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VANCOUVER, B.C.--ABPA has accepted a Letter of Agreement for meeting space as offered by the Sheraton Vancouver at Wall Centre in the heart of the city referred to as Spectacular by Nature.
Dates for the 2012 annual convention--the Association's 33rd--are Tuesday, April 24, through Saturday, April 28th.
The room rate will be $149.00 (Canadian) for run of the house with upgrades to corner rooms and junior suites also available.
Hotels in the Vancouver area were visited by the 2012 Convention Committee between June 4th and June 8th to both look at the properties in question and to evaluate the agreements being offered.
Fortunately for ABPA, the two leading hotels in which the Committee was interested--based on accounts of members in the Vancouver area--both lowered their room rates to come into the area which the Committee deemed acceptable.
Said Show Manager Stan Rodman, “It is always a balancing act between the quality of the hotel and its services as weighed against a room rate which most of our members would find palatable and which encourages attendance.”
He added, “We were fortunate in that both hotels in which we were interested were willing to compete for our business.”
By the same token, the Convention Committee under the leadership of Dolores Richardson, judged that being in the heart of Vancouver was an important factor contributing to the final decision.”
Said Richardson, “While we received at least eight different bids from the request for proposal letter sent by our hotel rep agency, Helms Briscoe out of Carmel, In., only three were in the city while the other five were in the suburbs.”
She added, “All of us felt that people coming to Vancouver would want to be in the city especially for most, this would be a first time trip.”
It was the same recommendation being made by Bruce and Angie Highberg, the Helms Briscoe reps who solicited the original proposals, as well as ABPA member Brad Desaulniers of Partscheck Live and Founder member Hank Lewis, formerly of the late Nordan Distributors and a longtime resident of British Columbia.
Reports Rodman, “The two primary hotels at which we looked were nearly equal in value and their contracts were similar but the Sheraton is a newer facility and the North Tower, in which we would be meeting, was built in 2002 and is outstanding.
“The facilities are first class as is the location and those who set their sights on attending ABPA's first ever NW Pacific Coast convention in Canada will be pleasantly surprised at the accessibility to so many of the city's venues.”
The agreement was signed with Panu Immonen, sales manager, who well represented the hotel and its position.
Now, for the Committee, which also had a chance to meet with members of the Tourism Vancouver staff, the real work begins--building interest and attendance for April, 2012.
To that end, Rodman is formulating an incentive program in which distributor members can participate in order to bring their top sales and management people to the convention.
He is soliciting input from several key staffers, or former staffers, of companies which have conducted such programs in the past in order to set realistic, attainable goals for such a reward.
More on this incentive program will be forthcoming.
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