Understanding the demand and availability for accommodating meetings in a destination can be daunting and time-consuming prospect for a meeting planner, especially if more than one destination is under consideration. Every destination is unique in location, weather, venues, amenities, intellectual capital, etc., which impacts each destination’s overall business transient, group and leisure demand.

Four Local Demand Factors to Consider When Identifying Value Dates for Your Next Meeting

• Seasonality – High and low seasonality differ in just about every destination. It’s important to look at the historical occupancy rates of the destination under consideration to understand where the high and low periods are. Being armed with this information helps meeting planners to understand the flexibility hotels may have in negotiations, availability and concessions.
   
• Special Events – We all know destinations hold special events throughout the year. These events offer meeting attendees an opportunity to experience something unique to the destination. Planners will want to know if and how the meeting dates they are requesting will be affected by these events. Depending on the meeting requirements, holding a meeting coinciding with a special event could prove beneficial for the organization. Alternatively, a meeting planner may also decide to avoid a special event due to a conflict of interest, large crowds around the meeting venue, and/or higher room rates.
   
• Citywide Conventions – Depending on the event requirements, holding a meeting over a citywide convention could be very beneficial. For example, if your meeting utilizes a lot of hotel meeting space compared to your guest room block, being on top of a citywide convention where a hotel is participating with a rooms-only block could be a good fit. On the other hand, a large citywide convention can drive up demand and create compression in the destination. Available inventory will likely be sold at higher rates and the space you are looking for may not be available.
   
• Transient vs. Group Demand Mix – The business transient and leisure business mix also differs in every destination. For example, destinations such as Philadelphia, Chicago and San Francisco have high weekday demand. If the meeting arrives on a Tuesday and departs on a Thursday, and flexibility to this pattern is not indicated on the RFP, then many hotels may consider this undesirable, and move on to other business that fits the traditional Sunday-Wednesday or Wednesday-Friday/Saturday arrival departure patterns.

In order to fully understand the unique destination demand factors of the destination(s), you are considering, get in touch with the local CVB sales professional. No organization has stronger hotel and venue connections and better destination knowledge than the CVB. To reach out to CVB experts at more than 155+ of the top meeting destinations, search and compare destinations with meeting locations and key stats.