Sunshine Matters

Meetings and conventions are big business for Florida and one of VISIT FLORIDA’s main platforms in attracting visitors to the Sunshine State.  Business travel to Florida generates approximately $219 per person per day to our economy, and those visitors have a very high potential for traveling back to Florida with family and friends.

In January, the Sunshine State hosted two national tourism industry conferences at the Orange County Convention Center in Orlando.  The first was the 3-day Professional Convention Management Association “Convening Leaders” event, which hosted more than 3,800 meeting professionals and tourism industry professionals from around the U.S. and other international locations.  Immediately following, Orlando again hosted the Travel Exchange 2013 which combined the National Tour Association and the United Motorcoach Expo to cover the full spectrum of North American travel buyers and tour operators together with travel sellers creating the perfect platform to book travel.

These two tourism conventions hosted in Florida gave VISIT FLORIDA and the Florida tourism industry a tremendous opportunity to showcase our unparalleled facilities and world-class attractions and entertainment to groups that might bring their clients to Florida in the future.  We were center stage with featured exposure at both conferences as we welcomed the meeting professionals, tour operators and travel buyers at hosted events that included SeaWorld, Universal, Kennedy Space Center, Hard Rock Live and many other attractions and dining opportunities in and around Orlando.

There is more to come as the Sunshine State will play host in October 2013 to the Rejuvenate Marketplace at the Ocean Center in Daytona Beach, bringing over 2,000 faith-based meeting professionals and tourism organizations to Florida.  In November, the Southeast Tourism Society will bring hundreds of tourism industry leaders together in Jacksonville and in December, Orlando will be the host city for the SITE Global Conference, attracting hundreds of incentive travel and meeting professionals from across the globe.

If you would like to learn more about these conferences, or how Florida tourism businesses can benefit from participation in VISIT FLORIDA’s Meetings and Conventions initiatives, please contact me at chatcher@VISITFLORIDA.org.