Convention centers throughout Southern California and the nation battle in a never-ending contest to win the business of everyone from comic book geeks to medical device makers.
Their weapons: marketing campaigns, sales presentations, cold calls, and facility expansions and renovations that can cost tens of millions of dollars.
The spoils for the victors: visitors and the money they spend at hotels, restaurants, shops, theme parks and other attractions.
Officials of the city-owned Anaheim Convention Center and their counterparts at the Anaheim/Orange County Visitor & Convention Bureau will have those stakes in mind this week when a proposed $180 million facility expansion is expected to go before the City Council on March 11.
The proposal aims to extend the 1.6 million-square-foot convention center’s status as the largest in Southern California. It drew more than 1 million visitors to 238 events last year and accounted for nearly 500,000 hotel nights. That puts it second in the region to San Diego on hotel stays and behind only Los Angeles in attendance (see related information graphic, above).
Backers of the plan say added space would help the convention center attract and retain larger events, such as the annual gathering of the National Association of Music Merchants (NAMM), which drew more than 96,000 visitors for its four-day run in January.
An expansion is also needed to attract new groups and shows and to accommodate more than one gathering at a time, said Jay Burress, president and chief executive of the bureau.
And it’s necessary to stay ahead of a crowded local field—Los Angeles, San Diego and Long Beach all boast big-league convention centers, with Ontario not far back and Riverside open for niche business. Then there are the competitors scattered throughout the U.S.
“There is an incredible amount of centers that have been built—there are competitors now that weren’t competitors years ago,” Burress said. “It’s not just an arms race of us trying to keep up with the other destinations—it’s really building to maintain your competitive advantage.”
The Long Beach Convention & Entertainment Center has one of the newest additions to pitch to meeting planners—the $10 million, 45,000-square-foot Pacific Ballroom that opened in November. The space is customizable, with floor-to-ceiling curtains and electronic walls. Groups can use its lighting, sound and video system—all controllable through an iPad.
Pacific Ballroom capped off a $40 million investment that also included improvements to the lobby, meeting rooms, hallways and landscaping.
It was a repositioning intended to add appeal to the Long Beach facility for a new generation of meetings and conventions attendees with an environment that encourages networking, said Long Beach Convention & Visitors Bureau President and Chief Executive Steve Goodling.
“We provide lots of opportunity for networking, and that is really where this trend is going—the generation of attendees who know nothing different than being raised in a Starbucks environment where they can sit down, fire up their iPad, iPhone or whatever it is,” Goodling said. “Now, inversely, you have the older generation who can’t stand anymore. You have two generations whose needs now are overlapping for two different reasons.”
Unique Experiences
Convention centers and destinations need to offer unique experiences, because attendees are “burned out on four walls,” he said.
“We’re in an overall market that’s oversupplied in terms of exhibit space, so in order to continue to win business as a destination, we have to answer the needs more of the convention planner and convention attendee. Are we giving them an environment that’s a ‘wow’ experience?”
Current bookings would suggest the answer to that question for Long Beach is yes. Pacific Ballroom led to an additional $39 million in business from 24 events booked over the next three years, Goodling said.
Standing out as a destination is also important, said Los Angeles Tourism & Convention Board Senior Vice President of Sales Darren Green.
“Certain destinations are always looking for more space, and other destinations may have an abundance, and there are also cycles in your booking and demand periods,” he said. “I don’t think the space has as much to do with it as demand—if the demand is there and the facility is an attractive option for customers.”
Anschutz Entertainment Group won the management contract for the Los Angeles Convention Center in December, taking management of the city-owned facility private.
Green said bookings have been consistent, with an uptick in short-term demand—business from events booked closer to their run dates—from smaller groups.
San Diego is also seeing a window of opportunity in the short-term business.
“I think the economy is helping drive short-term business,” said Steven Johnson, vice president of public affairs at San Diego Convention Center Corp. “It was really hard hit when the 2008 financial crisis occurred, and people were canceling events left and right. We’re seeing a strengthening in the regular economy with short-term. We saw it last year, and we’re seeing it continue in this solid secondary business for us.”
San Diego Convention Corp., which manages and markets the facility, said the bulk of its projected 2014 business will come from medical shows forecasted to bring in $425.9 million in total economic impacts via organizations such as the American Association for Cancer Research and the American Academy of Pediatrics.
The California Coastal Commission in October approved the $520 million expansion of the San Diego Convention Center that includes 225,000 square feet of exhibit space and an 80,000-square-foot ballroom.
Construction is expected to begin early next year, although the plan still faces a legal challenge filed by an environmental group.
The outlook for bookings is also bright further inland.
The Riverside Convention Center totals 65,000 square feet of indoor space following a $43 million renovation and expansion. It has 80 events booked through 2018.
The National History Day California State Competition returns to Riverside in April. The last time it was in the city, two years ago, part of the downtown business district was turned into a historic representation of the competition’s theme, with Revolutionary War scenarios running down the four-block pedestrian mall. That integration of major events into the downtown keeps Riverside unique, said Debbi Guthrie, senior vice president of convention center manager Raincross Hospitality Corp.
“Smaller”
Although the convention center added space, it still has a boutique feel that gives Riverside an advantage against the competition, she said.
“Groups choose us because it’s a smaller venue and they feel like they’re not just filling a room at a convention center,” Guthrie said. “Everything that happens around the convention center and the hotels are all centered around them, and so they feel like they’re part of our community.”
Anaheim has its own trump card in the Disneyland Resort, with its two theme parks that help draw more than 20 million visitors annually in their own right, according to the Themed Entertainment Association.
That’s part of a package that helped the visitor bureau’s sales staff book 42 major conventions last year, according to Burress, who said he sees the proposed expansion as the best chance to keep business flowing to Anaheim.
“It’s all about jobs,” he said. “It’s about economic impact and future revenue to the city.”
