The preeminent meetings industry associations have banded together in an unprecedented industry-wide collaboration focused on stressing the value of the travel and meetings industry to Congress and the new presidential administration.
“This is something, frankly, that needed to happen yesterday, so it’s happening today,” said Deborah Sexton, president and CEO of PCMA, Jan. 12 at the association’s annual meeting in New Orleans.
Sexton said recent discussions about the importance of the federal government bailing out key U.S. economic sectors, such as the financial and auto industries, brought the issue to the fore.
“When you don’t see the travel industry being mentioned as a big part of the economy, you’ve got a problem,” Sexton said.
The effort will involve an alphabet soup of travel industry associations, including CIC, PCMA, NBTA, MPI, ASAE, DMAI, SITE, ACTE and IAEE. The associations will be joined by third-party meetings giant Maritz Travel.
The coalition will provide research to the U.S. Travel Association, which will handle lobbying efforts at various levels of the government.
“We will doing a lot of lobbying, but you can’t just lobby with anecdotes,” said Roger Dow, president and CEO of U.S. Travel explaining how his association will use the research to present a case for the travel industry to the government. “I’ve been in the industry for many years and this is the first time I’ve seen this type of [collaboration] between industry associations.”
The association leaders met Jan. 12 to formally begin the project, and are planning to meet again in the next couple of weeks in Washington, D.C., to develop a written plan. The effort, which has yet to even receive a formal name, is expected to last up to 18 months.
Although lavish meeting and incentive programs being held by companies that are receiving federal bailout money, such as the recent AIG program at The St. Regis Monarch Beach Resort in Dana Point, Calif., have created acute negative public perception issues about the incentive segment of the meetings industry in particular, the coalition as yet has no plans to prioritize its efforts on specific parts of the meetings industry.
The argument can be made, however, that negative news about one segment can affect the industry as a whole.
“This is way beyond the incentive market,” said Christine Duffy, president and CEO of Maritz Travel. “We’ve had clients that have received bailout money that are canceling meetings because they don’t want to be next on the Jay Leno show.”
- To hear an interview about the new meetings industry association collaboration visit www.meetingstoday.com/tv and click on Videos About Us and the Deborah Sexton video.
