In Europe, Featured, HSMAI, HSMAI, Marketing, News, News items, Revenue Management, Travel>Hotels, Upcoming

For many hotels, capitalising on MICE business will be an important part of their revenue management strategy this year – particularly as so many of our members are seeking different ways to drive their business recovery in the post-pandemic era.

With travel restrictions lifting, there are good reasons for the industry to feel optimistic about this piece of the business tourism pie – but what is the real picture on the ground and, in your region?

This month HSMAI Europe held an in-person event at the Hard Rock Hotel in London (part of the glh Hotel Group) and a series of virtual events for our DACH, French, Benelux, Nordic and Spanish members to explore the current MICE marketplace and B2B opportunities. Our thanks to Cvent, a market leader in hospitality technology, who presented their data findings on planner sourcing and RFP activity in each region,to all those that took part in the panel discussions and also to Jonanthan Liu, Director of Revenue and Marketing Strategy and Jane Griffiths, Global Sales Director at glh for their time and hospitality.

For those that couldn’t attend the events, we’ve put together some highlights from the findings and guidance on how to build MICE business this year.

Certainly, the way we do MICE business, and our approach has to change – it’s not a case of having the same pre-Covid mindset in 2022. As the data revealed, hybrid events are here to stay. For many regions, they have become the top type of event to organise, even with the return of in-person events. It seems clear that hotels and venues prepared to evolve, make changes and create memorable meaningful experiences to accommodate planners’ needs will be the ones reaping the rewards this year.

Sustainability and the industry’s commitment to doing far more than green washing is a big driver to hybrid events being top of the agenda. But to echo Michael Nowlis’s words in his interview ‘Let’s Talk Sustainability’ featured this month, whilst the industry is taking action, it still has far to go. Many of you may know that Michael, aside from being the Chair of our Association’s Board of Directors, is also an academic and currently is a Programme Director at the Institute of Sustainability Leadership at Cambridge University.

Sharing educational insights on how our industry can work together to meet environmental targets is an extremely important focus for our Association – it won’t come from us working in silos but by us sharing the wealth of knowledge so we can build on our efforts to date. We hope you find this month’s practical tips on supporting the sustainability drive helpful. The need for tomorrow’s hospitality workforce to be part of a responsible business brand remains critical – as highlighted in our interview with Emile Schelfhout, the Chair of HSMAI Europe’s Student Council.

Finally, whilst HSMAI Europe is an apolitical organisation and our focus is on the industry, our thoughts are with all those who are suffering due to recent developments in the Ukraine and Russia.

 

Ingunn Hofseth
President & CEO
HSMAI Region Europe

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