VisitPittsburgh: Convention Bis Is Up

Visit Pittsburgh says it booked 472 meetings in 2010 and beyond representing an estimated $286 million in spending. The numbers were released at the group’s annual meeting this morning. VisitPittsburgh Vice President for Sales and Marketing, Craig Davis says that is an increase of nearly 15% from 2009. The organization also reported the convention center was used 205 days last year, up from 191 the year before.

Davis says it is getting easier to market the city to convention planers. “The city is bigger, brighter, cleaner and our convention hotels that have come on board in the last five or six years have been incredible quality hotels and that has helped us sell tremendously,” says Davis. He says VisitPittsburgh also got a great deal of help from the “Bring it Home” campaign that calls on Pittsburghers who serve on national or international boards to push for their group’s conventions to be held in the city. “Because Pittsburghers are so proud of their city we get no problem getting people to help us.”

Looking out to the future, Davis notes several large conventions have been booked including the NRA convention in April of this year and the Veterans of Foreign Wars of the United States (VFW) and the Fraternal Order of Police (FOP) conventions in 2015. The VFW convention is expected to bring in 12,000 visitors.
And the FOP event will mark the 100th anniversary of the founding of the organization in Pittsburgh.

Davis says the tourism marketing focus last year was on Cleveland. Pittsburgh and Cleveland cross-marketed in each other’s region and Davis says visits from the Cleveland area jumped 51%. The 2011 focus will be on the Great Allegheny Passage, which is a biking and hiking trail that connects Pittsburgh to Washington DC.

Hosting the NHL Winter Classic also helped to boost tourism numbers. Davis says the event is believed to be responsible for 15,789 room nights and $22.3 million in spending.

Mayor: First Night Will be Safe

Pittsburgh Mayor Luke Ravenstahl says people should not be afraid to come downtown for the First Night celebrations. In an effort to set aside some public concerns that big events in downtown Pittsburgh are no longer safe, Mayor Ravenstahl says there will be beefed up patrols in the golden triangle New Year’s Eve. He says the gunfire during Light Up Night was an isolated event. “We, as a city, can’t let a few idiots get in the way of a wonderful event,” says Ravenstahl, ”We are determined from a police department prospective and a public safety prospective not to let that happen.”

Ravenstahl says there will be additional officers downtown and they will be keeping an eye out for groups of people like those that gathered on light up night and eventually caused problems. “What I can tell the people of Pittsburgh today is you will be safe, come downtown experience this wonderful event and you should not let a few bad apples ruin your experience with your family on this New Year’s holiday,” says Ravenstahl.

First night usually draws about 35 thousand revelers. The Cultural Trust says there could be another 20-30 thousand on the streets December 31st thanks an influx of visitors in town for the winter classic hockey game on the north shore the next day. Visit Pittsburgh says every hotel room downtown is booked for New Year’s Eve.

Back From Asia, Mayor Calls Trip Successful

After a 10 day trip to China and Korea, Mayor Luke Ravenstahl called the trip a success and said it was laid the groundwork for attracting new businesses to settle in the region.

The mayor went with a delegation that included Dennis Yablonsky, CEO of the Allegheny Conference and Joe McGrath, CEO of Visit Pittsburgh.

Yablonsky said the trip was a success. The delegation met with companies they were already courting and with new companies. The companies are in the sectors the region is trying to grow: advanced manufacturing, financial services, energy, life sciences, health care and information and communication technology.

Yablonsky credits the G-20 Conference, held in Pittsburgh in September of 2009, for bringing attention to the "transformation" of the region. Ravenstahl said the G-20 summit "put Pittsburgh back into the global game." He said the trip did not cost taxpayers anything. He said he was not sure who paid for the trip.

The next step is for the companies to visit Pittsburgh and see all that the city has to offer.

S.E.A. Expects Deficit for Convention Center

Low attendance and less visitor spending are causing Pittsburgh’s David L. Lawrence Convention Center to operate at a deficit in 2010.

The city-county Sports & Exhibition Authority is expected to post a $409,631 operating deficit for the convention center by the end of the year. The SEA runs the center and would need to pay for that loss with its reserves.

Visit Pittsburgh President Joe McGrath says corporations are sending fewer people to conventions and cutting down on hospitality once they get there.

But McGrath says it could be worse for Pittsburgh – it is in many other cities.

“We have fared very well in this economy compared to virtually any destination in America. In 2009, in fact, for hotel occupancy, maintenance, and rate we were in the top 10% of the nation, so we have done extremely well as a destination selling in hard times.”

McGrath says the 2010 deficit isn’t likely to shrink because conventions are planned well in advance, but the convention center’s fortunes could change in the next few years.

VisitPittsburgh: 2009 Good Despite Rough Economy

VisitPittsburgh says 2009 was a good year despite the down economy but the nagging problem of not having enough hotel rooms continues. Before its annual meeting downtown this morning, President Joe Mc Grath noted how VisitPittsburgh took advantage of the region being in the spotlight several times in 2009 to spread the word about the city’s tourism and convention opportunities. He says the year began with a Steelers Super Bowl win, followed by the Penguins Stanley Cup victory and a bass fishing tournament and then wrapped up with the hosting of the G20 Pittsburgh Summit to end the year with a bang. Mc Grath says the G20 Summit has directly resulted in at least 5 conventions booking in the city already.

In 2009 Pittsburgh ranked second in the nation in “revenue per available room” and 8th in hotel room occupancy rates. Mc Grath says those numbers are both good and bad. He says it is good that visitors are coming to the region for business and leisure travel but it is bad because it points to the need for more rooms. VisitPittsburgh is in the process of trying to land a large 2015 convention and had to talk to eight different hotels to pull together the 1,200 rooms needed to host the gathering. Mc Grath says in the past they would have needed only three hotels but strong demand means hotels can’t commit the space to the conventions.

Mc Grath says convention traffic faired well in 2009. The annual report shows, “In 2009, VisitPittsburgh’s Convention Sales Department booked 434 meetings and conventions for 2009 and beyond, including 47 conventions accounting for 191 usage days at the David L. Lawrence Convention Center.” Mc Grath says Pittsburgh has been helped by the recent scrutinity of convention locations. Several news stories have ridiculed events for going to “resort” locations and Mc Grath says Pittsburgh does not suffer from that reputation.

Mc Grath says the slow economy also helped the region’s recreational tourism numbers. He says people were taking vacations but rather than heading to Europe or the Caribbean they were staying closer to home and many of them were coming to Pittsburgh. The report shows visitor traffic from targeted zip codes where VisitPittsburgh advertised was up 11%, while spending from those visitors rose 13% in 2009. Mc Grath says they will be focusing their tourism advertising on Cleveland this year and VisitPittsburgh has formed a partnership with a similar group in Cleveland. In addition, the June launch of a direct flight between Pittsburgh and Paris seems to be helping fill a few hotel rooms.

Budget issues continued to be a problem for VisitPittsburgh. Mc Grath called it a “tremendous challenge.” The annual report says nearly all grant revenue came in below VisitPittsburgh’s budgeted levels and state funding cuts hit hard. In 2009, state funding declined to less than $750,000, as compared to $2.3 million in 2008.

Allegheny Institute Doubts G20's Economic Impact

The Allegheny Institute says it does not think as much money was left in Pittsburgh during the G20 as some have estimated. The conservative think tank has released a policy brief regarding VisitPittsburgh's claims of a $35 million economic benefit to the the Pittsburgh region as a result of the G20 economic summit. The Allegheny Institute claims that the projection is unreasonable. The group looked at two indicators of economic impact for the region. They looked at RAD (Regional Asset District) revenues and hotel tax revenues. According to the policy brief RAD revenues were down in September of 2009 as compared to 2008, but hotel tax revenues increased by $600,000 representing an additional $8.5 million in hotel spending. Allegheny Institute senior research associate Frank Gamrat says the picture is incomplete because they were only able to analyze two sources but he believes the $35 million impact projection is still unreasonable because of the difficulty in quantifying the actual impact to the region.

Visit Pittsburgh has released a written response saying in part; "The Allegheny Institute fails to note that most of the 33 delegations associated with the Pittsburgh Summit were exempt from paying any taxes. These delegations represented over 3,500 attendees. In addition, security forces were also exempt from paying taxes. Used as the cornerstone for the Allegheny Institute’s faulty analysis, tax collections in this case are not a meaningful measurement of direct spending relating to the Pittsburgh Summit." "VisitPittsburgh stands behinds our estimate of $35 million in direct spending as a result of the Pittsburgh Summit."

G20 Already Paying Dividend

Regional economic development officials say the G20 is already paying off for the city. Visit Pittsburgh CEO Joe McGrath says his organization estimates $35 million was spent by out of town guests related to the G20. About half of that was spent last week. And he says the summit is already paying off in convention bookings. He says before the G20 the number 2 reason for not choosing Pittsburgh for a convention was that the city was not glamorous enough and that has changed. He says he expects to ink one deal for a convention in 2011 today and another next week for a 2014 event and both mentioned the G20 coverage as the deciding factor. McGrath says the conventions should each bring about a million dollars to town. Allegheny Conference Executive Dennis Yablonsky has a similar story. He says he received a call Friday from an international company that had been reading about Pittsburgh in their local papers and would now like to come to the city to talk about doing business in Pittsburgh. Another official estimated that the number positive news coverage about the city was equal to $100 million in advertising.
McGrath says he understands that many downtown business lost revenue Thursday and Friday but he says he thinks many of them broke even for the month due to extra business in the weeks leading up to the G20. He pointed to several dinners held at area restaurants for out of town delegations in the last month. He says the Japanese Government asked him to recommend the best Pennsylvania red wine and then ordered 200 bottles for an event. McGrath also noted that while revenues were lost downtown it was sent to other parts of the region. He says golf courses reported increases in rounds played Thursday and Friday.

Visit Pittsburgh Hopes to Show Media the City

More than 3,000 media credentials will be issued for the G20 Summit to be held in Pittsburgh September 24th and 25th and local officials are hoping to pull those reporters away from the economic and protest stories long enough to teach them what makes the city tick. To help, Visit Pittsburgh has set up several media familiarization tours. The first of which is tomorrow. The Tours range from exploring the high tech expertise the city can offer to the natural treasures to be found. Visit Pittsburgh spokesperson Beverly Morrow-Jones says her organization often runs such tours for members of the media. They are often travel writers but the formula is the same. Get the reporters on a bus for 4 to 8 hours and tour them around the city. Among the G20 related tours being offered to media:
"Robotics & Technology"
"Family Fun"
"Life Sciences and Health Care Advances"
"Pittsburgh's Integrated Energy Solution for the Globe"
"Art & Culture Lovers"
"Outdoor Adventure"
"The Power of Three -- Eds & Meds"
Morrow-Jones says Visit Pittsburgh is also setting up custom tours for interested media. A series of tours will be held this week and then a second round of tours will be held the week of the Pittsburgh Summit. Morrow-Jones says when the reporters and producers leave they will not only be more familiar with the city but will also have all of the components to write or produce a story. She says the region has great story to tell and reporters are interested in answering the question, “Why Pittsburgh?”

To listen to an interview with Morrow-Jones Click here.

"Biggest Steeler Fan" Picked

VisitPittsburgh has announced the winner of its biggest Steelers fan contest. The top prize winner is Tina Kunst of Panama City Beach, Florida who wrote about her "Steeler-themed" wedding last May. Kunst wore a full Steeler yellow wedding gown and of course a Steeler garter. Her husband wore a tuxedo with a Steeler tie and the bridesmaids wore black with Steeler yellow jewelry. A giant Steeler helmet was used as the altar. The reception was held in a sports bar with 60 inch widescreen televisions showing a replay of Super Bowl XL (in which the Steelers defeated Seattle). Tina Kunst receives 2 tickets to a future Steeler game, a Steelers jersey and a Super Bowl XL game football. A VisitPittsburgh spokeswoman says they received more than 300 photo submissions and stories from across the U.S. including from Virginia, Florida, New York, Texas, Maryland and California.

VisitPittsburgh Searches for No.1 Steelers Fan

Pittsburgh's convention and tourism bureau is looking for the most enthusiastic Steelers fan in the world, says spokeswoman Beverly Morrow-Jones. VisitPittsburgh is accepting videos and photographs of extreme team spirit from now until January 28th. The winner of the contest will receive two tickets to a future home game, a Steelers jersey and a Super Bowl XL game ball. this is the second time VisitPittsburgh launched a fan search. The first was three years ago when the Steelers were in Superbowl XL. Creativity is encouraged in contestants. The winner of the 2006 contest carved pumpkins into football helmets and wore them to October home games. Morrow-Jones says there are more than 800 Steelers bars across the world, and the 2006 contest drew fans from as far away as Alaska and New Zealand.

Pittsburgh Text Messages

Local tourism agency Visit Pittsburgh has gone one step further into the technology-enhanced world. Their newest initiative, "Pittsburgh Txts," lets visitors and residents register to receive text message updates on their cell phones about exciting events happening in Pittsburgh and its countryside.

To sign up for the texts, cell phone users can text "PghEvents" to 86631. Once registration is confirmed, weekly updates are sent each Thursday, with only standard texting rates that apply.

Pittsburgh ranks 4th nationally in tourism

Visit Pittsburgh released it's annual report of tourism and announced Pittsburgh now ranks 4Th in the nation. Pittsburgh passed New York to take the 4Th spot nationally. Joe Mcgrath, President and CEO of Visit Pittsburgh said that 10 million people visited Pittsburgh in 07 bringing in 3 Billion Dollars to the region. Visit Pittsburgh says that even though Pittsburgh does well comparatively with cities of similar size a new larger hotel near the convention center will help bring in larger conventions.

Pittsburgh is on short list for international convention

International Congress and Convention Association Executive Director Martin Sirk was in Pittsburgh for two days this week to finish his assessment of the city and its bid to host the 2011 ICCA convention. Pittsburgh is in the running against Dubai and Abu Dhabi, Saudi Arabia and Leipzig, Germany. Sirk says he has been impressed by the city and what it has to offer. He says the convention center and hotels are very nice but every city has those types of amenities. He says to succeed in the convention business today cities have to offer more. He says the organizations wooing conventions have to be top notch and have the ability work closely with clients. He says those groups also need to work closely with amenities and attractions in the region. Sirk says if a city is going to truly thrive in the convention game it needs to think globally and that is what Pittsburgh is doing. He says just by being one of three finalists the city has won. He says he and his staff work closely with the finalists to help them improve their bids and presentations and in doing that it helps the applicants fine-tune their presentations to other organizations.