Travel industry sells self

Saying that political leaders have demonized business meetings and events, the U.S. Travel Association pushed back Wednesday with the launch of the national “Meetings Mean Business” campaign.

It is designed to spell out the economic impact of the meetings business.

The industry group hopes it can help stem the nationwide cancellations of big gatherings that members say are a result of government and media scrutiny.

“Our campaign will challenge policy-makers to tone down the dangerous rhetoric, embrace sensible guidelines for companies receiving assistance and promote travel as an economic solution,” association president and chief executive officer Roger Dow said.

Concern about lavish corporate meetings among businesses receiving government bailout funds has fueled headlines and drawn the ire of Congress. An October meeting of AIG executives at the St. Regis Resort in Monarch Beach, Calif. —- a month after the company received government help —- added “AIG effect” to the lexicon.

Duluth-based Primerica, a subsidiary of financial giant Citigroup, which has received bailout funds, canceled its June meeting at the Georgia World Congress Center. The convention was expected to have a $55 million economic impact.

Heywood Sanders, a University of Texas in San Antonio professor who studies the meetings industry, said he’s not sure a campaign is the answer.

Companies always pull back on travel and meetings when the economy is in trouble, he said. Convention attendance then falls or meetings are canceled.

“It’s a natural reaction by firms and by individuals,” he said, noting cancellations for industries not receiving government help, like home building, real estate and newspapers.

“No amount of marketing is going to change that dynamic,” he said.

Others were more supportive of the idea.

“The meetings and events business has come under intense scrutiny recently, and we are concerned that legitimate business meetings and events are now being portrayed as perks and symbols of excess,” said Roslyn Dickerson, senior vice president of corporate and public affairs for InterContinential Hotels Group, the London-based company whose Americas office is in Atlanta.

“This incorrect portrayal is causing many large groups —- including those not receiving government assistance —- to cancel business meetings and events for fear of being criticized,” she said.

William Pate, president of the Atlanta Convention and Visitors Bureau, said Atlanta’s hospitality industry accounts for $11.4 billion in economic impact and more than 230,000 jobs.

“A healthy meetings and conventions business is particularly important in this economy because it generates billions of dollars in economic impact and millions of jobs in major metropolitan cities,” he said.

Tim Mescon, president of Columbus State University, said there is no surrogate for face-to-face-meetings and that leaders must remember that a convention is a business.

“We forget that those venues themselves are part of the business infrastructure that is created,” he said.