The Caribbean Lures Convention, Incentive Market

The Caribbean is the destination of choice among those who like traveling and having fun while working, said Meeting Professionals International (MPI) and American Express in a joint comparative annual report.

MPI and American Express President Colin Rorrie pointed out that corporate budgets for events planned for the United States and Europe were up 25 percent from 2003, from $3.4 million to $5.3 million.

Jamaican magazine Skywritings writes that what really has tourism professionals in the Caribbean taking notice is the 11 percent increase of meetings held in North America, whose planners are now looking for venues other than those in their own turf.

Companies are keen to putting more meetings, events and incentives in their schedules whenever they believe a steady recovery is underway, the same sources reported based on the outcomes of the 2004 FutureWatch.

Governments of Jamaica, the Bahamas and Santa Lucia are bending over backward to draw this market segment to their countries by putting a full-fledged assortment of top-flight services in the hands of event organizers.

Marcia Bullock, manageress of Groups and Conventions for the Jamaican Travel Board, spelled out how her company relays whatever information it has on events and incentives to event planners and decision-makers, thus offering an overall view of whatever services are available.

In Santa Lucia, the building of two brand-new sport stadiums has shifted the focus on them as far as events and big-time conventions are concerned. However, music is what has actually spurred planners everywhere, especially with the possibility of holding the island nation´s yearly jazz festival that brings in such big-cat corporations as General Motors.

For Air Jamaica, the segment of meetings and conventions accounts for nearly 40 percent of all sales. "And we hope this trend will remain very much on the rise," said Edith Seaton, regional manageress of the air carrier for the United States.

Different travel associations and companies tend to book a whole year of events in advance, a practice that guarantees high occupancies for both the high-peak and off-peak seasons. Those groups range from small 10-passenger packs to thousands of attendants.