to the Palm Springs Convention Center in 2021.

The convention center will get another new neighbor when the Agua Caliente Band of Cahuilla Indians opens its new cultural center and sports arena two blocks away. The arena will be available for conventions and trade shows.

Still to come are a Virgin Hotel and the long-delayed Andaz Palm Springs Hyatt, now set to open late this year. visitgreaterpalmsprings.com

Oklahoma City, Oklahoma

The biggest news in downtown Oklahoma City, meetingswise, is the opening this year of the new $288 million convention center, with 200,000 square feet of exhibit space and a 30,000-square-foot ballroom.

On its heels is the arrival next year of a neighboring 17-story Omni Oklahoma City with 605 guest rooms and 78,000 square feet of its own meeting space.

Both are adjacent to the 70-acre Scissortail Park, 30 acres of which opened last fall. It has become a great place for visitors and locals to go for a walk or run and enjoy public art. Getting to and from major downtown attractions is a lot easier with the addition of a downtown streetcar, which runs six miles through the city. visitokc.com

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SMALL MARKET

MEETINGS SUMMIT

A TOTALLY DIFFERENT

a d i r Flo M

BY DAN DICKSON

eeting planners, travel groups and tourists of all kinds have a wide variety of Florida destinations to consider when seeking a place for fun or to get important work done. Millions of people prefer a slower-paced, less-congested part of the state. For that, they head to northwest Florida.

“You’re in the Florida Panhandle, what’s called the Emerald Coast, with hundreds of miles of beautiful beaches,” said David Griffin, director of sales and marketing for the Sheraton Panama City Beach Golf and Spa Resort. Griffin is as much a “chamber of commerce ambassador” as he is a hotel executive. His enthusiasm for this sliver of the Gulf of Mexico coastline is quite apparent.

“The clear blue water and the white beaches will attract you first,” he said. “If you’re coming down from the North, we have the nearest beaches in Florida. It’s an easy drive here from anywhere in Florida and also from Alabama, Georgia, Mississippi and Louisiana.”

Or you can fly. Northwest Beaches International Airport is just 18 miles from Panama City Beach. Many of the airline arrivals come from Atlanta, the nation’s busiest airport. The flight from there to the Florida Panhandle is just 40 minutes. There are numerous other nonstop flights from around the country.

The Panhandle enjoys an average of 320 days of sunshine per year. And its pace of life stands out for many visitors.

“This is a totally different Florida experience,” said Renee Wuerdeman, vice president of sales for Visit Panama City Beach, the local convention and visitors bureau.

“We have a quiet, cool, old Florida vibe, and you’ll have an experience that you won’t get in a bigger Florida city,” she said. “We are not a glitzy Florida location that competes with Orlando, Miami or the other Atlantic locations because we are so different.”

Meeting planners and hospitality industry professionals can experience Panama City Beach for themselves when they attend the Small Market Meetings Summit, which will take place there May 13-14.

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www.smallmarketmeetings.com

SHERATON PANAMA CITY BEACH GOLF AND SPA RESORT HAS 320 GUEST ROOMS AND 60,000 SQUARE FEET OF MEETING SPACE.

ON THE REBOUND

A tragic and frightening week that locals will never forget came in October 2018 when Hurricane Michael, a Category 5 monster, whipped ashore on the Florida Panhandle. Both Panama City and Panama City Beach felt the wrath of the storm.

“Panama City was ravaged and nearby Mexico Beach is basically gone,” the CVB’s Wuerdeman said.

Many people who have not lived through a hurricane may not realize that it usually takes well over a year to get communities back to some semblance of order. Determination, careful planning, hard work and a measure of luck played key roles in this particular recovery.

“For us, the east end of Panama City Beach was hit pretty hard, but now our buildings are back online,” Wuerdeman said. “We were up and running three to four months after the hurricane. The silver lining in a disaster is that what was old and needed to be replaced anyway now has been. There’s fresh construction going on everywhere, and new businesses, like restaurants, hotels and resorts, are coming in.”

An out-of-town visitor casually driving around Panama City Beach would perhaps notice little remaining serious storm damage. As before the storm, visitors can still enjoy a treasure chest of activities to keep them busy.

BEDS AND MEETING SPACES

SAINT ANDREW BAY

All photos courtesy Visit Panama City Beach

March 2020

Panama City Beach and surrounding Bay County have more than 18,000 guest rooms ranging from hotels, resorts and villas to condos, townhomes and bed-andbreakfast spots. They can be rented for a single night or for an extended stay. They cater to everyone, including meeting groups, families, couples, reunion attendees and travelers just passing through. Prices range from budget conscious to money-is-no-object.

Griffin’s Sheraton resort property was one of several Panama City Beach sites that were damaged along the waterfront. The resort had been renovated not long before Hurricane Michael arrived. Now the resort is rebuilt — again — and better than ever.

“We get quite a few SMERF [social, military, educational, religious, fraternal] groups here,” said Griffin. “Florida is somewhat of a military state, so we host many meetings associated with the government. Our state and national association markets are large, too.”

The Sheraton property, a AAA Four Diamond resort with 320 guest rooms, has 60,000 square feet of flexible meeting space indoors and attractive and large patio and lawn spaces outside as well. “We have just what the planner needs, which is a place for the general sessions, facilities to feed everyone and an exhibit area,” he said. “We are very affordable compared to resort areas in other parts of the country.”

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JOE CAPPUZZELLO

PANAMA CITY BEACH BOUNCES BACK October 10, 2018, Hurricane Michael blasted the Florida Panhandle between Mexico Beach and Tyndall Air Force Base in Panama City as a Category 5 storm with maximum sustained winds of 160 miles per hour.

“The area is rebounding from Michael, and they just want to get back on the map and let people know they’re open for business,” said Joe Cappuzzello, president and CEO of The Group Travel Family, which manages six travel and meeting planner conferences.

“We reached out to them to see if we could help. We brainstormed with the CVB, and they committed to hosting three of our conferences over the next three years. We’re going to help to promote the city.”

The Sheraton Panama City Beach Golf and Spa Resort is where the conferences will take place. “We’re excited to showcase this beach community at the Small Market Meetings Summit in May, Select Traveler Conference in 2021 and Going On Faith Conference in 2022,” said Cappuzzello.

The Sheraton property has been completely renovated, including all the guest rooms and suites, the meeting spaces, the spa, the salon and the restaurants. The property appears to be in even better shape than before the storm ravaged the area.

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Some other notable major meeting facilities in Panama City Beach are the Boardwalk Beach Resort and Convention Center, Edgewater Beach and Golf Resort, and Laketown Wharf. If planners want to combine great spaces with quick access to the water, they might consider booking one of six retreat spaces that are either on the beach or right across the street from it. Several other meeting spaces with Gulf views are a cut above the usual chain hotels, among them the Hampton Inn Beachfront, the Holiday Inn Resort and Springhill Suites.

“After a long day of meetings, what we can do is take you to a place where you can have a great time with music and dancing,” said the CVB’s Wuerdeman. “Then you take your shoes off, walk a few steps away and enjoy a bonfire on the beach. A lot of groups send their people off that way on the last night of a conference.

That’s who we are — very casual and affordable.”

WATER EQUALS FUN

With the Gulf of Mexico as its front porch, Panama City Beach is the site of many water-related sports and activities.

There’s a huge fishing community there. The area is home to an acclaimed nationally syndicated fishing and coastal lifestyle show on the Discovery Channel called “Chasin’ the Sun.” The show’s hosts load up their boat with fishing enthusiasts and take them offshore, up the creeks, under bridges off the pier, practically anywhere fish are biting around Panama City Beach. Captain Justin Leake is one of the guides.

“There is a never-ending supply of fishing activities here yearround,” said Leake. “We do a lot of natural reef, coastal and migration fishing and also do blue-water fishing starting at 50 miles offshore. I’d say we’re the red snapper capital of the world.”

Much of what is caught in these waters is cooked in restaurants in Panama City Beach, part of an area known as the Seafood Capital of the South.

Wreck diving, snorkeling, sailing, wind surfing, jet skiing, parasailing and sightseeing cruises are other ways visitors enjoy the beautiful waters of the Gulf.

Though it was known for some time as a hard-partying spring break destination, Panama City Beach has taken the steam out of that trend.

“We decided that that is really not who we are,” said Wuerdeman. “So we moved them [visiting students] out of the area, changed our image and various liquor laws, and marketed to the families that had left. Within two years of spring break leaving, we basically had our family base back.”

MORE RECREATION

Pier Park is a remarkable 1.1 million-square-foot, open-air complex that features 124 top retail stores, wonderful restaurants and tourist attractions such as an Imax theater. The center also presents live music and year-round festivals.

www.smallmarketmeetings.com

RIPLEY’S BELIEVE IT OR NOT

PIER PARK

GULF WORLD MARINE PARK

“After a long day of meetings, what we can do is take you to a place where you can have a great time with music and dancing.

Then you take your shoes off, walk a few steps away and enjoy a bonfire on the beach.

— Renee Wuerdeman, Visit Panama City Beach

March 2020

Family entertainment is easy to find nearby, with amusements like Wonderworks, Ripley’s Believe It or Not, ZooWorld Zoological and Botanical Park, Gulf World Marine Park, Shipwreck Island Waterpark, Coconut Creek Family Fun Park, Pier Park Amusement Rides and Museum of Man in the Sea, to name a handful.

There are several fine golf courses operating in the area, including the only Jack Nicholas-designed course in northwest Florida.

Many choose to fish, camp or hike in natural preserves such as St. Andrews State Park, which boasts 1,200 beautiful acres, two and a half miles of beaches and two fishing piers. Many watersports are available, and people also see wildlife, enjoy picnics and snack at the concession stands.

Camp Helen State Park on the western edge of Panama City Beach is an ecological wonder. It is bordered on three sides by water. Lake Powell forms one of the park’s borders and is a rare coastal dune lake. There are very few of them in the world.

“Everything we do here in Panama City Beach revolves around the water,” said the CVB’s Wuerdeman. “We’re laid-back. You’re going to get a very serene experience while you’re here, unless you also like a very lively experience — then we have that, too.” visitpanamacitybeach.com

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MEETING LEADERS

“The key is to connect with someone locally and have them champion the destination.”

JAY CLOUTIER

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BY REBECCA TREON

rowing up in Burlington, Vermont, Jay Cloutier was like a lot of other young men who didn’t know what they wanted to do when they grew up.

“I graduated high school with little to no direction, so I got a job in the restaurant industry as I worked my way through college,” Cloutier said. “The last few years I was in a management position, and management took me to a convention and visitors bureau dinner, and I thought, ‘This is what I want to be doing.’”

His colleagues agreed it would be a good fit, but there were few positions available in Vermont. He began to look further afield.

He relocated to Albany, New York, at his ex-wife’s suggestion — she recommended him for a position that had opened at the local CVB. That was a good move both professionally — he got the job — and personally, as he could be in the same city as his sons. He worked in the state association and religious markets for roughly five and a half years before leaving to work on the hotel side of hospitality.

“That proved to be a good decision because it gave me the whole perspective on what hotels experience when hosting meetings,” he said.

When his former supervisor at the CVB retired after 19 years, he jumped at the chance to become director of sales. Nearly two decades later, Cloutier is still sharing Albany’s story with people.

“We’ve come a long way in 20 years,” he said. “There’s a treasure trove of stuff to discover here, and so much of it is free because it’s run by the state or the county.”

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Among Cloutier’s favorite Albany attractions is the USS Slater, a WWII destroyer escort moored on the Hudson River. After numerous tours of the ship, he still learns something new every time because of the volunteers who work there.

“They all tell amazing stories and are responsible for the constant restoration work happening on the ship,” he said. “People are amazed how much there is to discover on the ship alone.”

Cloutier also loves the New York State Capitol, which took nearly 40 years to construct.

“The story of the beauty and opulence of the building dates back to the Civil War,” he said.

“It was really built to show not just the country but the world that New York was a force to be reckoned with — we were the state in the Union that provided the most during the war.”

In appealing to meeting planners who are considering Albany as their destination, Cloutier uses the city’s proximity to major New England hubs as the draw.

“We’re so close to where people are located — just about three hours from cities like Boston, Philadelphia, New York — that meetings here end up being some of the best attended compared to those in other cities,” he said. “Once attendees are here, Albany is easy to use, navigate and get around, especially for conferences using multiple properties. Several properties are only a couple of blocks from each other and some are within a couple of miles of the airport.”

Cloutier has spent his career bringing meetings and conferences to a small city in upstate New York that many people wouldn’t necessarily consider as a first choice, but that is what he loves about it.

“When I was asked in my interview how I’d represent the destination to clients, the answer I gave them 20 years ago is the same answer I’d give today,” he said. “The key is to connect with someone locally and have them champion the destination.”

EXECUTIVE PROFILE NAME Jay Cloutier TITLE Director of Sales ORGANIZATION Discover Albany LOCATION Albany County, New York BIRTHPLACE Burlington, Vermont EDUCATION Bachelor’s degree in history from the University of Vermont CAREER HISTORY Senior sales manager at Visit Albany; left in 2005 to work in various hotels in the area; returned to Discover Albany in 2017 as director of sales.

www.smallmarketmeetings.com

JAY CLOUTIER VISITS WITH STUDENTS AT A BILINGUAL HIGH SCHOOL FOR A DAY OF THE DEAD FIESTA.

Courtesy Discover Albany

TIPS FROM JAY CLOUTIER

• Get the destination’s staff involved early. Whether you work with a sales team on RFP distribution and bid collection, or contact them when the hotel/facility is selected, invariably clients who engage early on get to take advantage of the broadest array of complimentary services.

Site tour coordination, off-site activity options and convention service support are best leveraged when given enough time to explore your options. Budgets for smaller destinations like Albany are less flexible, so early engagement ensures the best menu of options.

• Ask to engage with the social media team with the DMO you are working with. Sharing hashtags and handles with the social media team can increase exposure and engage local audiences. Local awareness of your group’s presence in a community can help make your attendees feel even more welcome, particularly as they explore the broader destination.

• If lowering your carbon footprint or reducing food waste is of interest to you and your conference attendees, we have easy-to-access options for food recovery and other services to help you meet your conference goals for leaving a small footprint on the community you visit.

March 2020

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MANAGING

Always Be Prepared

CRISIS MANAGEMENT EXPERTS SHARE BEST PRACTICES FOR MEETINGS

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BY RACHEL CARTER

everal years ago, during the National FFA Organization’s annual convention in Indianapolis, event staff found themselves dealing with a personal-injury crisis, and “we had to be very reactionary,” said Mandy Hazlett, the organization’s associate director of convention and events.

“We realized that, internally, we didn’t have a well-laid-out structure or plan, if something were to happen, to deal with the safety and protection for our attendees and also for the safety of our staff.”

That prompted Hazlett and her team to develop a crisis management plan, one that they’ve spent the past several years honing and updating with lessons learned after each event.

The FFA’s management plan is now used “for every single meeting and conference we have that’s scalable for every meeting we have,” whether it’s the annual convention with 68,000 attendees or one of the FFA’s 15 or so smaller conferences throughout the year.

A crisis management plan doesn’t prepare for every possible emergency; it prepares people to respond in a way that will help protect the life, safety and security of event attendees.

“You have to have a written plan, you have to communicate that plan, and you have to practice that plan. Where most people fail is practicing that plan.”

ASSESS THE RISKS Any crisis management plan should first consider location, from the city to the venue. If planners can afford it, they should hire a consultant to do a risk analysis. And if they can’t afford it, they need to do their best on their own.

“From a risk analysis standpoint, the more you know, the better off you’re going to be,” said Bob Mellinger, founder and CEO of Attainium, an Arizona-based business continuity planning and management firm that created Event-Aware, a crisis management mobile app for meetings and events.

Consider the risks of meeting in Miami during hurricane season or Minneapolis in wintertime.

Planners should also know what is going on in the city during their conference: Is there another major convention or a political rally? Are there any other potential disruptors?

When it comes to the venue, some have been used so much “they are just good at what they do, so you don’t need to site-survey them,” he said. If you’re considering a smaller venue that you haven’t

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Greg Shaffer FOUNDER

Shaffer Security Group Experience: 31 years

www.smallmarketmeetings.com

“Your best mode of defense so that you are ready yourself is to practice. Go through and do some role-playing. The more knowledgeable you can be and get those jitters out, you’re no longer becoming reactionary when a situation is happening.

You go into execution mode.”

Mandy Hazlett ASSOCIATE DIRECTOR OF CONVENTIONS AND EVENTS National FFA Organization Experience: 22 years

March 2020

used before, asking others about their experience or conducting a site survey with an eye on emergency planning is wise.

CONNECT AND COMMUNICATE Meeting planners should get all the relevant agencies at the table: police, fire, emergency medical services, public works, and even homeland security and area hospitals for large events.

Building relationships with those agencies, even if it’s just a quick meet-and-greet, goes a long way. You know who to contact, and they know you.

IEEE provides an event emergency action planning template. The organization recommends that every crisis management plan should include, at the bare minimum, emergency response procedures for immediate response, such as evacuating the meeting space and venue, and extended response, such as sheltering in place, setting up a command center and evacuating meeting participants from the city or country.

Some of that will be specific to the venue, which should take precedence. Hazlett pointed out that the FFA emergency plan does not trump any emergency or evacuation plans for the host hotel or event venue — “ours is just folded in.”

Any plan should also include maps and information about the meeting venue, with emergency exits and who to call within the facility should an emergency arise. That includes knowing the locations of the first-aid room, the safety shelters and the automated external defibrillator devices.

There should be contact lists for key staff of the planner’s organization, facility, destination and vendors, as well as emergency service providers, according to IEEE. The FFA even ensures planning and program staff know where the nearest hospitals and drug stores are located.

The biggest concern at any event is always medical, said Greg Shaffer, founder of Shaffer Security Group, a global security, risk management and tactical training firm based in Dallas.

“You’ll have 1,000 medical incidents before you have one violent incident,” he said. “A medical incident is by far your greatest vulnerability.”

KNOW YOUR ROLE Certain issues will be the sole responsibility of the venue. But the rest is a matter of assigning roles and communicating responsibilities, like knowing who is authorized to speak to the media, who will make sure attendees get back to their hotel, who is in charge of making contact with family and relatives back home, who is responsible for the rest of the group that’s still there and who will ensure that attendees are picked up at the airport.

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The FFA has a call tree, so if a crisis arises, staff knows whom to call back in headquarters to start the plan of action, from public relations to emergency management for travel.

“One phone call kicks the whole thing into gear,” Hazlett said.

‘TRAIN THE PLAN’

“The problem with crises is there are so many of them, and you can’t plan for them all. What you can plan for is to know what your guidance is during a crisis. If you know all that stuff up front, it almost doesn’t matter what the incident is — almost.”

Making a plan and assigning responsibilities is all fine and good, but then “they put it in a binder on the bookshelf; most people don’t train the plan,” Shaffer said.

Tabletop exercises are necessary to make sure the plan works when disaster strikes. Gather representatives from your organization and from relevant agencies to role-play various scenarios, whether it’s an evacuation, an injury, a weather-related event or a lock-in situation.

Tabletop exercises reinforce that everybody knows what piece of the plan they own, how to execute it and who to communicate with.

SAFETY AND SECURITY Planners should always connect with the head of security at their host hotel or venue, but they often bring in security a month or a few days before an event, when it’s “too little, too late.” Bringing in the security team early will help ensure the safety of an event and “can save you a lot of headaches,” Shaffer said.

Controlled access and credentialing is critical, meaning you “identify who is supposed to be there and only allowing those people to enter,” he said. Controlling access to the venue and having solid credentialing procedures for attendees and vendors means “you’ll have a good, safe event.”

Even then, planners should always prepare for an active-shooter situation. Shaffer is a proponent of what he calls “intervention capable response” — having armed security on-site. If a shooter comes in, 50 unarmed security guards are “going to be doing the same as everyone else: running and hiding.”

FFA staff have even gone through active-shooter training with representatives from the state police.

Events that feature big-name celebrities or high-profile politicians will likely have their own security service and requirements that planners will need to accommodate.

LEARNING LESSONS

Bob Mellinger FOUNDER AND CEO

Attainium Experience: Over 30 years

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Debriefing after an event is an important but often overlooked step, Mellinger said. Debriefing is the only way to make sure the plan worked and to make it better for the next event, something Hazlett has experienced firsthand.

“There’s something that changes with every event, and you learn a new lesson every time,” she said.

Any plan is a guide for how to respond in a crisis situation. Sitting down to assess after the event means you can revise and finesse the plan, which will then improve any future crisis response.

“You take that information and feed it back into the next ‘before,’” Mellinger said. “It’s a circle.”

www.smallmarketmeetings.com

IDEAS

Courtesy Florida’s Space Coast

TECHNOLOGY AND TALENT These smart cities attract tech-focused enterprises

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BY RACHEL CARTER

uch of America’s tech industry is still concentrated in a handful of major metropolises — the San Francisco Bay Area, Seattle, New York — but several smaller cities have established themselves as alternative tech hubs that offer lower costs of living, a deep talent pool and geographic diversity.

Many of these smaller high-tech cities are fueled by universities that pump money into research and development and pump out a new class of young, educated, ambitious entrepreneurs every year. Others grew up around government facilities and programs.

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Whether on the rocky slopes of Utah’s mountains or the sandy beaches of Florida’s coastline, these high-tech cities deliver high-quality destinations for meetings and events.

BREVARD COUNTY, FLORIDA

There’s a new space race on, and the starting line is Florida’s Space Coast, which includes the coastal cities of Brevard County.

NASA's Kennedy Space Center on Merritt Island has been the launch hub of human spaceflight since the Apollo program, and the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station may soon change its name to reflect its new status as a designated facility for the Space Force program.

But the private sector is moving in: Elon Musk’s SpaceX, Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin, the United Launch Alliance and others.

“Now you have not just NASA but all these private companies that have gotten into the business, so we’re probably more so the Space Coast than ever before,” said Peter Cranis, executive director for the Space Coast Office of Tourism.

The area has seen “tremendous growth,” which has contributed to growth in the hospitality sector.

Brevard County has about 9,200 guest rooms and is

Above: The Apollo/ Saturn V Center at Kennedy Visitor Center Visitor Complex can seat up to 600 guests for banquets beneath retired spacecraft.

www.smallmarketmeetings.com

tracking another 2,200 rooms set to come online in the next couple of years.

The Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex serves as both event venue and attraction for meeting groups. The flexible Debus Conference Facility can seat up to 230 for meals, and guests will have a view of towering spacecraft in the Rocket Garden.

The 100,000-square-foot Apollo/Saturn V Center can seat up to 600 banquet guests beneath the 363-foot Saturn V Moon rocket, one of only three still in existence. In the Space Shuttle Atlantis venue, up to 250 guests can dine beneath the orbiter and explore over 60 exhibits. Guided and custom group tours of the complex are also available.

“Now you have not just NASA but all these private companies that have gotten into the business, so we’re probably more so the Space Coast than ever before.”

— Peter Cranis, Space Coast Office of Tourism

The Radisson Resort at the Port in Cape Canaveral has a 10,700-square-foot convention center, a separate 7,700-square-foot pavilion ballroom and several additional breakout rooms. visitspacecoast.com

PROVO-OREM-LEHI, UTAH

Utah’s Wasatch Front region is known as Silicon Slopes, a cluster of information technology, software development and hardware manufacturing companies about 40 miles south of Salt Lake City.

In 2014, Xactware moved to Lehi, where software giant Adobe is now building its second facility.

Founders of area tech companies Qualtrics, Omniture and Domo just announced their new Silicon Slopes Venture Fund, which will invest solely in Utah-based startups.

Many of the local startup entrepreneurs are Brigham Young University graduates who “were young Mormon missionaries who have this tenacity and this drive and are used to getting doors slammed in their face; they have an ‘I can conquer the world’ attitude,’” said Joel Racker, president and CEO of Explore Utah Valley.

Courtesy Explore Utah Valley

Courtesy Florida’s Space Coast

March 2020

Courtesy Explore Utah Valley

Clockwise from left: a SpaceX launch in Florida; Utah Valley Convention Center; Redford Conference Center at Sundance Mountain Resort in Provo

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IDEAS

Utah Valley University in Orem used to be a technical institute and is now headed by a former Microsoft executive, “so its tech programs are over the top,” Racker said.

All that young talent and zeal are manifesting as local startups, and all that local activity is attracting investment. Explore Utah Valley has gone from measuring about 2,300 guest rooms a year to now tracking roughly 4,500 rooms countywide. The Utah Valley Convention Center opened in 2012 in downtown Provo with about 84,000 square feet of combined meeting, prefunction and garden space.

Across the street, the 329-room Provo Marriott Hotel and Conference Center offers another 25,000 square feet of event space, including an 8,100-square-foot ballroom. A new downtown Hyatt Place opened in August with 133 guest rooms and two small conference rooms.

Sundance Mountain Resort in Provo Canyon offers the 3,500-square-foot Redford Conference Center and a 4,200-square-foot rehearsal hall. utahvalley.com

ANN ARBOR, MICHIGAN

In 2005, a group of local stakeholders came together to start a discussion about how Ann Arbor, Michigan, could become a better destination for companies to launch, a discussion primarily driven by the fact that the University of Michigan (UM) has ranked No. 1 in research funding among the nation's public universities for years.

A year later, Ann Arbor Spark was born to help entrepreneurs launch startups, as well as attract and retain existing business. The organization also works closely with UM, which has its own incubator and accelerator programs.

“The tech community has grown out of a robust partnership between the university and community, with a lot of stewardship from local economic development engine Spark,” said Laura Berarducci, director of marketing and communication for Ann Arbor Spark.

Much of the area’s tech ties into Michigan’s automotive industry and centers around mobility, such as autonomous and connected driving technology. May Mobility, which is head-

A DRIVERLESS SHUTTLE AT THE UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN IN ANN ARBOR

Courtesy Destination Ann Arbor

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quartered in Ann Arbor, has driverless shuttles running in Detroit; Grand Rapids, Michigan; and Providence, Rhode Island.

Ford Motors recently chose Ann Arbor to pilot its Ford City Insights Platform, a suite of advanced software tools to track and solve mobility issues. Just outside Ann Arbor, the American Center for Mobility is a testing facility for connected and automated vehicles and other mobility technologies.

UM’s wide selection of event space includes the 6,300-squarefoot Rogel Ballroom in the historic Michigan Union, which just underwent a two-year renovation, and a 5,200-square-foot ballroom in the Michigan League.

The UM-themed Graduate Ann Arbor hotel opened in 2016 with 11,000 square feet of meeting space, including three ballrooms. Destination Ann Arbor can also tap local tech leaders to be speakers for conferences and meetings. annarbor.org

SANTA BARBARA, CALIFORNIA

The late 1970s and early 1980s marked the beginnings of Santa Barbara, California, as a high-tech destination, and the city is now part of the region sometimes referred to as Silicon Beach.

University of California Santa Barbara graduates who went there for an education stayed to launch their own startups. And many of those startups were successful enough to become attractive acquisitions for larger tech companies.

Though much of the area’s early development of tech companies happened in outlying communities, downtown Santa Barbara has recently become a hub for tech companies moving into vacant retail space. Nearly 70 technology companies now call downtown home, according to a Hayes Commercial Group report last spring. Tech companies such as Sonos, LogicMonitor and Amazon have converted dead retail space along State Street into their offices. That has created a ripple effect, prompting new businesses to open in downtown Santa Barbara and in the trendy Funk Zone district near the waterfront.

Smaller events can take advantage of Kiva Cowork, which offers a variety of venues in several locations, but also opened a wine bar and astronaut-themed vegetarian restaurant in downtown.

The Hilton Beachfront Resort offers 60,000 square feet of indoor and outdoor event space, and the Ritz-Carlton Bacara has more than 70,000 square feet of flexible meeting space.

Groups can gather inside the Wolf Museum of Exploration + Innovation, better known as Moxi, or on the rooftop surrounded by views of the mountains, city and ocean. Guests can explore the museum’s interactive exhibits and even book a hands-on “makerspace” activity in the Innovation Workshop. The Santa Barbara Center for Arts, Science and Technology is also available for private events.

Planners who want to provide corporate social-responsibility programming for their events can work with Youth Interactive, an after-school project for teens that fosters entrepreneurial and artistic creativity to prepare them for business success. santabarbaraca.com

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Meet in Tualatin Valley, Home to Oregon’s Newest Venues High-Tech meetings and the brand-new, state-of-the-art Wingspan Event and Conference Center are the perfect pairing.

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cenically situated in the Pacific Northwest, nestled between Portland and the Oregon Coast, Tualatin Valley is the perfect place to escape.

Abundant activities—from cycling to wine tasting—offer a diverse selection of award-winning venues and facilities, and a host of adventures and experiences, the Tualatin Valley blends culture from the past to the present, industry and wilderness, and the rugged and the refined.

Tualatin Valley offers hundreds of miles of trails, wetlands and parks for the outdoor enthusiast. The area is home to some of the region’s best international eateries as well as popular brewpubs and cafes. Not to mention the opportunity to taste award-winning Pinot Noir at any of our 30 wineries. Take a tour of the vineyards or taste a flight of unique Oregon wines.

WINGSPAN EVENT & CONFERENCE CENTER

A Growing Destination

Tualatin Valley boasts numerous top-notch hotels and meetings and event facilities, making this a premier location for your next meeting, tour or event. Throughout 2020 and 2021, Tualatin Valley will welcome 10 new hotels and two state-of-the-art event spaces.

Meeting in Tualatin Valley

Located in the heart of Oregon’s Silicon Forest—one of the most diverse high-tech clusters in the nation—Tualatin Valley’s newest hot spot, the Wingspan Event and Conference Center, is opening this summer in the city of Hillsboro.

Conveniently located just minutes west of Portland and 30 miles from Portland International Airport, this event center is an ideal destination for meetings and events.

Features

• 89,000 square feet of total space, including 39,000 square feet of exposition space • 13,000 square feet of meeting space • Expansive lobby and gallery • Large entry plaza and outdoor exhibit area

House, opening in December 2020, which will be steps away from the Patricia Reser Center for the Arts, and the unique Japanese-themed boutique, CedarTree Hotel, opening in Hillsboro in early 2021. Additional hotels opening in Tualatin Valley include Element by Marriott, AC Hotels by Marriott, and two Hampton Inn by Hilton properties.

Bringing More Art to Tualatin Valley

Coming in late 2021, the Patricia Reser Center for the Arts will bring a much-needed performing arts facility to the city of Beaverton. This multi-disciplinary, will house 550 seats, art gallery and meeting and event space.

The arts center will be perfectly situated in central Beaverton neighborhood, the up-and-coming arts and entertainment district where the food THE PATRICIA RESER CENTER FOR THE ARTS scene is already booming.

Dozens of new restaurants and food carts have made BeaverContact Us Today ton an exciting destination in recent Our dedicated sales team will help years. The theater is also directly secure group rates, arrange site across from the MAX light rail inspection tours, provide visitor station, making it easily accessible information, provide itinerary from downtown Portland. assistance and more. Contact us by calling 503-644-5555, or In addition to new facilities, 10 new email sales@wcva.org. Learn hotels are slated to open throughmore and download the Tualatin out 2020 and 2021. These new hotels Valley Meeting Planners Guide at include the stylish, 125-room Hyatt tualatinvalley.org/meetings.

s r e k s e u h H an d t

HAYMARKET The Pinnacle Bank Arena is surrounded

by Lincoln’s Haymarket District, a restored historic area.

All photos courtesy Lincoln CVB

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CITY

LINCOLN AT A GLANCE

Lincoln Greenville offersblends collegeurban town sophistication vibes and distinctive with Nebraska Appalachian venues scenery

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BY ELIZABETH HEY

BY SAVANNAH OSBOURN

ebraska’s of of Lincoln exudes ow intocapital its fifthcity decade a transformaa young and aenergetic vibe that radiates tion from South Carolina mill town, from the University of Nebraska-LinGreenville has morphed into a remarkcoln (UNL) campus to downtown and the ably user-friendly tourism and meetings Historic Haymarket Husker mania prevails destination with a district. strong corporate base. Its walkduring football season, and the arts, sports and able downtown offers distinctive venues, artsculiand nary scenes thrive year-round. entertainment, with award-winning restaurants, Your attendees can watch world-class entertainment boutique shopping and exceptional night life. And at the Lied Center for Performing Arts, tour Memorithe surrounding Appalachian foothills add a beaual Stadium for an insider’s view of Husker athletics tiful natural ambiance to this urban destination. or bike the extensive city trail system. Flourishing craft beer and farm-to-table establishments highlight the state’s agricultural roots. Perhaps most memorable, your attendees will be welcomed with friendly Midwestern hospitality.

LOCATION: Southeast Nebraska ACCESS: Lincoln Airport, Omaha Eppley Airport, Interstate 80 HOTEL ROOMS: 5,200 CONTACT INFO: Lincoln Convention and Visitors Bureau 402-434-5335 lincoln.org MEETING SPACES

Lancaster Event Center BUILT: 2000, expanded several times since EXHIBIT SPACE: 400,000 square feet OTHER MEETING SPACES: Three breakout rooms Pinnacle Bank Arena BUILT: 2013 EXHIBIT SPACE: 30,000 square feet OTHER MEETING SPACES: 11 event rooms MEETING HOTELS

The Lincoln Marriott Cornhusker Hotel GUEST ROOMS: 300 MEETING SPACE: 47,000 square feet Embassy Suites Lincoln GUEST ROOMS: 252 MEETING SPACE: 20,000 square feet Graduate Lincoln Hotel GUEST ROOMS: 231 MEETING SPACE: 15,000 square feet WHO’S MEETING IN LINCOLN

National High School Athletic Coaches Association ATTENDEES: 1,000 American Forensic Association ATTENDEES: 800

March 2020

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Destination Highlights

DISTINCTIVE VENUES

Capital Cigar Lounge

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ne of the Midwest’s most affordable and accessible cities, Lincoln lies less than a day’s drive from Chicago, Minneapolis, Kansas City, Denver, and St. Louis. Safe and walkable, downtown is adjacent to campus. Big city amenities abound, as do first-rate hotels and meeting spaces.

“Almost any night of the week, there’s a live music option within walking distance of our downtown hotels,” said Derek Feyerherm, senior director for the Lincoln Convention and Visitors Bureau. “The Lied Center brings in Broadway shows, national tours of comedians and music, and some locals acts, too. It’s between downtown and the university, with the Embassy Suites and the Kindler Hotel just across the street.”

On campus, the Sheldon Museum of Art houses a significant contemporary collection. Morrill Hall’s top-notch natural science collection showcases prehistoric mammoth skeletons, as well as the Mueller Planetarium. At Memorial Stadium, named in honor of World War I veterans who attended the university, tours of the new football training facility include a half-acre training room and a chance to step out onto the turf.

Slated for completion in 2021, a walkway dedicated to veterans will lead to the new facility.

“Having a flagship university in downtown creates so much energy and synergy in the music, shopping and arts scene, and we still have a small-town feeling here,” said Feyerherm.

In Historic Haymarket, venues include Pinnacle Bank Arena, the Railyard and Canopy Street. Sporting events, concerts and performances fill the calendar, especially on weekends.

Saturday mornings in spring and summer, vendors at the Haymarket Farmers’ Market sell food, produce, crafts and more.

Morrill Hall

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DESTINATION HIGHLIGHTS

Distinctive Venues

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incoln’s newest downtown property, the Kindler Hotel, is one block from UNL’s campus and within walking distance of downtown hotels. This 49-room boutique hotel opened in August 2019 as a marriage of two historic buildings. The ballroom, featuring floor-to-ceiling windows and original Art Deco moldings, holds 180 guests. A 14-seat executive boardroom lends itself to strategic workshops and retreats.

More than 100 years ago, the Scottish Rite opened its Masonic Center in the shadow of the Nebraska State Capitol. Today, this ornate Neoclassical Revival temple has been revamped for meetings with a full kitchen and buffet area. Numerous spaces include the ballroom, with capacity for up to 300, and the Lodge Room, for 200 people.

In addition to renovated historic buildings, new venues include the Capital Cigar Lounge. Opened in early 2019, it contains a variety of event spaces, including a boardroom and lounge for more relaxed meetings.

For those hesitant about the smell of cigar smoke, a state-of-the-art Trane HVAC system ensures that clean air is pumped in while existing air is filtered out.

Sports enthusiasts can take in baseball when the Lincoln Saltdogs play at Haymarket Park. Sections of the stadium can be rented for groups with various food and beverage options. At the Ice Box arena, where the U.S. Hockey League Lincoln Stars play, groups can opt for traditional seating or reserve smaller suites for games and meetings. Catering ranges from concession-style options to steak dinners.

www.smallmarketmeetings.com

Major Meeting Spaces

AFTER HOURS

Bike trails at Union Plaza

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he Lancaster Event Center, roughly 15 minutes from downtown, provides 400,000 square feet of flexible space throughout five interconnected buildings. Each building averages 80,000 square feet, and interior walkways provide access during inclement weather. All offer full catering. Feyerherm said that five events can take place simultaneously, or the center can easily host one large expo.

At Pinnacle Bank Arena in downtown’s West Haymarket development, groups can take advantage of several nontraditional event spaces. The major tenant of this 15,500-seat venue is the UNL Huskers men’s and women’s basketball programs. When games aren’t scheduled, the arena floor can be reserved for 30,000 square feet of exhibit space, a 2,300-person reception, a 1,000-person banquet or theater for 3,800 to 14,000.

“The arena staff can be very creative with how groups use the Pinnacle’s space and 11 event rooms,” said Feyerherm. “The club and luxury lounges on the suite levels are great for meetings, and the arena floor makes a unique spot for events.”

Modern amenities and Midwest charm intermingle at the Lincoln Marriott Cornhusker Hotel. Attendees can walk to downtown restaurants and attractions or take the complimentary shuttle up to a three-mile radius. The Cornhusker offers 40,406 square feet of flexible space, 29 event rooms and a maximum of 22 breakout rooms, plus on-site audiovisual services.

The 231-room Graduate Lincoln boasts a bold retro vibe and views of Memorial Stadium and the Capitol. Nostalgia rules at the tiki bar, and the second-floor patio features foosball, pingpong and a year-round pool. The 5,800-square-foot ballroom can host 450 people; partial room rentals accommodate 100 to 125 people.

MAJOR MEETING SPACES

March 2020

The Graduate Lincoln

After the Meeting

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he expansion of the Historic Haymarket district around Pinnacle Bank Arena has created new retail and development. From the arena to bustling Canopy Street and the Railyard, the district offers restaurants and bars, boutiques and an ice skating rink during winter.

Serving some of the nation’s best beef and produce, the Lincoln culinary scene continues its farm-to-fork emphasis. In central Lincoln, standout Piedmont Bistro by Venue welcomes groups and focuses on a high-quality, locally sourced menu. Set amid pastoral views on certified-organic Lakehouse Farm, attendees can dine on bestof-season dishes at the Prairie Plate Restaurant, where everything is sourced on-site or from neighboring farms.

Craft beer aficionados will want to dive into the annual Lincoln Beer Tour, held May 1 through December 31. A free passport booklet entitles participants to a complimentary pint at approximately 10 breweries.

Historic Robber’s Cave, south of downtown, offers 30to 60-minute tours of a 5,000 square-foot maze of sandstone tunnels. Tours highlight its history and the variety of characters, such as Jesse James, believed to have hidden there. Afterward, nearby White Elm Brewing and Backswing Brewing offer craft tastings and tours.

For exercise before or after meetings, the community is connected by a well-defined, 131-mile trail system. Outside most downtown hotels, the bike-share program makes it easy to explore the city or head to its outskirts. Walkers will also appreciate the hard surface and crushed rock trails that weave through greenways, cityscapes and parks.

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HOTEL

On Campus at Swarthmore

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BY KRISTY ALPERT

ennsylvania’s Swarthmore College made headlines when it opened in 1869 by providing the unprecedented chance for men and women to study together under the same roof. It continued to be a leader in the academic field and on the playing field, becoming one of the earliest adopters of a quickly developing nationwide sport called football.

Over the years, Swarthmore College has consistently paved the way for future growth and success for its students and alumni, making headlines once again when it opened the 40-room Inn at Swarthmore in 2016.

The Inn at Swarthmore provides a much-needed gathering space for the greater Swarthmore community; there, faculty, students, alumni, families and more can sleep, convene and dine together in a mixed-use building. The Inn at Swarthmore was designed to LEED Silver standards, with a hybrid wood-and-steel structure that creates an energy-efficient envelope around its interiors, and white-oak flooring and furnishings from wood reclaimed from the site. The inn is part of a master plan that incorporates an on-site restaurant, a bookstore and pedestrian pathways that link the property to the campus and surrounding shops around the borough of Swarthmore.

Artwork from alumni and students at Swarthmore College lines the walls of the inn, creating a gallerylike aesthetic in the public spaces. Guest rooms are also outfitted with student and alumni artwork. Rooms are equipped with wireless internet and come with ergonomic workspaces and mini refrigerators, creating a homelike feel for the rooms. Bathroom amenities are from William Roam.

The inn also features three meeting rooms with more than 3,400 square feet of flexible meeting space, available for hosting anything from academic conferences to business workshops.

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www.smallmarketmeetings.com

M E E T I N G S PAC E S

THREE MEETING ROOMS AT THE INN AT SWARTHMORE CAN BE CONFIGURED FOR PRESENTATIONS OR BANQUETS.

There are three dedicated meeting and event spaces at the Inn at Swarthmore, and during the warmer months, the inn’s private courtyard is also available for tented receptions and dinners. The high-ceilinged Gathering Room is the largest venue — with 2,400 square feet of divisible space for up to 150 guests total or 70 guests per room when divided into two smaller rooms — set within a neutral color palette. The Sycamore Room is a versatile space for up to 60 guests and features large floor-to-ceiling windows, and the Ingleneuk Room’s location adjacent to the Broad Table Tavern is suitable for smaller meetings of up to 16 guests.

C AT E R I N G Visitors from around the state make the trip out to the Inn at Swarthmore just for the chance to dine at the inn’s celebrated Broad Table Tavern, a chef-driven restaurant that offers seasonally inspired menus that showcase locally sourced ingredients from nearby farms, vineyards and breweries. The restaurant’s acclaimed ethos extends to the catering team as well. Locally sourced charcuterie and cheese boards entice guests before plated or buffet dinners that feature house-made pastas or tender cuts of filet mignon. Catering menus cover everything from breakfast through dinner, including breaks and dessert, and include a full bar menu.

EXTRAS

HOTEL FACTS LOCATION Swarthmore, Pennsylvania

SIZE

40 rooms

MEETING SPACE

More than 3,400 square feet

Each of the venues at the Inn at Swarthmore is equipped with state-of-the-art audiovisual equipment and features the latest in technology, like the flat-panel LCD screen in the Ingleneuk Room.

On-site event coordinators are available, as are tables, chairs, votive candles and floor-length tablecloths. Guests will have access to the Swarthmore Campus and Community Store near the lobby, where they can purchase or peruse Swarthmore College merchandise, books and locally produced fair-trade gifts and mementos. The Broad Table Tavern occasionally hosts special events like a chef’s table or a holiday feast.

BEFORE AND AFTER

ACCESS

30 minutes from Philadelphia International Airport and accessible via train

CONTACT INFO THE QUAD AT SWARTHMORE COLLEGE Photos courtesy Inn at Swarthmore

March 2020

610-543-7500 theinnatswat.com

Guests are free to explore the artwork throughout the halls of the Inn at Swarthmore before or after events at the inn. The property is less than a mile from many of Swarthmore College’s main sites, where guests are free to roam the campus’s 425 acres of arboretum-quality terrain filled with hiking trails and rolling lawns.

Philadelphia is a 30-minute drive from the campus and a 31-minute train ride from the Swarthmore train station.

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THE CARMEL CENTER FOR THE PERFORMING ARTS OFFERS MEETING AND EVENT SPACE IN AN UPSCALE SUBURB OF INDIANAPOLIS.

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Meetdieng Gui

Only 25 miles from downtown Chicago, the small towns that make up the South Shore of Indiana are a great place to host a smaller meeting or conference and still take advantage of all that Chicago has to offer. The biggest attraction in the area is Indiana Dunes National Park, which was just upgraded from lakeshore to National Park status in 2019.

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Courtesy Visit Hamilton County

BY PAULA AVEN GLADYCH

ndiana is so well placed in the United States that it is contiguous to several major metropolitan areas, including Chicago; Cincinnati, Ohio; and Louisville, Kentucky, not to mention its own Indianapolis. Conference planners love to host meetings in some of the smaller suburbs surrounding these cities while still having the option to visit and experience the amenities and attractions of the larger urban centers.

SOUTH SHORE

Suburban Indiana

“That kind of helped put us on the map,” said Erika Dahl, director of communications for the South Shore Convention and Visitors Authority in Hammond, Indiana. “It was always a National Park, but it was a lowercase park. It was a lakeshore. It didn’t get a lot of national attention, but now it is a bucket list item.”

And although the area doesn’t have its own convention center, it has 6,000 hotel rooms and some distinctive meeting venues, including two casino properties and the County Line Orchard.

“We’re an affordable location to have an event or meeting, or even just a quick weekend getaway,” Dahl said.

Guests can fly into either of Chicago’s two airports, and it is a short drive or electric train ride from Chicago to northwest Indiana. The Mascot Hall of Fame in Whiting, Indiana, is not only a fun place to visit but also a great place to host a smaller meeting or event right on the lakefront. Fair Oaks Farms, one of the largest agritourism destinations in the country, also has 17,000 square feet of meeting space in its Farmhouse Restaurant, Event Center and Pub. southshorecva.com

www.smallmarketmeetings.com

CARMEL

A suburb of Indianapolis, Carmel is a thriving upscale community just north of the city. Chock full of top-notch hotels and meeting facilities, the city prides itself on its visitor experience.

Outdoor enthusiasts can take a bike ride along the Monon Trail, a paved path that runs from Carmel 20 miles north through Westfield, Grand Park and Sheridan. The trail takes visitors past the Carmel Center for the Performing Arts in the city center, as well as the Carmel Arts and Design district; Clay Terrace, an outdoor shopping mall; and the Grand Park Sports Campus.

Along with more traditional meeting options, Carmel also has some breweries and restaurants that make first-rate off-site venues.

The Embassy Suites by Hilton Noblesville is the area’s largest meeting hotel, with 30,000 square feet of space. The Renaissance Indianapolis North Hotel in Carmel has 268 lodge rooms and 16,000 square feet of meeting space. The Hotel Carmichael, which opens in June, will have a more boutique vibe with several indoor and outdoor food-and-beverage outlets and an on-site supper club.

The Grand Park Sports Campus is a 265,000-square-foot events center that is well suited for exhibitions and trade and consumer shows. The space is getting updated to be more of a conference facility with breakout spaces. The Ritz Charles, the Hyatt Place Indianapolis and the 502 East Event Centre in Carmel also offer convention and meeting facilities. visithamiltoncounty.com

JEFFERSONVILLE

Jeffersonville, Indiana, sits across the Ohio River from Louisville, Kentucky.

“We have the benefits of both sides of the river, and we are a smaller destination,” said Luanne Mattson, assistant director of SoIN Tourism.

“We have three communities — Clarksville, New Albany and Jeffersonville — that have meeting capabilities, and all are destinations themselves.”

Because Louisville recently opened a brand-new convention center, many smaller meetings and conventions are getting turned away, which has given Jeffersonville a chance to get creative and attract those groups across the river. Its major hotels include the Fairfield Inn and Suites by Marriott Louisville North, the Sheraton Louisville Riverside and Hawthorn Suites by Wyndham.

One work-around is that event attendees stay at hotels in Jeffersonville and take a free shuttle service between the hotels and area meeting venues, including those in Louisville.

“I take time to go out and find those connections,” said Todd Read, trade and consumer sales manager for SoIN Tourism. “We can make it work for everybody.”

One of the big draws in downtown Jeffersonville is the Big Four Pedestrian Bridge, a former railroad bridge that was converted to a pedestrian and bike path that connects historic Jeffersonville to Louisville’s Waterfront Park. The bridge opened in 2014, and with it came new restaurants, bars, attractions and an arts and cultural district at the base of the bridge. gosoin.com

IT’S TIME TO SEE THE BEND. Meetings here start with a great location – we’re situated in the heart of the Midwest.

Then come the amenities, like a downtown convention center and iconic attractions.

WISCONSIN MICHIGAN M IL W

Ready to find out more? Let us show you around in 2020.

CONTACT LINDSAY FERENCE TO PLAN YOUR NEXT MEETING IN THE BEND lference@visitsouthbend.com | 574.400.4023

March 2020

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Meetieng Guid

LAFAYETTE-WEST LAFAYETTE

One hour north of Indianapolis, the home of Purdue University has a small-town feel with many urban amenities.

Lafayette-West Lafayette is broken down into three distinct districts, with a downtown that runs 92 blocks across the Wabash River and up to the Purdue University campus. The Lafayette side is the historic side.

In West Lafayette, the Purdue campus dominates. Both sides come together to take advantage of the local boutique shops, restaurants, 113 public art installations and art galleries downtown. The area has 2,700 hotel rooms, with more slated to open in the next year.

The city doesn’t have a conference center, but Purdue has plenty of meeting options. The Purdue Union Club Hotel, which is undergoing a $30 million renovation, is a full-service, 192-room hotel. Its ballrooms can hold 1,200 people for a cocktail-style reception. The hotel is connected to the Stewart Center, a dedicated meeting facility that can host groups of 10 to 500 people in its 23 meeting rooms.

The center also has two auditoriums: Fowler Hall, a 400-seat theater, and the Loeb Playhouse, a 1,000-seat theater. Both can be used for large-group presentations, ceremonies and performances.

Convention-goers love to add tours of Wolf Park, the Farm at Prophetstown and Tippecanoe Battlefield and Museum. Wolf Park is a research facility that studies wolf pack behavior and pecking order, and it has grown into a major attraction. The Farm at Prophetstown is a 1920s-era farm that shows visitors what it was like when farms began using tractors instead of animals to farm. homeofpurdue.com

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FRENCH LICK/WEST BADEN

French Lick and West Baden are resort towns that offer worldclass opportunities and small-town charm. Located 43 miles from Bloomington, Indiana, and 74 miles from Louisville, Kentucky, the area is a great jumping-off spot to these larger metropolitan areas.

The French Lick Resort — made up of the historic French Lick Springs Hotel, built in 1901, and the West Baden Springs Hotel, built in 1902 and listed as a National Historic Landmark — features upscale amenities like world-class spas, three championship-level golf courses and a casino. There are 700 rooms between the two properties, and the new Valley Tower, a 70-room hotel connected to the casino, recently opened its doors.

In 2015, the resort upgraded and expanded its 105,000-square-foot meeting and event center space, including a 22,600-square-foot adjustable ballroom. It also features 27 state-of-the-art meeting rooms. The center can host events for upward of 2,500 people. A 31,600-squarefoot exhibition hall can accommodate 200 exhibitors as well.

When not in meetings, attendees can visit the Wilstem Wildlife Park for an intimate view of grizzly bears, elephants and kangaroos; enjoy the Big Splash Adventure Hotel and Indoor Water Park; or take a ride on the French Lick Scenic Railway, a 20-mile historic train ride through Hoosier National Forest. visitfrenchlickwestbaden.com

THISISINDIANA.ORG/GROUP-TRAVEL

www.smallmarketmeetings.com

BUILT IN 1810, VERAESTAU HISTORIC SITE CAN HOST INDOOR EVENTS FOR 32 OR OUTDOOR EVENTS FOR UP TO 300.

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Meetdieng Gui

Aurora Built in 1810, Veraestau sits on a bluff overlooking the Ohio River in Aurora. The beautiful old mansion is not only open for tours from spring through Christmas but is also a great meeting venue.

The home was donated to Indiana Landmarks about 20 years ago.

It came fully furnished and decorated by the home’s previous owners, who purchased it in the 1930s. The furniture isn’t roped off; visitors are

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Courtesy Veraestau Historic Site

BY PAULA AVEN GLADYCH

ndiana has a rich history, both industrial and cultural. Because of that, there are numerous historic sites across the state that make incredible venues for meetings and events.

From Native American mound-builder sites to historic mansions and a 1920s vaudeville theater, there are plenty of unique meeting venues to choose from.

VERAESTAU HISTORIC SITE

Hoosier Historic Sites

encouraged to fully enjoy the house by “appreciating the historic materials and artifacts without feeling you are in a museum,” said Jarrad Holbrook, director of the Southeast Field Office and Veraestau Historic Site for Indiana Landmarks.

When the home isn’t open for tours, it is available for meeting and event rental. The inside meeting spaces consist of two small parlors, a medium-size dining room and a larger double parlor. The dining room has a table that can sit up to 12 people. The site also has six-foot folding tables that can be added to the other rooms for a total event size of 32 people.

“We encourage people to explore the house and have a look around,” Holbrook said. “We’re happy to give people further context.”

The site has full restroom facilities, a full kitchen and updated appliances. Caterers are welcome to come in and bring their own food. The home is equipped with a portable screen and projector. South of the home, 60-foot tents can be erected for events of up to 300 people overlooking the river below. indianalandmarks.org/our-historic-sites/veraestau

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EMBASSY THEATRE

Fort Wayne The Embassy Theatre turns 92 years old in May. The theater, originally built as a movie palace and vaudeville house, also came with a seven-story, 250-room hotel wrapped around the north and west sides of it. The theater still has its working Grande Page pipe organ, which was installed in 1928. The organ, which is only one of three built of its size, has 1,100 pipes.

In the 1970s, the hotel was renovated into a ballroom and meeting spaces for weddings, meetings and in-house events. The ballroom can host 350 guests for a sit-down plated dinner and about 400 for a cocktail party. The theater itself can hold 2,400 people for concerts, shows, lectures and presentations. Groups can use the lobby for cocktail receptions before the speaker or presentation portion of an event.

Many people rent out the space because they love the 1920s feel of it. The facility provides tables and chairs, and its staff is hands-on with the planning, said Brittneay King, events manager for the theater.

“A lot of people want to have Roaring ’20s parties here,” she said. “It is very cool for that vintage look people are looking for.”

The theater is ornate, she said, and when people host events there, they don’t have to bring in a ton of decorations to create the perfect atmosphere. fwembassytheatre.org

FORT WAYNE’S 92-YEAR-OLD EMBASSY THEATRE Courtesy Embassy Theatre

Experience Boilermaker Pride!

Discover Lafayette-West Lafayette, Indiana, just an hour north of Indianapolis, two hours south of Chicago and Home of Purdue University.

Here, you will find everything you need to make your next event a guaranteed success! Whether you are interested in the full-service conference center at Purdue University, one of our historic venues, a fun contemporary space or one of our other great conference venues and hotels in the area, Visit LafayetteWest Lafayette will help you with every step of planning your meeting!

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March 2020

Janet Martinez

Sales Manager jmartinez@homeofpurdue.com 765-447-9999

2/7/20 10:22 AM

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Meetieng Guid

MONROE COUNTY HISTORY CENTER

Bloomington The Monroe County History Center was built as a Carnegie Library in 1918. In the 1970s, a new library was built next door, and the original building was slated for demolition. Thankfully, a group of citizens fought to save the building, and it was turned into a museum and a genealogical research library.

Groups that meet at the history center can include the museum as part of their rental for an additional fee. The main room in the museum is on the first floor in what was formerly the community room of the Carnegie Library. Rental includes use of the stage and the staging kitchen, tables and padded folding chairs. It can hold 80 people.

The museum’s permanent exhibits are in the oldest part of the library building. The Cook Gallery explores Monroe County from the arrival of the first European settlers to present day. There is an 1880s one-room school and an original 1840s cabin to explore. The museum gets about 11,000 visitors a year. monroehistory.org

TIPPECANOE PLACE RESTAURANT

TIPPECANOE PLACE RESTAURANT IN SOUTH BEND Courtesy Tippecanoe Place Restaurant

South Bend Tippecanoe Place Restaurant is housed in a National Historic Landmark. The 40-room, 24,000-square-foot mansion was built by Clem Studebaker, the founder of Studebaker Wagon Corporation, between 1886 and 1889. Before the Studebaker family made auto-

THE PERFECT DESTINATION FOR SMALL TO MID-SIZE MEETINGS Whether you’re hosting a conference or meeting, organizing a trade show or planning your special event, we have every type of space, from barn to boardroom to ballroom—even a 265,000 sq. ft. indoor event center fit for the largest events.

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JUST NORTH OF INDY

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mobiles, they were the world’s largest manufacturer of wagons, and that’s how they made their fortune.

The family ended up losing the mansion during the Great Depression. After that, the home was used for various purposes: a school for people with disabilities, the Red Cross during World War II, the E.M. Morris School for Crippled Children, school offices and administration, and space for a local historical preservation group. Then in 1980, a division of Ralston Purina bought the building and turned it into a restaurant, and its current owners have maintained that tradition. Groups can rent out individual rooms in the mansion or the entire house, which can accommodate groups of 12 to 200. The mansion’s grounds are also available for wedding ceremonies.

“Most of our rooms seat about 30 people, but three different rooms seat up to 60,” said Kevin Jakel, general manager of the restaurant. “We do weddings, lunch and dinner events, meeting events and business dinners.”

Guests are welcome to take a self-guided tour of the house as part of their visit. Tippecanoe Place serves American classic cuisine like steak, chicken, seafood and prime rib. Jakel calls his restaurant a special-occasion spot. The home is decked out for Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year’s, which are the busiest five weeks of the year, he said. The restaurant also hosts brunch every Sunday. tippe.com

Good events make good memories and Grand Wayne Convention Center in downtown Fort Wayne, Indiana, is the perfect backdrop for your next event. >> See for yourself at grandwayne.com

ANGEL MOUNDS STATE HISTORIC SITE

Evansville The United States is home to many mound sites built by Mississippian cultures between A.D. 1000 and 1450. Angel Mounds is an archaeological site that sits on 600 acres and includes a village site and 11 mounds. They are some of the youngest mounds in the U.S., at around 1,000 years old.

“We’re the last gasp of the mound builders with this culture,” said Mike Linderman, Western regional director for Indiana State Museum and Historic Sites. He added that the mounds aren’t burial mounds.

“They are status symbols,” he said. “The larger the mound, the more important they would have been in the community.

They are the mansions of our property.”

Angel Mounds rents out its grounds for special events, and its visitor center can host groups of up to 100 people. The staff at Angel Mounds will provide programming to go along with any business meeting, and guests have a fantastic view of the grounds from the visitor center’s large viewing window.

Angel Mounds doesn’t have designated caterers. Planners can bring in food and alcohol from wherever they want or use the visitor center kitchen to make their own. The museum was built in 1971.

Every few years the staff upgrades the information and exhibits to reflect new findings from the property’s archaeological dig. indianamuseum.org/angel-mounds-state-historic-site

March 2020

Missy Eppley | Sales Manager

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B RE AK OU T FRO M THE BOARDROOM Gain outside perspective in Montana’s Glacier Country.

FINN at the Doubletree, Missoula.

Downtown Whitefish.

BRING SOMETHING NEW TO THE TABLE Western Montana’s Glacier Country is a unique meetings destination where inspiration, new ideas and authentic experiences are found among mesmerizing peaks, glistening waters and exceptional mountain communities brimming with small-town charm and big-city amenities. From branded convention hotels to luxury guest ranches, contemporary urban spaces and distinct lodging properties, meeting venues abound alongside unexpected culinary experiences and the latest in technology. Montana’s unrivaled landscape offers extraordinary teambuilding opportunities, which add an unforgettable experiential component to any meeting. With Glacier National Park as the backdrop for Kalispell and Whitefish, and the Bitterroot Mountains as the backdrop for Missoula, our larger cities offer meeting options as endless as our big blue sky.

KALISPELL A mountain town rich in culture, Kalispell combines city conveniences with Montana’s outdoors. Easily accessible from meeting hotels, Kalispell’s vibrant downtown offers Montana-inspired dining, spirits and brews. It’s situated perfectly between Glacier National Park and Flathead Lake, blending four-season adventure and soul-stirring beauty for an unforgettable experience beyond the conference room.

MISSOULA Ideas are inspired by nature and nurtured by unexpected sophistication in Missoula, where three rivers and seven wilderness areas come together. Hospitality, technology and amenities are all top notch in this incredible meetings destination. Pulsating with big-city arts, culture, music and culinary scenes, Missoula is ideal for corporate events, retreats, conferences and conventions.

WHITEFISH Metropolitan flair meets ski-town vibe in Whitefish, with a perfect balance of modern amenities, outdoor recreation and a lively arts and culture scene. From boutique downtown hotels to convention hotels on lakes and golf courses, every property boasts incredible views and easy access to Glacier National Park, Whitefish Lake and Whitefish Mountain Resort.

GETTING HERE It’s easy to get here! With two major airports—Missoula (MSO) servicing Missoula and Glacier Park (FCA) servicing Kalispell and Whitefish, access to Western Montana has never been easier. Six major airlines offer 14 direct flights (some seasonal) arriving from major cities, which makes travel planning effortless.

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Rocky Mountain Views

THE RANCH AT ROCK CREEK OFFERS LUXURIOUS ACCOMMODATIONS SURROUNDED BY MONTANA’S ROCKY MOUNTAINS.

T

Meetdieng Gui

BY PAULA AVEN GLADYCH

he Rocky Mountains stretch 3,000 miles from New Mexico to Canada, creating numerous out-of-the-way places to get away from the hustle and bustle of urban life and get out into nature. In destinations throughout the region, scenic venues offer a change of pace, along with amazing views and outdoor opportunities.

RANCH AT ROCK CREEK

Philipsburg, Montana The Ranch at Rock Creek is a Forbes Travel Guide Five-Star luxury property that also offers a world-class culinary experience to guests.

The ranch can host 125 guests on-property where food, drinks and most activities are all included. Skiing, snowmobiling, horseback riding, shooting and fly-fishing are just a handful of the available outdoor activities. The ranch has 70 horses that can be ridden year-round and

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Courtesy The Ranch at Rock Creek

at all experience levels. The spa on-property costs extra.

The 2,700-square-foot Buckle Barn Great Hall and Lawn can be booked for meals and cocktail receptions of up to 125 people. The Buckle Barn Library is a smaller, more comfortable meeting setting for up to 30 people, with upholstered chairs, a flat-screen TV, a wrap-around table and bookshelves filled with Western classics. Smaller meeting spaces are also available throughout the property.

The ranch has many teambuilding activities, including paintball, shooting challenges, scavenger hunts, geocaching, a survival skills challenge, a ropes course, barnyard Olympics and a ranch carnival. Every guest gets the use of a bicycle to travel around the 6,600-acre property, and lodging ranges from luxury suites and cabins to glamping tents. theranchatrockcreek.com

BEAVER RUN RESORT AND CONFERENCE CENTER

Breckenridge, Colorado The beauty of the Beaver Run Resort and Conference Center is that everything is under one roof, said Bruce

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Horii, director of sales and marketing for the resort. The lodge buildings and conference spaces are connected by covered walkways so people don’t ever have to go outside unless they want to.

Of course, most people want to, no matter the season. Beaver Run sits on Peak 9 of the Breckinridge Ski Resort and is just a few blocks away from Breckenridge’s historic downtown, with its many boutique shops and locally owned restaurants and pubs.

The resort is surrounded by mountain bike and hiking trails, and the conveniently located Beaver Run SuperChair quickly whisks skiers and snowboarders to the top of the mountain. The resort has handled events as large as 1,500 people in its 40,000 square feet of function space. The largest ballroom is 7,200 square feet and can comfortably hold 500 people.

“The beauty of having a lot of function space is we can do several smaller groups at the same time,” Horii said. “We have a large banquet, catering and service staff, so we’re always used to multitasking.”

He said the staff at Beaver Run like to have fun, so they make sure groups incorporate elements of the town or the mountain, depending on what their goals are. Many groups do teambuilding exercises outdoors, take historic walking or ghost tours of town, or visit the many breweries or distilleries in town. beaverrun.com

A BOARDROOM AT BEAVER RUN RESORT AND CONFERENCE CENTER

UTAH STATE UNIVERSITY BOTANICAL CENTER

Kaysville, Utah The USU Botanical Center is not like most botanical gardens; it was built as a demonstration and teaching center. Because the center is associated with the Utah State University Extension, its gardens and natural areas are planted only with trees, flowers and shrubs that grow well in Utah’s drier climate.

There is an edibles demonstration garden that not only looks at the best food to grow in the state but also at the best ways to irrigate it.

“Utah is the second-driest state in the nation,” said Jayne Mulford, Utah House manager at the USU Botanical Center. “One of the things we are concerned about is how to have beautiful places and environments without using tons of water.”

An arboretum on the property features 400 species of trees grouped into hydrozones based on their water requirements. Adjacent to the Botanical Center is a research farm that conducts experiments on fruit trees, berries and organic gardening.

The Botanical Center is a great place to host a meeting or an event. Utah House is a green building demonstration that is set up to look and feel like a real home. It demonstrates water conservation, healthy living, universal design and energy conservation. A waterwise landscape surrounds it. Groups of 25 to 40 people can fit in Utah House. Larger groups can use the meeting space at Wetland Discovery Point, a beautiful facility with floorto-ceiling windows that is surrounded by water.

Visitors can fish and hike the system of trails that wends through the property during meeting breaks. usubotanicalcenter.org

Courtesy Beaver Run Resort

WETLAND DISCOVERY POINT AT UTAH STATE UNIVERSITY BOTANICAL CENTER

Courtesy USU Botanical Center

March 2020

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Meetieng Guid

SUN VALLEY RESORT

Sun Valley, Idaho The Sun Valley Resort is at the base of Bald Mountain in Sun Valley, Idaho. The four-season resort can host groups of 20 to 800 people in its 400 guest rooms spread between two hotels, townhouses, cottages and condominiums. The resort also operates the ski area.

The views are beyond compare, said Brent Gillespie, director of sales for the resort, and meeting attendees can take time off from their conference events to go skiing, play golf, fly fish, ice skate, swim, ride horses or go mountain biking.

“With us running and operating everything, we run it through our catering managers and our sales department, which makes it easy to book things and organize,” he said. If groups want to organize events off property, like whitewater rafting or Salmon River float trips, the resort will handle it for them.

Sun Valley is well known as a skiing destination. The base of Bald Mountain sits at 5,600 feet in elevation, and it is just over 3,000 vertical feet to the top.

The resort has numerous meeting spaces, including the Limelight Ballroom, which can hold 1,000 people theater style or 500 people banquet style. The ballroom can be broken down into three smaller venues, and there are nine other meeting rooms that can accommodate 16 to 350 people. Sun Valley Village and the Sun Valley Lodge both have meeting spaces that can accommodate up to 300 people. sunvalley.com

SNOW KING RESORT

Jackson, Wyoming Jackson, Wyoming, serves as the gateway to both Grand Teton National Park and Yellowstone National Park. The Snow King Resort is nestled into the side of Snow King Mountain, the town ski hill, and is about six blocks from the town square with the famous antler arches.

The views from the resort’s Grand View Ballroom and Grand View Lawn are of Grand Teton peak, buttes, mountains and the valley.

The resort is known for its outdoor activities, like hiking, biking and skiing. There’s also a large ropes course in the area that is great for teambuilding.

“It is no fun to be here and sit in a conference room all day,” said Ariel Koerber, marketing manager for the Snow King Resort. “There is a beautiful view, but it is best if we can get out to enjoy it.”

The newly renovated resort has more than 10,000 square feet of indoor meeting space, plus a private lawn that can accommodate tents and a dance floor for dinners and cocktail receptions. The largest group the resort can host outdoors is about 600 and indoors is about 350 in the Grand Teton Ballroom.

Many groups like to hold half-day meetings at the resort, allowing their attendees to take advantage of the outdoors. The resort is close to an elk refuge. In the winter, groups can take a sleigh ride through the refuge, getting a close-up view of these majestic animals. snowking.com

Boise’s Best. At its Centre.

Centrally located in the heart of vibrant downtown Boise, the newly expanded Boise Centre has a variety of customizable meeting spaces, modern amenities, exceptional culinary services and a friendly and dedicated staff ready to make your next event an unforgettable experience. Explore Idaho’s premier convention center for yourself.

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• Centralized, downtown location • Only seven minutes from Boise airport • Over 20 direct flights from major U.S. cities • Surrounded by more than 100 restaurants and breweries • Over 1,200 hotel rooms within walking distance • Close to outdoor recreation, including the Boise Greenbelt

LEARN MORE: boisecentre.com

www.smallmarketmeetings.com

Rocky Mountains College Towns

THE UNIVERSITY OF COLORADO IS A DEFINING INSTITUTION IN BOULDER.

C

Meetdieng Gui

BY PAULA AVEN GLADYCH

ollege students are attracted to the Rocky Mountains like bees to honey. Students like the lifestyle and culture that goes along with the area’s scenic beauty. The region is home to numerous colleges and universities that have become integral parts of the communities they inhabit.

Here are some of the most popular college towns in the Rockies that are also great places to host a meeting or conference.

BOULDER, COLORADO

The city of Boulder, Colorado, has 107,000 permanent residents, but when school is in session at the University of Colorado at Boulder, 33,000 more people are added to the mix.

“Being in a college town takes on a different vibe in a community that can really generate so much energy and so much vibrancy in a

March 2020

Courtesy Boulder CVB

community,” said Mary Ann Mahoney, CEO of the Boulder Convention and Visitors Bureau. The university and the federal laboratories in Boulder are a big attraction for groups.

Boulder doesn’t have its own convention center, but it does have about 2,600 rooms and lots of meeting space in town and on campus. The University of Colorado has some versatile spaces, such as the Glenn Miller Ballroom in the University Memorial Center and the Fiske Planetarium. Many of the classroom buildings have meeting spaces, as well as auditoriums that are just right for meetings and lectures.

There are numerous hotels surrounding the university.

The largest ballroom in town is at the Embassy Suites by Hilton Boulder, with 7,637 square feet. The Hilton Garden Inn, next door, also has meeting space. Between them, they have 376 guest rooms.

To preserve its beautiful views of the foothills and its famous rock formations, the Flatirons, the city is surrounded by open space and outdoor recreation. Biking and hiking are two of the most popular sports in and around Boulder. bouldercoloradousa.com/cvb

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Meetieng Guid

BOISE, IDAHO

BOISE’S RESTAURANT ROW ON EIGHTH STREET

By Brett Sayles, courtesy Boise CVB

Boise State University (BSU) is just a few city blocks away from Boise’s main downtown core. The city has grown exponentially over the past 10 years.

“It is booming,” said Sophie Sestero, spokeswoman for the Boise Convention and Visitors Bureau. With that growth in population has come new restaurants and businesses. The river that runs through town has a 25-mile-long green belt alongside it that has 10 dedicated wineries and cideries. Boise proper has 19 craft breweries. People love to hike and bike along the greenway.

“The thing that differentiates Boise is we are so welcoming,” Sestero said. Plus, Boise is an outdoor paradise, offering everything from whitewater rafting to float trips, kayaking, skiing and stand-up paddleboarding.

The university can accommodate conferences of up to 1,400 people. The BSU student union has three ballrooms and multiple meeting rooms. The Stueckle Sky Center, which was built overlooking the blue turf of BSU’s Albertsons Stadium, has 131,000 square feet of space and offers 360-degree views of the city and foothills.

The Double R Ranch Club seats up to 350 banquet guests or 450 theater style. Groups can also add a tour of the field if their event doesn’t conflict with a football game or practice.

The Grove Hotel has 14,000 square feet of meeting space, with additional space available next door at the 5,400-seat CenturyLink Arena. The Boise Centre has more than 80,000 square feet of meeting and event spaces. boise.org

BILLINGS, MONTANA

At 110,000 people, Billings is the largest city in Montana and the largest urban center in the mostly rural region.

Two colleges call Billings home: Montana State University Billings and Rocky Mountain College. Because of that, the area draws a lot of young professionals. With 55 hotels citywide, the area is just shy of 5,000 hotel rooms. It also has about 350,000 square feet of meeting space.

Billings has five independent full-service conference hotels, and the MetraPark complex has a 12,000-seat arena, a 28,800-squarefoot pavilion and the 77,400-square-foot Expo Center.

Because most people are unfamiliar with Montana as a destination, Visit Billings works with meeting planners to help orient them to the area, including the best restaurants, the best beer and where to go to experience the nightlife and culture that makes the area unique, said Stefan Cattarin, meeting and convention sales manager for Visit Billings.

Besides its convention facilities, Billings has a beautiful zoo — ZooMontana — with some of the best bison and grizzly bear exhibits in the country, a children’s museum, water parks and a Scheels sporting goods store with a Ferris wheel, an arcade and a giant fish tank. Outdoor sports are huge in Montana. Some must-see areas include Pictograph Cave State Park, Pompeys Pillar, the Billings Brew Trail and the Beartooth Highway, which leads from Billings to the entrance of Yellowstone National Park. Many of the off-site venues in Billings celebrate its Western history. visitbillings.com

SUNRISE OVER DOWNTOWN BILLINGS

Courtesy Visit Billings

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LARAMIE, WYOMING

Laramie, Wyoming, is an outdoor-lover’s paradise and is home to the University of Wyoming. Two mountain ranges run to the east and west of Laramie, attracting outdoor enthusiasts who like to hunt, fish, hike, climb and camp.

Laramie is known for its proud Western history, but it has grown into so much more, said Mike Gray, design and operations manager for Visit Laramie. Downtown Laramie is full of unique shops and restaurants and has five breweries. The city has even expanded its culinary palate from beef to include exotic things like Thai food, vegetarian fare and sushi.

Meeting planners love the city, as it has first-class meeting venues for a city of 32,000 people. The Hilton Garden Inn has 3,483 square feet of event space and 135 guest rooms. That facility sits across the street from the University of Wyoming Marian H. Rochelle Gateway Center, a 67,000-square-foot facility that has several conference and meeting options.

Travelers like to visit the Wyoming Territorial Prison Historic Site, a prison built in 1872 that housed many notorious outlaws, including Butch Cassidy. The University of Wyoming American Heritage Center is also worth a visit. Marvel comic book legend Stan Lee donated nearly 200 boxes of his working drafts, photos, videos, articles and fan mail to the center before his death. The Deerwood Ranch Wild Horse EcoSanctuary cares for 350 wild mustangs and is a great place to visit. visitlaramie.org

OGDEN, UTAH

The city of Ogden and Utah State University have a symbiotic relationship. Each works to promote what the other has to offer.

Ogden prides itself on its proximity to outdoor sporting activities like skiing, hiking and biking, but its history plays a huge role as well, since Ogden is where the transcontinental railroad was completed.

Visitors love to visit the historic Union Station, which houses four museums and two art galleries.

The 2002 Winter Olympic Games, which were held in Utah, were a huge catalyst to revitalization and development in the area.

“We didn’t recognize we were an outdoor recreation destination,” said Sara Toliver, president and CEO of Visit Ogden. “It’s been wonderful to see the city embrace that and enhance those offerings.”

Many of the area’s historic buildings were turned into restaurants, retail, and meeting and event spaces. The area has about 1,600 guest rooms, 500 of which are in Ogden’s downtown convention district.

Its convention center has 70,000 square feet of meeting space that is attached to Peery’s Egyptian Theater, a historic movie palace built in 1924 that is now an 800-seat multiuse theatrical venue.

The university is also a meeting destination. It recently built meeting space above its stadium that “literally sits right in front of the mountain range there, so the views are just unparalleled,” Toliver said. “It is absolutely breathtaking.” visitogden.com

WESTERN

Authenticity. Hospitality. Experience.

Cheyenne offers your meetings the history and romance of the the West, paired with facilities, amenities and value you deserve. Visit Cheyenne’s services are unmatched in the west and help ensure a successful meeting.

March 2020

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