Rotorua becoming conference capital

Rotorua and Taupo both increased their market share of multi-day conferences in 2011.

With many of Christchurch's venues no longer available, Canterbury slipped from holding 16 per cent of this market to just 4 per cent, giving Rotorua the opportunity to take its place as the third most common location for such events behind Wellington and Auckland.

In 2010, Rotorua accounted for 10 per cent of conferences and conventions of more than one day. In 2011, that had grown to 14 per cent. The city hosted 297 multi-day conferences - up 10 per cent on the previous year - with 40,000 delegates who spent a total of 140,000 days in Rotorua and spent an estimated $60 million here.

According to Ministry of Economic Development figures, Taupo also increased its share of this economically valuable market, rising from 6 per cent to 7 per cent.

Rotorua Convention Bureau manager Denise Siviter said Rotorua's rise had been helped by its hosting of the conference and incentives trade show Meetings in June. The national trade show was to have taken place in Christchurch, but the venue had to be changed after the February 22 earthquake and organisers praised Rotorua for pulling it together so well at such short notice.

She said Meetings showed delegates how easy it was to run a professional and successful event in a compact city such as Rotorua, with many people seeing the area in a fresh light.

The city made a strong showing in both the domestic and Australian markets, with domestic delegate days increasing from 12 to 20 per cent of the market share.

Siviter said work bureau business development manager Debbie Gee had done in Australia had borne fruit, with delegate days jumping from 2 per cent of the market to 17 per cent.

"Rotorua Convention Bureau and industry have formed strong relationships with key people in Australia by working together to encourage business to come across this side of the Tasman."

Australian delegate days in Rotorua increased from fewer than 2000 a year ago to more than 10,000 during 2011. Siviter said Rotorua had no profile and no history when it entered this market, but had come along in "leaps and bounds".

With the larger facilities of the Energy Events Centre, Rotorua has previously performed well in conferences of 500-plus delegates. With Canterbury dropping from 15 conferences of 500-plus in 2010 to none in 2011, Rotorua moved up from third ranking to second on 14. Auckland topped this group on 22. It was ranked third in all other size categories. "These results are a great start to the year and the Rotorua Convention Bureau look forward to another successful year in 2012," she said.

Taupo's highest showing was in the up-to-100 category making up 79 per cent of its 142 multi-day conferences. Single-day conferences contributed 47 per cent of the 86,270 delegate days spent in the town last year.