An intellectual city needs a dedicated convention bureau

Limiting travel movements and striving for a car-free city are understandable goals. However, there’s no one-size-fits-all approach. For example, an incoming business group requires suitable logistics with as few disruptions as possible, but many levels of government don’t seem to be aware of this.

The Netherlands doesn’t have a Minister of Tourism, and there’s nobody responsible for tourism at the municipal level, either. My homeland of Italy has both. In terms of policy, no distinction is made between business visitors and leisure visitors. This is odd, knowing that business visitors have different behaviours, priorities and spending patterns. Even within the business segment, there’s a clear distinction: a conference visitor in the Netherlands spends an average of €389 a day, which is almost €100 more than an individual business traveller. Knowing that, one might think this would justify having a conference desk at Schiphol even before customs. After all, efficiency is key for business groups. While airlines differentiate target groups, airports fail to do the same.

In my hometown of Amsterdam, there are developments making access to the city centre increasingly difficult. However, it’s essential to our sector that buses and taxis can take our guests to hotels and venues with as few obstacles as possible.

And if policymakers see public transport as the future of inner-city transport, then they have to invest in it as well. These days, bus routes are being scrapped to reduce costs. There is nothing wrong with building new hotels on the outskirts of the city, but people don’t come to Amsterdam to see the surrounding polder. They come for the city, and it’s important that they can get there easily.

To position oneself as an intellectual city, it’s important to make policies aimed at conference groups. And I’m not just talking about major conferences. In my time at the Hilton, we’ve had many meetings of 150 people and many more of 30 or 40 people. Ultimately, the market for large meetings and small conferences is much more important than the occasional major conference. The conference visitor segment is too important to be included in a general tourism policy, both in terms of knowledge economy development and finance. This is especially true if you also claim to want to reduce the nuisance caused by mass tourism.

I believe that a suitable policy can only be developed if a city has an independent meeting and convention bureau, not one that will be tucked away and fall under the tourism department in the next round of budget cuts. This independent agency can help the event and hospitality sectors develop a targeted policy for business groups and jointly present itself unambiguously to that target group.