The "AIG Effect" — Impact and Opportunity

Greetings,

This is certainly a time full of challenges, and in the group market one of those challenges is what might be termed the "AIG Effect." AIG, of course, was chastised for accepting bailout money while continuing to have meetings at "tony resorts." Nevermind that they could not get their meeting deposit back, and decided to get some value for their sunk costs.

It has become easy to target organizations of every type with criticism for continuing one of the practices that made them successful in the first place — face to face comunication and motivation. Recently a Northern California newspaper criticized a group for meeting at a Monterey resort, even though they were paying more than $70 below the destination's average room rate and operating on a modest per diem.

There is a certain amount of criticism that will change with time and an improved economy. However, in the name of balance we should be reinforcing why meetings are good business and why resort destinations like ours may be particularly good in these times. Here are a few reasons. You can surely add a number of your own:

• Properties are working with clients to focus on the essentials necessary for successful "value engineered" meetings.
• Resort destinations, so often driven by huge demand, are motivated to bring added value to meetings during the downturn.
• If a group is going to meet, they want to ensure that people show up. Our destination routinely attracts higher attendance than our competitors, bringing value that others cannot.
• Off-site meetings facilitate effective communications, generate innovation, retain top employees, create customer understanding and reward performace. Arguably, these qualities are more important than ever.
• We are an attractive alternative for our drive markets to reduce travel budgets while still retaining impact and quality.

Helping our customers articulate these facts to their constituents should be a consistent part of our interaction. It may seem we are tilting at windmills, but this line of reasoning should be part of the conversation — at least until we have an improved economy to talk about!

With Appreciation,

Steve Wille, President/CEO

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