Rival Venue Cos. Grow (Even) More

Early in September, after nearly 18 years at the Miami Beach (Fla.) Convention Center, SMG lost its management contract when the Miami Beach City Council voted 6-1 to give it to Global Spectrum.

Global Spectrum's partner on the successful bid, Switzerland-based Messe Schweiz, owners of one of the largest shows in the center – Art Basel Miami Beach – also re-upped at the center for three more years.

At the time, Tom Mobley, Global Spectrum's senior vice president, told Tradeshow Week, “What the council recognized ... is we brought new energy and enthusiasm that would drive revenues and customer service.” And, he added, noting the unprecedented partnership with Messe Schweiz, “Clearly, Art Basel is important to Miami Beach.”

Global Spectrum officially took over the building Oct. 1 with a three-year contract (and an option to renew for two more) worth an annual base fee of $280,000.

The dust has settled and officials at both Global Spectrum and SMG now are saying, “Next!”

In the past year, both venue management companies have struck numerous domestic and overseas deals.

The 500,000 square foot Miami Beach CC, according to Gregg Caren, SMG's vice president of strategic development, was the sixth-largest of the more than 60 tradeshow venues on SMG's roster by amount of exhibit space.

“Today, SMG still manages 10 facilities with 300,000 sq. ft. or more of exhibit space and 17 venues with more than 200,000 sq. ft.,” Caren said. “In total, our portfolio includes more than 11 million sq. ft. of space in four countries, plus Puerto Rico.”

One big feather landed in SMG's cap at the end of 2007 when it was awarded a contract to manage a venue in Beijing, the new China Natl. Convention Center, a first at the time for a U.S. company in China.

The 600,000 sq. ft. center was used as a venue for the fencing competition and a press center at the 2008 Beijing Summer Olympics and has been transferred back to SMG's hands.

“There is now a massive retrofit project underway in order to ready the CNCC for conventions and exhibitions,” Caren said.

SMG's been busy back on U.S. soil, too. Caren cited new contracts at the Irving (Texas) Convention Center and Eastern Kentucky Exposition Center in Pikeville, Ky., as well as renewals at the Atlantic City (N.J.) Convention Center, Colorado Convention Center in Denver, Palm Springs (Calif.) Convention Center and Salt Place Convention Center and South Towne Exposition Center in Salt Lake County, Utah.

“We are constantly working on requests for proposals both here and abroad,” Caren said. “Given the lengthy list of current venue clients, we are equally focused on renewing existing management contracts as we are on new opportunities.”

Global Spectrum also beefed up its portfolio of 20-plus convention centers in the U.S. and Canada in the past year.

According to Frank Russo, Global Spectrum's senior vice president, new contracts were signed with the Las Cruces (N.M.) Convention Center, Augusta (Ga.) Civic Center and, most recently, the Conference Center Niagara Falls in upstate New York.

“We are actively looking for 'Falls' cities,” Russo joked.

Global Spectrum already manages the Glen Falls Civic Center in Glen Falls, N.Y., an arena, and the Sioux Falls (S.D.) Convention Center.

All kidding aside, he added, “Niagara Falls was looking for a company that can bring that building back to life and more people downtown.”

The USA Niagara Development Corp. chose Global Spectrum to manage the 116,000 sq. ft. CCNF.

“Global Spectrum is a well-respected industry leader, and we believe they are the perfect group to help us enhance customer experience, increase bookings and make the (CCNF) a must-visit exhibition and convention center for the region,” said USAN's Christopher Schoepflin.

Still, the Miami Beach CC became the biggest convention center Global Spectrum manages, and, Russo said, “Now that the glass ceiling has been cracked in getting Miami Beach, it has opened doors.”

Caren might say the same thing about the deal he landed late last year in Beijing.

When the retrofit project is completed, the CNCC will have 250,000 sq. ft. of exhibit space, relatively small compared with other Chinese convention centers such as the Shanghai New Intl. Expo Centre, with its 2.2 million sq. ft. of exhibit space, or the Zhengzhou Intl. Convention & Exhibition Centre, with 771,750 sq. ft.

But, according to Caren, the CNCC will be unique to the Asian marketplace because of its 100 breakout rooms, 48,000 sq. ft. ballroom and 64,000 sq. ft. convention hall that can accommodate up to 6,000 attendees.

“I see the building as the Moscone Center of China,” Caren said when the CNCC contract was announced, referring to the SMG-managed convention facility in San Francisco.

Moscone “is certainly not the biggest convention center in the U.S., but it's heavily used,” he added.

China's not the only international market that SMG is exploring. It also has managed Mexico City's World Trade Center Intl. Exhibition & Convention Center for the past three years and has more on tap in the country with the Expo at Mundo Imperial in Acapulco, Mexico, opening this year and additional new venues in Mazatlan and Tampico, Mexico, in the pipeline.

“Mexico has been an exciting growth area for SMG,” Caren said. “We (also) continue to work with event organizers to explore their own potential growth in Mexico.”

And, he added, SMG looks to expand even further in Latin America, Europe, Asia and the Middle East.

Global Spectrum doesn't have any overseas convention center contracts yet, but, like SMG, it isn't content to stay in North America either.

The company recently signed a collaboration agreement with NEC Birmingham Group, which runs the Natl. Exhibition Centre in Birmingham, United Kingdom, to form Global Spectrum Europe, which will provide expertise and services to the market, as well as sell and operate venues, such as stadiums, arenas, performing arts centers, exhibition centers and theaters throughout Europe.

“The partnership between Global Spectrum and NEC will offer European clients an extraordinary depth of talent and relationships that will ensure the success of their venues,” Russo said.

The new partnership with Messe Schweiz, he added, represents another potential opening to overseas markets. “We're looking at managing exhibition centers together,” Russo said. “Our overall strategy is to get more business and grow our company.”