Glasgow wins £46 million of conference business

 

Among the new international meetings coming to the city are the 3,000 delegate European Society of Organ Transplantation in 2011 worth £5.4 million to the local economy, and the European Symposium on Calcified Tissues (3,000 delegates) in 2010, which is also worth £2.4 million.

 

Glasgow’s credentials as a major conference destination have been underscored by the decision of a number of UK associations to return to the city. Among the organisations which have recently rebooked are Drug Therapy in HIV, a 2,500 delegate conference worth £5.7 million, which returns next year for the ninth time, and the British Society for Rheumatology, which has 2,500 delegates and is worth £4.6 million.

 

The announcement was made by Glasgow City Marketing Bureau (GCMB) at the start of National Meetings Week, which runs from October 15 to 19. National Meetings Week is held annually to highlight the fact that meetings and events contribute £10.3 billion every year to the UK economy and support 530,000 jobs, according to the Business Tourism Partnership.

 

GCMB booked £147,989,426 of conference business in 2006-07 – more than double the value of the previous year. (See notes to editors 1).

 

Councillor Steven Purcell, the Chair of GCMB and Leader of Glasgow City Council, said: “Glasgow is enjoying an excellent year for conferences. We have come up against very strong competition internationally, which makes these conference wins all the more satisfying.

 

“Much of our success is down to the Team Glasgow approach that the Convention Bureau at GCMB takes, working with our partners in the city’s hotels, venues – particularly the SECC - restaurants and shops.”

 

Molly Doheny, head of the Convention Bureau at GCMB, added: “I am delighted that many of our national association conferences have chosen to return to the city, which is a ringing endorsement of the package that Glasgow is offering to the highly competitive meetings marketplace.

 

“It is also particularly pleasing that many of these international conferences have been won by members of the Glasgow Conference Ambassador Programme – GCMB’s free, one-stop service that offers advice and support for academics, scientists, medics and business people thinking of bringing a conference to the city.”

 

The Scottish Exhibition + Conference Centre (SECC) – the UK’s largest integrated conference and convention centre – has been central to establishing Glasgow as a major international conference destination.

 

This year the Clyde Auditorium at the SECC – popularly known as the Armadillo – celebrates 10 years in business. Over the past decade, the Armadillo has hosted 583 conferences attracting 450,000 delegates, according to the SECC. In the past 10 years, events and conferences at the SECC have generated £1.1 billion to the economy of Glasgow and supported 2,500 jobs.

 

Ben Goedegebuure, Director of Conference Sales at the SECC, said: “As we celebrate the 10^th anniversary of the Clyde Auditorium, I’m delighted that not only has it become an icon for Glasgow and the SECC, but that it has earned a reputation as a first-class facility that has placed us on the world map as a conference destination of choice.

 

“I am pleased to say that today we continue to invest in our facilities and they are only going to better when our new 12,500-seat purpose-built Arena opens in 2011. Its construction demonstrates our commitment to continuous improvement in our venue which will make the SECC and Glasgow an extremely attractive proposition for organisers and delegates alike.”

 

Molly Doheny added: “The opening of the Armadillo in 1997 undoubtedly signaled Glasgow’s intention to become a serious player on the conference scene. It has given the city the infrastructure to successfully bid for leading national and international meetings and it has been a pleasure to work in partnership with the SECC to establish Glasgow as a cutting edge conference destination.”

 

One in five hotel beds in Glasgow is now occupied by a conference delegate, highlighting the importance of meetings to the city’s economy.  This month (October), Glasgow launched an ambitious 10 year strategy to grow the city’s tourism sector from £700 million a year in 2005 to £1 billion in 2016, and increase the number of visitors from 2.8 million to four million. Attracting more business tourists – including conference delegates – is a crucial part of this strategy.

 

This year’s National Meetings Week is focusing on the importance of meetings to sustaining the UK’s cultural legacy.

 

In the field of culture and the arts, many museums, galleries and theatres owe their longer opening times and reduced or free entry to the extra revenue they bring in from meetings.

 

Hundreds of castles and stately homes across the UK are able to stay open and be enjoyed by members of the public as a result of the money they generate from meetings and events.

 

The meetings industry also helps support educational establishments. Meetings held in schools and universities generate valuable revenue which can be reinvested in equipment or programmes.

 

Finally, many venues are a central part of their local communities, either as an employer, a destination for local meetings, or as an organisation that buys goods and services from other local businesses.

 

 

 

 

1.  Part of the reason for the value of conferences in Glasgow doubling is that VisitBritain has revised the official way of calculating the value of meetings after research showed delegates spend far more money on items such as shopping, accommodation, food and drink than had been previously thought. But even using ‘like for like’ figures, GCMB still recorded a healthy 8% increase in the value of conferences booked from £65.7 million in 2005-06 to £71.1 million in 2006-07.

 

To read the VisitBritain survey on delegate spending, click: http://www.tourismtrade.org.uk/Images/11816%20BTU%20Delegate%20PDF%20AW_tcm12-29500.pdf)

 

2.  For more information on National Meetings Week, see www.nationalmeetingsweek.co.uk. Or contact amy.scott@daviestanner.co.uk 01892 619100.

 

3.  To arrange an interview with GCMB Chief Executive Scott Taylor or GCMB Convention Bureau Head Molly Doheny, contact Caroline Gray on 0141 556 0832 caroline.gray@seeglasgow.com

 

4.  GCMB is a partner in National Meetings Week along with organisations such as VisitBritain, InterContinental Hotels Group, Marriott Hotels, Visit London and Sodexho Prestige.

 

5.  Some meeting facts, supplied by CAT Publications: