Benchmark Hospitality International—a hospitality management company that operates 35 award-winning hotels, resorts, and conference centers coast to coast and offshore—announced its "Top Ten Meeting Trends for 2012," as observed by its properties.
Among them: Trend One is being called “Luxury is Back!” Properties are seeing high-end resorts considered once again; albeit cautiously. Trend Two, “At Last,” refers to strong growth of meeting demand; the third trend is—simply put--meeting size is trending up and space is at a premium. The third trend, simply put, is “Meeting Space is Trending Up and Space is at a Premium. Trend Four is “21st Century Meeting Space is Different!” Today’s planners are looking for properties with outsized meeting rooms out of doors, inspirational and non-traditional nooks & crannies for small gatherings and breakouts inside, and are requesting oversized chairs and meeting accessories as an occasional alternative to ergonomics, according to company officials.
Benchmark is calling trend number five “Meetings Technology has Leapt into the 21st Century!” Trend Six is “The Meeting Package is Coming Back strong!” Planners are embracing CMP pricing for the value it offers the meeting budget, according to company officials. Trend Seven is “Slowly and Carefully Meeting Pricing is Trending Up; Trend 8 is labeled “Teambuilding Budgets are Continuing their Comeback.
Trend Number Nine, “We’ve Seen this Before, We’re Seeing it Again,” refers to the fact that as the economy strengthens, corporate America is once more renewing its focus on ensuring it has the best trained sales and management teams possible, and is therefore ramping up training budgets, said Benchmark executives. Lastly, Trend 10 is all about location. It’s being called “Increasingly, the Meeting Destination is as Important as the Meeting Venue,” referring to the fact that time invested in a meeting is more valuable than ever before, and the need to counter-balance this with destination experiences is taking on new meaning, the company said.
Officials also have noticed a bonus trend, “Socially Responsible Meetings.” The need to give back is strong, they said.
