The Conference and Events industry is very diverse and interesting, with endless possibilities. Conferencing Weekly look at some issues that could affect agencies, venues and the industry in general.

 

  • Customer expectations – Delegates expect good quality venues, with adequate facilities such as Wi-Fi broadband, video conferencing, good AV facilities. Venues must up their game in order to meet delegate’s high expectations. Venues that include AV such as an LCD projector in their Day delegate prices already have an advantage over others. In the future, we will continue to see more of this. 
     

  • Olympics 2012 – The upcoming Olympics means that a great deal of investment will be going into the capital city, from more bedrooms and hotels, to improved transport links. Events may be hard to place around the time of the Olympics, so organisers may think about staying away from London, however this will be a great boost to the economy and meetings and conferences. 
     

  • Religious conferences – The amount of religious conferences in the UK, is on the rise and looks to become a prominent sector in the industry. They are great for venues as they often take place in off peak season, they may have low budgets but have large numbers because of their following. 
     

  • Price of venues – Whether rates are to increase or stay stagnant is anyone’s guess at the moment. London prices generally will stay high, but venues will become more flexible in the future if they need to fill up space. 
     

  • Volumes of conferencing – Conferencing is a massive earner for our economy. It is set to rise, as meetings and conferences need to happen in order to make business’s work. Areas that conferencing may become more popular will be cities such as Sheffield, Leeds, Manchester…etc as much redevelopment and investments is going into these Northern Cities. 
     

These are just a few aspects that conferencing weekly believe are important factors to the future of our industry.