Conference numbers drop when we're building big new convention centres

Friday, 7 September 2018

Drone footage shows the emerging shape of Te Pae, the Christchurch Convention Centre. (Video first published in July 2018)

The lucrative conference and business events market has taken a dive and it's not clear why.

There were more than 3000 fewer business events around the country for the year to the end of June, and the number of delegates dropped by 80,000.

A Ministry of Business Innovation and Employment (MBIE) survey of more than 300 venues also showed a slowdown in conference and convention activity which dropped 8 per cent.

The previous year business activity rose 15 per cent and MBIE manager of business and economic development Dr Antony Kennedy said the most likely explanation was that events around the Lions Tour in June and July 2017 had contributed to the spike.

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While some venues reported a 'lower level of confidence,' this was not the case across the board and many reported good growth, he said.

SkyCity's new international convention centre is due to open in 2020.

About half the events for the year were business-related, with those involving associations and Government entities coming a distant second and third.

Industry sources said that despite the drop, there was still a need for large new convention centres under construction in Auckland and Christchurch, and one planned for Wellington.

Wellington Regional Economic Development Agency business events and partnership manager Jessica Beyeler said conferences tended to drop off in the capital in election years as Government departments held off on meetings 'due to uncertainty of who would be governing and whether it was business as usual or a change.'

According to Statistics NZ international arrivals data, an extra 3600 overseas conference delegates came here last year, and feedback from the industry was more positive than the survey indicated, she said.

'I spoke to larger venues in Auckland, Hamilton, Wellington and Christchurch, all of whom reported a record year for business events, they didn't feel the stats reflected what they were experiencing.'

ChristchurchNZ general manager of destination and attraction Loren Heaphy said the dip could be related to the 'halo' effect of last year's Lion's Tour and the World Masters Games because they soaked up accommodation during the traditional conference season, prompting organisers to delay business events.

The aim was to avoid peaks and troughs by getting organisations to work collaboratively around the scheduling of events.

'The ideal is that you have a few big telegraph pole events - a concert or a sporting event - and the gaps between are filled with really big lucrative business events, because we know people attending conferences and conventions tend to stay longer and spend more.'

According to Tourism New Zealand (TNZ), the conference average delegate spends about $334 a night, roughly double that of international holiday makers.

TNZ helps organisations bid for international conferences attracting at least 200 overseas delegates and TNZ global manager of business events Lisa Gardiner said they had secured $400m worth of business over the past five years.

She said the opening of Auckland's new international convention centre would cater for up to 3500 delegates, but New Zealand was still very much a boutique destination compared with places like the US.

'I was reading about one [a conference] the other day where they were having to cap numbers at 50,000 people, that's not the sort of space we'd seek to play in.'