If imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, then the International Association of Conference Centers (IACC) is getting genuine praise in spades.
Increasing numbers of hotels are adding conference facilities designed to adhere to IACC’s strict requirements for membership in the organization.
Among them is the Hyatt Regency Bonaventure Conference Center & Spa near Fort Lauderdale, Fla., which has applied for IACC membership following a $100 million renovation carried out according to the organization’s standards. It seeks to join a small but growing number of hotels operated under major brands that offer IACC-sanctioned conference facilities.
For 26 years, IACC has promoted its own brand of bona fide “conference center,” setting standards for what it believes are the right conditions for the most productive meetings and training.
Its 304 member properties worldwide, including 214 in North America, range from day centers and university facilities to resorts. Many are operated by companies such as Benchmark Hospitality and Dolce International that specialize in conference center management.
Conference centers, according to IACC, differ from other hospitality venues in that they are purpose-built to maximize the productivity of meetings of between 25 and 75 people. IACC’s list of membership criteria includes rules covering acoustics, lighting, furnishings, and equipment.
The IACC Difference
While a growing number of hotels are adding such amenities as ergonomic chairs to their meeting rooms, these steps are only part of what it takes to become an IACC member, according to Tom Bolman, executive vice president of the St. Louis-based organization.
“The physical part is easy. Hotels add components like furnishings, but it’s the operations part that they don’t get right,” he says.
If a non-IACC hotel says it has a top conference center, Bolman suggests asking a few questions to quickly discern if it is equipped for serious smaller meetings. Is there a guest-room work area? Is the group assigned a conference planner? Will there be continuous refreshment breaks? Is there a business center close to the meeting rooms? All of these points are part of IACC criteria.
In recent years, meetings hotels nationwide have also been adding their versions of the CMP (complete meeting package)—another IACC-pioneered requirement. Bolman advises asking what it encompasses. IACC stipulates that CMPs include lodging (except at day centers), three meals, refreshment breaks, 24-hour meeting room access, and basic audiovisual equipment.
Neil Pompan, a hospitality consultant and IACC North America president, explains further: “Hotels sell guest rooms. Conference centers are selling meetings to small and medium-size markets—that’s a very subtle but very significant difference. Ultimately, what we’re doing is promoting the most successful meeting that can be provided.”
The Evolving Center
According to Bolman, IACC’s basic concept, which is to provide a distraction-free environment, hasn’t changed since the group was formed in 1981.
“The types of conference centers, though, have changed. The [hotel] flags have been getting involved. We have a lot more day conference centers. People expect higher standards, and conference centers have lots more amenities like golf and spas,” he says.
Currently, Hilton has nine IACC-certified properties under the Hilton brand and seven under Doubletree; Marriott, seven; Sheraton, six; Wyndham four; and Millennium, one, in New York City.
The Hyatt Regency Bonaventure Conference Center & Spa, which held a grand reopening in February 2007, hopes to become the first Hyatt member of IACC. The resort features golf and 50,000 square feet of indoor meeting space on one level and another 50,000 square feet outdoors. There are three ballrooms and 24 breakout rooms.
Kelly Commerford, the resort’s director of sales and marketing, says the rollout of IACC–standard services will be completed this spring.
“IACC certification will enable us to go after new business—insurance and financial services training that require upscale facilities and meet in summer,” he says.
Ancillary Centers
Pompan, who welcomes the trend of major hotel brands embracing IACC standards, says that the majority of new properties being built to IACC standards are conversions of existing hotels.
“Hotels have come under new ownership, are undergoing multimillion-dollar renovations, and are being repositioned along IACC guidelines,” he says. “They will be opening in Denver, Detroit, Boston, Atlanta, central New Jersey, and Stamford, Connecticut.”
Most are what IACC categorizes as “ancillary” centers, a situation in which an IACC-certified conference center is part of a larger resort or convention hotel. IACC stipulates that the ancillary center be named in such a way as to differentiate it from the property. (Hilton, Doubletree and Wyndham brands use the phrase “Executive Meeting Center” in their names for their ancillary centers.)
In its 2007 conference center trends report done in conjunction with IACC, PKF Consulting said the “drift toward an increasing number of ancillary conference centers is partially a reaction to the need for more purpose-designed conference center space.” With record high construction costs, “new genuine conference centers are very difficult to build.”
Unlike the Hyatt Regency Bonaventure, which is going for full membership, the 269-room Doubletree Bethesda plans to seek membership as an ancillary center.
Formerly a Holiday Inn Select, the Doubletree Bethesda Hotel & Executive Meeting Center completed a $20 million renovation under new ownership last June. It is on Washington, D.C.’s metro line and its meetings business benefits from being next door to the National Institutes of Health.
To achieve membership, the hotel rebuilt 7,400 square feet of its meeting space to IACC standards.
“There are multiple advantages in being IACC. It gives us a clear point of difference,” says Rick Southard, director of sales and marketing for the Doubletree Bethesda. “It’s a turnkey solution. There are so many meeting planners who have other roles and so many duties. They don’t have to worry. The basic support they need is provided. If a planner has a series of 15 training sessions each for 30 people, the quality will be consistent for each one.”
Having a property built to IACC standards, he says, has “helped stretch occupancy and lift shoulder days and periods.”
The Bethesda hotel is owned by Thayer Lodging Group, which also owns three IACC-certified properties: the Wyndham Hotel and Conference Center Peachtree City, Ga., the Wyndham Miami Airport Hotel & Executive Meeting Center and the Wyndham Lisle-Chicago Hotel & Executive Meeting Center.
Conference Center Expansion
While more hotel companies that don’t specialize in conference centers are expanding their presence in IACC, those companies that do focus on conference centers are in a growth mode as well.
Last July, Dolce International announced a recapitalization that would allow for rapid expansion in the U.S. and Europe.
It repositioned as a pure management company. Principals of Broadreach Capital Partners, a private equity real estate firm, acquired 85 percent of Dolce. And with Broadreach and other partners buying properties, Dolce has expanded property management.
In November, the company added the 27th property to its hotel, resort and conference center portfolio, the Dolce Atlanta-Peachtree, formerly the Aberdeen Woods Conference Center. An enhancement that includes a ballroom addition will be completed in the fourth quarter of this year.
Last July, it took over management of the Dolce Valley Forge at King of Prussia, Pa., formerly Hilton Valley Forge. A $17 million renovation that includes adding 6,500 square feet of meeting space to the existing 21,000 square feet will be completed in June.
Last June, it took over the management of what is now the Dolce Basking Ridge, formerly AT&T’s executive conference center, in Basking Ridge, N.J.
Benchmark, which operates more than 30 resorts, hotels and conference centers, last March unveiled The Heldrich, a $120 million property in New Brunswick, N.J. The following month the property hosted IACC’s 26th annual conference, drawing 450 attendees, the highest turnout since 2001.
Aramark Harrison Lodging, which operates more than 50 conference centers, hotels and corporate training centers, in September opened the Desmond Tutu Education Center with 60 guest rooms at New York City’s General Theological Seminary of the Episcopal Church.
FLIK Conference Center Management, which operates 13 conference centers, will manage the AT&T Executive Education and Conference Center at the University of Texas Austin. Opening next August, the $127 million facilities will feature 297 rooms and 75,000 square feet of meeting space.
Sodexho Conferencing, which operates 16 conference centers, last June opened the Desert Willow Conference Center, a 40,000-square-foot day center in Phoenix’s Cotton Center business park.
It will also manage the 42,000- square-foot High Country Conference Center at Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff, slated to open along with a 160-room hotel in April.
Long-Term Outlook
In its 2007 survey of conference center trends, PKF Consulting found that more modest conference-center growth is likely to continue following three years of dramatic occupancy and rate growth.
“We indeed expect the peak to plateau for the foreseeable future,” stated Dave Arnold, the firm’s CEO-East.
The survey found “upper-end properties showing the best results with high investor confidence for the long-term strength of demand.” All types of conference centers achieved 2006 operating profit increases. And resort conference center profits grew at a faster pace that those of resort hotels.
A year earlier, in its 2006 report, PKF focused on conference centers’ increasing institutional ownership. It was one reason for their success, it said, but it also presented a challenge to the conference center concept: Owners look on them as a profit centers, and a growing contribution to revenue increase has come from leisure and individual business travelers.
PFK research also indicates that most conference centers have grown more flexible with the CMP and are more willing to unbundle some of the inclusions. For instance, if a group wants to go off-property for a dinner, many properties will now give a credit for meals already paid for in the CMP.
