Anaheim’s Newly Expanded Convention Center Keeps City in First Tier for Meetings
It’s 2001 and Orange County’s convention space odyssey is complete,at least for now.
After nearly four years of construction, the $180 million expansion of the Anaheim Convention Center wrapped up in December. The move brought the center’s space up to 1.6 million square feet from 985,000 feet. The expansion makes it one of the 10 largest convention centers in the U.S. The only other centers with more than 1 million square feet are in Chicago, Houston, San Antonio, Las Vegas, Orlando, New Orleans, Louisville, Ky., and Cleveland. San Diego will join that group later this year when its own expansion is complete.
The end of construction on the center’s fifth expansion in its 33-year history brought smiles to the faces of local hospitality veterans who saw their business decline during the expansion as the largest shows,like the National Association of Music Merchants,moved to other locations for the interim.
NAMM came back,the show was last weekend,as did others, and the 40% increase in available space gives the Anaheim Orange County Visitor and Convention Bureau more flexibility in booking events, including more concurrent bookings than were possible in the past.
Doug Ducate, president and chief executive of the Center for Exhibition Industry Research in Chicago, said only 38% of the total shows held yearly are in convention centers. The rest are held in hotels and other venues, but many of those shows are growing and needing to move into convention facilities. And increased flexibility,like that added in Anaheim,can only benefit a convention center, he said.
“For every event day, there are two non-event days,” he said. “Ideally, a convention center would have one show moving in, one in progress and one moving out on any given day.”
That, of course, helps fill the city’s hotel rooms, too. NAMM, for instance,which was expecting up to 65,000 attendees,booked all the meeting space at the Hilton Anaheim and the ballrooms at the Anaheim Marriott for exhibit space and entertainment. The organization also used some space at the new Grand Californian. The Hilton alone sold at least 1,300 rooms for the event,most of which were four-night bookings.
Citywide, NAMM had more than 9,000 rooms blocked for the convention, about a third of the city’s inventory. In addition, the group used places like Santa Ana’s Galaxy Theater and the Phoenix Club in Anaheim for concerts.
Greg Smith, executive director of the convention, sports and entertainment department for the city of Anaheim and general manager of the Convention Center, said the expansion was the largest single construction project in the city of Anaheim. Deputy city manager Shirley McCracken said it will help increase the number of visitors to Anaheim by nearly 8 million and bring an increase of $6 million to the city’s coffers.
Smith said this expansion was different from the previous four, which simply added “another box” of space to the center.
“It was fragmented space,” he said.
But this time, Smith notes, the expansion was also a remodel.
“It accomplishes two goals,” he said. “It unifies the facility that was five separate buildings into one large building, including a quarter-mile-long lobby, and it adds architectural style and signature to Anaheim.”
The intent, he said, was to illustrate the heritage of Anaheim and capture a Southern California feel in the design. He pointed to the glass frontage,described as a “curtain wall”,that invites light into the building and has the rippled feel of the California Coast as examples. The colors inside reflect California life: ocean blues, tans for the beaches and purple and orange for the mountains; the carpeting pattern includes elements of Anaheim’s agricultural heritage with a representation of the Santa Ana River running through it.
The building wasn’t the only thing to undergo change, either. The street that previously ran between the center and the Hilton is now a landscaped pedestrian zone dubbed the Palm Garden. And a new two-vehicle electric tram system delivers people from the most distant parking lots to the front door.
Visitor Bureau officials point out that the center never lost ground in square footage during construction, and though bookings and attendance fell during that time, the project was undertaken when studies revealed Anaheim could lose up to 60% of its convention business without improvements to the center.
Last year, there were a total of about 500 events booked by the bureau that brought about 972,000 attendees to the area. So far this year, there are already 285 groups with a projected attendance of 889,197 on the books. In total, 534 groups are confirmed for dates this year and beyond. Those groups alone will bring a projected attendance of 3.5 million to OC. And that’s at a time when the average booking time is only three to six months out for many events,including big shows.
But for some of the larger shows, there are still a few concerns.
NAMM, for instance, fears it will outgrow Anaheim once again, though Larry Linkin, president and chief executive of the organization, said that situation may be unique to NAMM.
“Our show is big,” he said. “It keeps growing and that’s a problem.”
Linkin said they are at a point where there aren’t too many places nationwide that can handle the show. Anaheim is still one that can.
Parking is another matter.
The Convention Center has 4,500 parking spaces on site (including some at the Hilton), making it a potentially tight fit for groups from other parts of California that could have a large contingent arriving by car. And though convention parking can be had at Disneyland, Edison Field and the Pond, that is somewhat dependent on the absence of simultaneous large-draw events at those venues at the same time.
For the biggest shows, move-in logistics are sometimes a concern. The Convention Center did not add any loading docks in the expansion, which could create a backup when the largest shows are moving in. On a recent Friday, a dozen or so trucks were backed up off West Street waiting to unload for the Medical Design and Manufacturing show.
Smith said loading logistics are handled by creating a “marshaling yard” at places like the Pond or the stadium, from which trucks are dispatched when space is available.
“We’re not a slow-move-in building,” he said. “You don’t build (facilities) for peak days, but for 80% (capacity) days,” he said.
Smith also thinks the center is in “pretty good shape” for parking, saying that the various locations have a pretty good system in place for coordinating dates and consider parking when booking events.
Now that the center is complete, there is one more element at the complex in need of a facelift: the 1960s-era arena. Smith said there are no funds allocated for remodeling that building to bring it more in line with the looks of the new center, though he believes there are at least some cosmetic things that need to be done. A projected budget of $300,000 for such upgrades was pulled by the City Council in favor of other projects, making it unlikely that any work will be done this year.
The convention center has garnered rave reviews from industry professionals around the country, and its 190-foot tower of glass surrounding the rotunda lobby is likely to become as much an Anaheim landmark as the Matterhorn or Grizzly Peak. And though many companies are bracing for an economic slowdown that eventually could put a drag on the convention business, there is no sign of a tourism slowdown in the immediate future.
The average meeting budget in 2000 was around $225,000, according to an industry survey by trade publication Successful Meetings. That survey projects continued growth of about 3% annually in the number and size of corporate and association meetings. Meanwhile, tradeshow attendance and the amount of space used climbed about 3% each last year, according to Tradeshow Week. Tradeshow attendance averaged 13,431 attendees in 2000, while the average show used 208,000 square feet of exhibit space. Both are expected to grow 3% annually. n
