The influential PowWow trade show is coming to the Anaheim Convention Center in 2007.
The international tourism event, the largest generator of travel to the U.S., is staged by Washington, D.C.-based Travel Industry Association.
PowWow is a showcase for representatives of U.S. travel destinations.
The travel insiders spend the better part of three days each year touting their benefits to domestic and international operators who package vacations for tourists.
OC tourism officials were among the 5,500 attendees from 70 countries who went to this year’s confab in New York in early May.
Their goals: to drum up business for this region and to help prepare for 2007 when Anaheim hosts the conference for the first time.
PowWow is more than just another convention, officials said.
The event generated roughly $300 million in travel bookings for New York during the next two to three years and is expected to generate similar results for Orange County.
“According to the Travel Industry Association, destinations that host PowWow receive approximately 10% of all international and domestic tour packaging,” said Charles Ahlers, president of the Anaheim/Orange County Visitor & Convention Bureau.
Some 80% of PowWow attendees book future business for the destination, according to the Travel Industry Association.
With that kind of expected impact, host cities typically go all out to impress attendees and the 400 or so reporters who cover the event.
Planning already has started here so that major work is completed by the time the convention hits Orlando next year, said Ann Gallaugher, vice president of tourism for the Anaheim/Orange County Visitor & Convention Bureau.
“Our challenge is to set ourselves apart from Orlando,” she said.
In June, Barbara Logan, the Travel Industry Association’s director of meeting and event services, paid a visit to Anaheim for the first formal joint planning session.
Logan last visited Anaheim in 1999. She was impressed by the changes in the Anaheim Resort District and said the city is on track with its planning timeline.
PowWow is set for April 21-25, 2007.
“Anaheim is even ahead of the curve,” Logan said.
She said the Travel Industry Association typically works three years ahead of the PowWow to make sure exhibitor space is filled and preparations are on track.
“We trust in the (host) cities to decide what they need or want to showcase,” she said.
Typically, a host city handles sightseeing trips for visiting travel buyers and journalists during the first two days of the event and determines where the evening PowWow events will be held.
Sightseeing trips that follow the meetings usually are arranged by state tourism offices, Logan said.
In Anaheim, evening events at the Disneyland Resort and Knott’s Berry Farm will be part of the mix, Gallaugher said.
New York staged events at the new Time Warner Center, Rockefeller Center and Ellis Island.
Last year, Los Angeles held events at the Walt Disney Concert Hall, Hollywood and Universal Studios.
Gallaugher said she was encouraged by the enthusiasm for California exhibited by tour operators in New York.
“As a first-time host for PowWow, we feel strongly this will give us the opportunity to unveil the new Anaheim resort product to the international market in particular,” Ahlers said.
