Visit London and its 30 stand partners at EIBTM expect to receive record enquiries following an extremely successful show in Barcelona. The record number of stand partners and over 150 appointments meant that the Visit London business team saw record numbers of event enquiries coming in for London. The Visit London team and partners also surpassed previous records by meeting over 900 people over the three-day show.
This year was also the first business trade show to be attended by a member of the Mayor of London’s Office. Director of Marketing and Head of London’s new Business Tourism Group Daniel Ritterband attended the show for the first time.
Ritterband said of the show: “It was a great pleasure to attend EIBTM and extremely useful in giving me further insight into the needs of global event planners. By meeting so many visitors to the show I was able to understand exactly what they require from a city when they plan to bring in business meetings and events. The Visit London stand was extremely successful and received record visitor figures to both our London destination presentations and to our 30 partner areas. By visiting the show I was able to really understand what the key goals should be for London’s new Business Tourism Group moving forward in 2010.”
Barbara Jamison, Sales Manager, Europe at Visit London added: “EIBTM is a key industry event for Visit London and it has proved year on year to be a key driver for events in the UK capital. Our target in 2009 was to beat last year’s figures of £52 Million business enquiries, and following a very busy few days of appointments and stand activity, we expect to at least double that amount in confirmed business this year. We saw over 150 pre-appointment meetings and there were some very clear countries which were very interested in London – the top ones included the US, Belgium, Italy, Sweden and France.”
Visit London’s stand featured over 30 London partners, a rise of 12 more partners compared with last year’s stand. These ranged from some of London’s biggest venues such as ExCeL London, Barbican, the QEII Conference Centre, through to unique events spaces such as the London Eye, Brocket Hall and One Great George Street, through to outstanding hotels like Park Plaza Westminster Bridge, Lancaster London and Jumeirah Carlton Tower.
Sue Etherington, acting commercial director, the Queen Elizabeth II Conference Centre said: “In these difficult times, it was encouraging to be involved in such a busy stand at EIBTM with lots of potential clients and actual events to be placed! Good organisation and support from Visit London ensured a very useful three days – well worth the time out of the office with approximately one million pounds worth of enquiries received.”
Lisa Fisher, Sales & Marketing Manager from One Great George Street said: This was the first year that One Great George Street exhibited at EIBTM or internationally, so this was seen as opportunity to introduce the venue to overseas buyers. The show was very busy and I am glad to have been involved. The number of hosted buyers joining us on the VL stand was impressive and having walked around the show appeared one of the most popular!”
The über cool Miramar Barcelona restaurant which is set within Barcelona’s mountain area was the location for a stylish networking evening hosted by Visit London on Wednesday 02 December. The evening showcased a slice of London’s modern and vibrant style and culture with beat boxing and break dancing competition.
