The Future of Europe s Tourist Offices and Convention Bureaux

Transcription

1 The Future of Europe s Tourist Offices and Convention Bureaux St Petersburg, 28 th - 31 st March 2012

2 From Russia with love Venue for the spring 2012 ECM networking meeting is St Petersburg romantic, Russian, a visual delight, with a breathtaking array of historical and architectural gems topped off by the incomparable Hermitage. It holds out the promise of being as inspirational a setting for Europe s leading city tourist offices and convention bureaux this coming March, as it has been for many of Russia s most celebrated sons from Pushkin and Dostoïevsky to Rachmaninoff, Tchaïkovsky and Shostakovich through to Medvedev and Putin. At the forefront of the Russian Revolution (after which in 1924 it became Leningrad), the city reverted to being called St Petersburg in In 2003, St Petersburg proudly celebrated the tri-centenary of its establishment by Tsar Peter the Great. Along with Moscow, it is the most important tourist destination in Russia which is down to its magnificent churches, squares, palaces, museums and parkland and its impressive conference facilities. Our theme for ECM St Petersburg is the future of Europe s city tourist offices and convention bureaux. Against a background of continuing economic uncertainty and reductions in public as well as commercial sources of funding, the outlook for city tourism offices and convention bureaux is, to say the least, a highly challenging one. Uncertainty is reinforced by widespread structural change - external and external. Across Europe, city tourist organisations are being restructured; in some instances this means the creation of new public-private partnerships; in other instances it means merger and the formation of a new breed of multi-functional city marketing agencies; elsewhere, radical change management regimes are evident as city tourism organisations seek to transform themselves from within into more integrated and purposeful marketing entities. Meanwhile, the Third Annual Incon Survey of the Global Association Conference Market 2011 has shed important new light on relationships between convention bureaux and PCOs. And, as discussed at recent ECM meetings, the online booking systems and contact centres established by city tourism offices and convention bureaux struggle to fight off the threat posed by third party booking agencies, while the rise of social media and the need to convert lookers into bookers remains a burning issue. So whither the future of city tourism offices and convention bureaux? The seminar in St Petersburg will seek to answer this most fundamental of question, taking forward the content of the debate begun at ECM Sofia one year ago and identifying best practice. Nana Gvichyia CEO, St. Petersburg City Tourist Information Center Dieter Hardt-Stremayr Managing Director, Graz Tourismus President, European Cities Marketing

3 ST PETERSBURG We would like to invite you to St Petersburg, a unique city, one of the most admired cities in the whole and an outstanding venue for conferences. St Petersburg is a treasure-house of superb architecture, history and culture. From its foundation, it was afforded the status of a capital from the eighteenth century it became the principal centre in Russia for industry, finance, science and education center. Nowadays it hosts more than 300 forums and congresses each year, many of them of international significance. According to the United Nations, St Petersburg is among the ten most attractive tourist destinations of the world. The city is an open-air museum of striking architectural magnificence, embodying architectural styles from the last three centuries. St Petersburg is Russia s gateway to Europe. It s a sea port, a huge megapolis, an intersection point of numerous highways. Moskovskiy railway station situated in the heart of the city marks the very beginning of the country s railway system. As a scientific and financial centre, St Petersburg is home to highly qualified professionals and other specialists work who are continually innovating and developing new products. Its universities provide Russia with 450,000 qualified graduates a year. Reflecting its position as the cultural and tourist capital of Russia, there are approximately 8,000 monuments and more than one thousand cultural institutions -museums, theatres, concert halls, cinemas, and exhibition halls abound. St Petersburg is one of the world s most desirable places in which to live, work, play, study and do business. As Russia s most European cities, it is safe and tolerant with a rich business, cultural and nightlife. Welcome to St Petersburg!

4 PROGRAMME Meeting venue: CORINTHIA HOTEL WEDNESDAY 28 TH march Knowledge Group Research & Statistics Chaired by Olivier Ponti (Amsterdam) Group members only* Coffee Break Conventions Committee Chaired by Heike Mahmoud (ECM Vice President Conventions Forum) Committee members only* Lunch (at own expense) price : Best Practice Session for members of the Conventions Forum Moderated by Anne Wallin Rødven (Oslo) All sessions open to members of ECM Convention Forum Presentation of ECM survey on meetings statistics Olivier Ponti, Manager Reasearch and Development, Amsterdam Tourism and Convention Board How to get good meetings statistics in your city (followed by an open discussion) Olivier Ponti, Manager Reasearch and Development, Amsterdam Tourism and Convention Board & Frode Aasheim, Manager, Bergen Convention Bureau Ambassador programmes - are they still important? (followed by Questions and Answers) Steen Jakobsen, Director, Wonderful Copenhagen Convention Bureau Elif Balci Fisunoğlu, General Manager, Istanbul Conventions and Visitors Bureau Coffee Break National Convention Bureaux are they a help or an expenditure? TBA national convention bureau (private) TBA national convention bureau (part of tourist board) Anna Lindström, Uppsala Convention Bureau (Swedish Convention Bureau network) Open discussion Meetings Committee Chaired by Gillian Cruddas (York) Committee members only* Editorial Board ECM Benchmarking report Chaired by Katrin Heintschel (Vienna) Group members only* Coffee Break Knowledge Group Culture and Events Chaired by Catherine Dardenne (Brussels) Committee members only* *Group / Committee members only - Please find all Committee and Knowledge Group members on Gathering in the lobby of Corinthia hotel Dinner Reception at Konstantin Palace The National Congress Palace address : Berezovaya alley 3, Strelna - St Petersburg dress code : black tie THURSDAY 29 th march Breakfast with the President of ECM at Corinthia hotel This breakfast is open to all potential members and new members attending an ECM meeting for the first time. THE FUTURE OF EUROPE S CITY TOURIST OFFICES AND CONVENTION BUREAUX INTRODUCTION Welcome & opening Dieter Hardt-Stremayr, President, European Cities Marketing Seminar chairperson s overview Dr Amelia Tomasevic, CEO, Zagreb Tourist Board ORGANISATIONAL AND MARKET CONTEXT Finance and organisation of European city tourist offices and convention bureaux 2011: results of the ECM member survey John Heeley, Director, Best Destination Marketing Case study of tourism organisation and strategy in St Petersburg Lev Kuznetsov, Deputy Director, St Petersburg City Marketing Agency What TripAdvisor can tell you about how your city is (or isn t) meeting the requirements of the 21 st century urban tourist Coffee Break Helena Egan, Head of Destination Marketing Sales, Europe, Middle East, Africa and Asia, TripAdvisor

5 KEY ISSUES Role of core PCOs Caroline Mackenzie, Director Business Development, Congrex Holding BV, UK Visitor and convention bureaux and how best to engage with your PCOs Caroline Mackenzie, Director Business Development, Congrex Holding BV, UK Pharmaceutical industry new developments Dr Beate Sidau, Managing Director, GRABEAS GmbH, Königstein Q&A s to the morning speakers Lunch KEY ISSUES CONTINUED Trend to join-in events with barcamps, hybrid meetings and social web Wolf-Thomas Karl, Marketing Director, Karl and Karl, and Christine Fuchs, Head of Sales and Marketing, TW TagungsWirtschaft Social media and the conversion of lookers to bookers Nicolas de Dianous, Marketing Director, MonNuage Reinvesting in an online booking system and making it work Dieter Hardt-Stremayr, Managing Director, Graz Tourismus Q&A s to the afternoon speakers and summing up by the Seminar Chairperson 15: Coffee Break FINALE Presentation of the new City Tourism Benchmark Tool Olivier Ponti, Manager Research & Development, Amsterdam Tourism and Convention Board Invitation to attend ECM Annual Meeting Gathering in the lobby of Corinthia hotel Dinner at Taleon Imperial Hotel address: Nevsky prospect 15, Saint-Petersburg dress code: black tie FRIDAY 30 th MARCH Board Meeting including Coordination Group Coordination Group chaired by Stefan Diender (Vice President Tourism Forum) Knowledge groups chairs and Board members only* Board Meeting Coffee Break Board members only - lunch served in the room Knowledge Group Online Marketing and Sales Chaired by Ossian Stienstrand (Göteborg) Open session for all delegates Knowledge Group Tourist Information centres Lunch Chaired by Synne Myhre (Oslo) Observers welcome Knowledge Group Tourist Information centres Open session for all delegates Knowledge Group Research and Statistics - part I Open session for all delegates «How to use the new City Tourism Benchmark Tool». Workshop moderated by Olivier Ponti (Amsterdam) Meetings Committee Committee members only* Coffee Break Knowledge Group Research and Statistics - part II Workshop repeated Visit to St Petersburg Tourist Information centre Open session for all delegates Visit to Lenexpo Congress Centre Open session for all delegates Gathering in the lobby of Corinthia hotel Cocktail at Erarta Museum address: Line 29th, 2 Vasilyevsky island dress code: smart casual SATURDAY 31 st MARCH Discover the highlights of Saint Petersburg cultural heritage Visit of the State Hermitage and the State museum-preserve Tsarskoye Selo Limited places, please book when registering

6 SOCIAL PROGRAMME Saturday 31 st March Discover the State Hermitage Museum and the State museum-preserve Tsarskoye Selo Gathering in the lobby of Corinthia Hotel The State Hermitage Museum One of the largest and oldest museums of the world, it was founded in 1764 by Catherine the Great and has been opened to the public since Its collections, of which only a small part is on permanent display, comprise nearly 3 million items, including the largest collection of paintings in the world. The collections occupy a large complex of six historic buildings along Palace Embankment, including the Winter Palace, a former residence of Russian emperors. Apart from them, the Menshikov Palace, Museum of Porcelain, Storage Facility at Staraya Derevnya and the eastern wing of the General Staff Building are also part of the museum. The experts say that if you were to spend a minute looking at each exhibit on display in the Hermitage, you would need 11 years before you would seen them all Transfer The State museum-preserve Tsarskoye Selo The Tsarskoye Selo palace and park ensemble (the State Museum-Preserve Tsarskoye Selo ) is a superb monument of world-ranking architecture and garden-and-park design dating from the eighteenth to early twentieth centuries. A whole constellation of outstanding architects, sculptors and painters made the ideas of their crowned clients a reality here. Tsarskoye Selo is a cluster of very fine examples of Baroque and Classical architecture and it was also the first place in the Russian capital where interiors decorated in the Moderne (Art Nouveau) style appeared. More than a hundred historical monuments are scattered across the Parks that have a joint area of 300 hectares: there are grand palaces and intimate pavilions, bridges and marble monuments, and also exotic structures imitating Gothic, Turkish and Chinese architecture that invest little corners of the parks with a romantic atmosphere Transfer to Corinthia Hotel free of charge - Limited places please register in advance

7 DINNER VENUES Wednesday 28 th March Seated dinner at the Konstantin Palace The National Congress Palace State complex The National Congress Palace is located on the picturesque coast of the Gulf of Finland, far from the city vanity, in the green space of Saint-Petersburg. Konstantin palace is the dominating structure of the complex. It is the former residence of grand dukes of the House of Romanovs and the revived monument of the Russian architecture of the XVIII th century. Today within the palace expositions Russian painting, decorative and applied arts of XVIII-XX centuries including the world-famous collection of M. Rostropovich and G. Vishnevskaya are widely presented. At the grottos of Konstantin Palace wine cellars with one of the greatest collection of elite wines in the world are placed. The palace is surrounded by the park, extending to the coast of the Gulf of Finland. Address : Berezovaya alley 3, Strelna Gathering in the lobby of Corinthia hotel at Shuttle to and from the dinner venue Dress code : black tie Thursday 29 th March Seated dinner at the Taleon Imperial Hotel Taleon Imperial Hotel is the only modern luxury hotel in Saint-Petersburg built in the XVIIIth century, a member of the Leading Hotels of the World and Virtuoso associations. At the beginning of the new millennium the renascence of the legendary buildings started. JSC Taleon, which conducted reconstruction and restoration of the palace, returned the former imperial splendor to the historical interiors. Nowadays, after laborious renewal, the ballroom appears in all its exquisite magnificence. Events, held at the Imperial Grand Hall, will definitely become the brightest ones in the cultural life of Saint-Petersburg and continue the tradition of the musical and dancing evenings, held in the legendary palace. Address : Nevsky prospect 15 Gathering in the lobby of Corinthia hotel at Shuttle to and from the dinner venue Dress code : black tie Friday 30 th March Cocktail at Erarta Contemporary Museum Erarta is the biggest in Russia non-governmental museum of contemporary art. Its task is to collect, exhibit, and popularize most ingenious and skillful works by contemporary artists. Erarta Museum welcomes the widest audience. Its pursuit is to provide every visitor with an opportunity to discover contemporary art and to find something in it that would be interesting and close to them. Address : Line 29th, 2 Vasilyevsky island Gathering in the lobby of Corinthia hotel at Shuttle to and from the venue Dress code : smart casual Azurmendi Yandiola

8 HOTEL INFORMATION All reservations to be made directly to the hotels by fax. Please download booking forms from ECM website. Please give the reference «ECM spring meeting» when booking. Corinthia Hotel ***** (Hotel venue) - Nevsky 57, St Petersburg Room rates (Buffet Breakfast and VAT included) Single room: 120 /night - Double room: 150 /night reservations.stpetersburg@corinthia.com Park Inn Nevsky **** Goncharnaya str. 4A, St Petersburg Room rates (Buffet Breakfast and VAT included) Single room: 2800 RUR - approx. 68 /night Double room: 3300 RUR - approx. 80 /night reservations.ledpn@rezidorparkinn.com Sokos Hotel Palace Bridge ***** Birzhevoy per.4a, St Petersburg Cronwell Inn *** Stremyannaya 18, St Petersburg Room rates (Buffet Breakfast and VAT included) Single room: 4200 RUR - approx. 101 /night Double room: 5000 RUR - approx. 121 /night reservations@shotels.ru Room rates (Buffet Breakfast and VAT included) Standard Single room : 2500 RUR - approx. 61 /night Standard Twin room: 3200 RUR - approx. 78 /night booking@str18-hotel.com Hotels location Map Cancellation policies stated page

9 CONFERENCE FEES Before February 15 After February 15 ECM Members (1 st & 2 nd delegate) EUR 400 EUR 450 ECM Members (3 rd delegate & more) EUR 360 EUR 390 ECM Members 1 day fee* EUR 223 Non-members EUR 495 EUR 545 Accompanying persons** EUR 223 Lunch at Corinthia hotel on 28 th March EUR 35 The conference fee includes attendance to the conference, lunches on Thursday and Friday, Seated dinners on Wednesday and Thursday and Cocktail on Friday and coffee breaks. Social programme on Saturday is also included in the fee. * 1day fee includes attendance on 1 day and either seated dinner on Wednesday OR Thursday. **Partners/Spouses may take part as an accompanying guest that includes seated dinners on Wednesday and Thursday and Cocktail on Friday, and Social programme on Saturday. Registration Please visit and register online before March 1st, If you have any questions, please contact Katy Schmitt at katy@europeancitiesmarketing.com. payment & cancellation policies Conference The conference fee is payable by Paypal or bank transfer to ECM via the online registration platform. Any cancellation must be sent in writing to katy@europeancitiesmarketing.com. In case of cancellation by 29 th February 2012 we will refund your registration fee. After this date a cancellation fee of 120 will be charged. Hotels Hotels room rates are guaranteed until March 1st, upon availability. Corinthia hotel : Rooms cancelled within the period 14-7 days prior 50% charge for 1 night Rooms cancelled less than 7 days prior to arrival 100% charge for 1 night Park Inn Nevsky : Rooms cancelled less than 72 hours prior to arrival 100% charge for 1 night Sokos Hotel Palace Bridge : Rooms can be cancelled without cancellation fees 3 days prior to arrival date. In case of cancellation 3 days prior,1 night stay is charged. Cronwell Inn : Room can be cancelled without cancellation fees 3 days prior to arrival date. In case of room cancellation, reduction of stay received less than 3 days prior to arrival date or no-show cancellation fee equals to 100% of the room rate per 1 night of stay is charged.

10 PRACTICAL SAINT-PETERSBURG IMPORTANT INFORMATION RELATED TO VISA Visa for foreigners is possible to get in the Russian consulates abroad. The reason to obtain the visa is an invitation issued by the Federal Migration Service or the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The procedure of execution of the visa takes from 1 to 14 days after the documents presentation to the consulate. In few isolated instances it is possible to speed up the procedure of execution. This service is paid additionally. A foreigner can get the visa only with the personal presence. Before to contact the consulate the foreigner must possess such documents as invitation, consular filled questionnaire, passport with a copy of its front page, 2 photos, medical certificate in case the visa is for multiple entries and insurance policy. When the foreigner gets the visa and crosses the Russian border he must make a registration in a hotel or appeal to the receiving party within 3 days excluding the arrival day.. How to get to St Petersburg By Air Pulkovo is the biggest airport of the North-West of Russia. By Railway ALLEGRO high-speed train connects St Petersburg and Helsinki, Finland. Please visit for rates and schedules. By Sea Regular ferries to St Petersburg from Helsinki, Stockholm and Tallinn. Please visit for rates and schedules. How to get to the hotels Please find a hotels location map page 8 To Corinthia hotel and Cronwell Inn From airport terminal 1 : buses #39, K39 to Moskovskaya Metro station and by metro to Mayakovskaya station From airport terminal 2 : buses #13, 113, K13, K113 to Moskovskaya Metro station and by metro to Mayakovskaya station From Allegro Train final stop : By Metro from Pl.Lenina station to Pl.Vosstania station From Seaport : bus #7 or trolley-buses #10 and #11 to Nevsky Prospect To Park Inn Nevsky From airport terminal 1 : buses #39, K39 to Moskovskaya Metro station and by metro to Mayakovskaya station From airport terminal 2 : buses #13, 113, K13, K113 to Moskovskaya Metro station and by metro to Mayakovskaya station From Allegro Train final stop : By Metro from Pl.Lenina station to Pl.Vosstania station From Seaport : bus #7 or trolley-buses #10 and #11 to Ploschad Vosstania

11 To Sokos Hotel Palace Bridge From airport terminal 1 : buses #39, K39 to Moskovskaya Metro station and by metro to Vasileostrovskaya station From airport terminal 2 : buses #13, 113, K13, K113 to Moskovskaya Metro station and by metro to Vasileostrovskaya station From Allegro Train final stop : By Metro from Pl.Lenina station to Vasileostrovskaya station From Seaport : buses #128 #346, #690 to the stop near the Tuchkov Bridge A taxi drive to the city centre costs approx. 30 Practical information CLIMATE Average temperatures in March : 0 C to +7 C TIPPING Tips of 5-10% of the bill are appropriate for waiters and taxi drivers CURRENCY Russian Ruble (RUR) 1 EUR = 41 RUR currency rate as per 18 th December 2011 TIME ZONE GMT + 4 hours

12 WITH SPECIAL THANKS TO OUR LOCAL SPONSORS In cooperation with For further information please contact: European Cities Marketing 29 D rue de Talant, Dijon, France Tel Fax katy@europeancitiesmarketing.com