This One Convention Could Make A Major Impact On Greater Cincinnati
More than 400 meeting planners are in Cincinnati this week for Connect Meetings — a trade show for people who decide where conventions should go. It is actually three trade shows: Connect Faith, Connect Medical and Connect Ohio.
The Cincinnati Convention & Visitors Bureau has been preparing for the city to be showcased for the event since 2014, the Cincinnati Business Journal reports.
Convention business growth could be quite a boost to the local economy. Between them, the meeting attendees will book more than 130,000 future hotel room nights to accommodate a variety of conventions.
The potential impact of that many room nights would be more than $26M in visitor spending, and Cincinnati is aiming to get a piece of that action.
One of the larger contingents at the Connect Meetings is faith-based organizations, which are meeting at Connect Faith. According to the bureau, more than 80 such organizations have held meetings in Cincinnati in the last 10 years.
Hosting the meeting planners gives Cincinnati an opportunity "to give them a first-row seat to our incredible city," bureau President and CEO Dan Lincoln said.
Overall, travel and tourism had a $6B impact on the Cincinnati region in 2016, the Cincinnati Convention & Visitors Bureau reported recently. The number of visitors increased 9% year-over-year to 26.1 million.
