Adelaide shares in national convention boom:
Friday, 17 June 2005
All around Australia, Convention and Exhibitions are booming, and Adelaide is no exception.
With bookings beyond 2010, The Adelaide Convention Centre is looking forward to June next year, which will be a record month in the Centre's 18 year history. "Unlike some venues where their core business is accommodation, ours is a specialist activity where we're not sidetracked by having to split resources. So we focus solely on the event, " says the Centre's CEO Pieter van der Hoeven. " I think you can best describe us as a five star hotel without rooms," he adds.
"And for purpose built convention centres such as ours, this is long term business where often you have to plan ten years ahead. the business we book today for three years' time may have been the result of work done by us for the past three years & or more," he said. "Right now, we're not marketing 2005 & we're marketing 2008 and beyond. And in turn that may come from leads we had identified five years ago. We average around 13 events a week, all year, we never close, and in doing this we generate around $50million of economic benefits to South Australia each year.
The Adelaide Convention Centre was Australia's first purpose-built venue, and since our opening in 1987, a chain of convention centres has been established around the Nation. It's a trend we warmly welcome, because it places Australia firmly in the minds of international event planners, and well in the forefront of considerations when a convention or exhibition is planned. It's then up to us to compete when they come looking."
"In this country, we have such a variety on offer & from Perth's distinctive advantages to the tropical atmosphere of Brisbane or Cairns. For a metropolis there's Sydney and its harbour, Melbourne has its own flavour, but when you come to Adelaide we provide the Oxford and Cambridge of Australia, with a scientific and technological flavour. And our business blends with this. But it's the city itself which has the distinct advantage over others, because Adelaide has all the infrastructure of a large city without the baggage which comes with it. Wide roads, easy access and a cost around 25% less than elsewhere.
In Sydney or Melbourne, delegates are moved around in buses, but Adelaide has almost 2,000 hotel rooms within close walking distance of the Convention Centre. Our theatres are also within walking distance, and so is the main retail area and CBD. Traffic is not a problem, and our airport is 15 minutes' away. The new terminal is opening in October, and this will extend our competitive advantage even further," Mr van der Hoeven claims.
In the Adelaide Convention Centre, our extension, which opened in 2000, offers more than 10,000 square metres of pillarless floorspace with views over Torrens Lake to the cricket ground and parklands through the 150 metre solar glass wall.
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