Destination Guide

With a rich history in exploration and maritime discovery, Lisbon is no stranger to welcoming guests from near and far. Offering a friendly population, competitive prices, and a unique landscape that combines sandy beaches, green mountains and a modern downtown area, Lisbon continues to attract both leisure and business travelers to its streets.

Host your next international event at the phenomenal International Fair of Lisboa (FIL) Meeting Centre, one of Europe's most well-equipped facilities. Or, get a unique taste of Portugal's capital at event venues such as the Maritime Museum or historic Castelo de Sao Jorge. Discover more Lisbon meeting venues, accommodations and more on the Cvent Destination Guide.

Blending cultural heritage with the best of modern amenities, Edinburgh, Scotland, is an ideal conference destination. In fact, this gorgeous city has been voted one of the most popular in the United Kingdom in which to live by the Guardian Travel Awards and to visit by Conde Nast.

Easily accessible, Edinburgh boasts high-speed rail links to all major cities in Britain and an airport that offers direct air routes around the world. Plus, over half of its world-class conference venues and hotels are within walking distance just two miles away from downtown. Explore venue choices, transportation options, things to do and more in Edinburgh, now on the Cvent Destination Guide.

For event industry professionals, Cvent can't be beat as the best one-stop-shop: our web-based software offers online event registration, event management, event web site creation, robust reporting, online surveys, and a sourcing tool. In addition, we've rolled out a Destination Guide so planners can focus their site selection and event sourcing efforts by comparing meeting-specific details among international cities.

At Cvent, we understand that you are burdened by the daunting task of coordinating countless aspects of the meeting and event planning process. We want to lift that burden by offering you an abundance of comprehensive resources, along with as much technical support as you need to keep things running smoothly and successfully.

And once you have all the event-related details in place or complete the meeting, you can easily distribute a variety of internal and customer pre- and post-event surveys to capture the valuable feedback that will help your organization in future planning.

The tasks involved with meetings and events can't get any easier or more customizable in look and feel with Cvent, and the seamless integration of all our online tools is extremely helpful because it allows you to have everything housed and connected in one central location.

Intimidated by the thought of taking on a system with multiple components? Just start with one of our offerings. Let us take the bulk of your manual processes and handle them with our impressive products. We're confident you'll want more after getting a little taste of Cvent!

And we're sure you'll find that choosing Cvent to manage all aspects of your organization's event needs is more affordable in the long run than trying to keep up a decentralized system. Once you get comfortable with Cvent's high-quality software, you'll wonder why you haven't stuck with just one "shop" until now.

What gets you excited about events or conferences you attend? The biggest thing for me is the location. I love getting to see cities and venues I've never seen before, it adds an element of fun to any event. Use Cvent's Destination Guide to find the perfect venue in the perfect city, and then let your invitees know about it! 

With Cvent's custom event website pages, you can design and display information about the hotel or venue. When your invitees are taken to your mini-event website from their invitations, they can not only learn more about the event itself, but also get more information about their destination to make them more likely to attend! Branding and customizing your website to get people excited and looking forward to your event is just one more way Cvent promises higher attendance and higher ROE (Return on Events)!

Check out this mini-website as an example!

Have you ever found yourself searching multiple metropolitan areas trying to decide where your next meeting will be held? Those searches can be time-consuming and inefficient. Sometimes you end up right back where you started, unsure of exactly where you’re going to hold your next event. Cvent has the solution for this problem: the Cvent Destination Guide.

The Cvent Destination Guide is an informative resource designed especially for meeting and event planners. It's a one-stop guide where planners can focus site selection and event sourcing efforts by comparing meeting-specific details across cities worldwide.

The Destination Guide has so many great features to explore. Browse cities by U.S. region or state, or view one of the more than 20 cities profiled internationally. City profiles offer a comprehensive overview of things to do, convention center information, transportation options and more. Also included is a key statistics page, where event planners can find useful data such as population, hotel room inventory, mileage to nearby cities and weather-related statistics. Plus, we know that budgets are tight, so there’s even a promotions page in each city for planners in need of a deal!

Beyond the city profiles themselves, the Cvent Destination Guide also offers a wealth of additional resources such as the Event Planning Comparison Chart, where you can quickly find and compare meeting details such as average taxi fare and the number of restaurants for cities across the globe. Or, browse the Convention Center Directory, Conference Center Directory, and CVB directory, or view venues that fall into Beach Destinations, Golf Destinations, and Mountain Destinations.

Here at Cvent we try to make your meeting planning process as smooth as possible. The Destination Guide is just one of the many things we have to offer to help make your meeting planning easier and more efficient.

Looking for a luxury NYC hotel for your next business event? The contemporary Strand Hotel in New York City offers the utmost of style and class from its 20-floor property in Manhattan's Midtown Fashion District.

Just around the corner from the Empire State Building, Madison Square Garden, Bryant Park and other New York attractions, the Strand Hotel has 177 guest rooms and 18 junior suites. Room decor and furnishings are inspired by mid-century Bogart elegance. The entire New York hotel is also adorned by a collection of Conde Nast vintage photography.

One of the best NYC hotels for intimate and elegant meetings and special events, the hotel offers 2,500 square feet of New York event space. Together, its meeting facilities can host up to 250 guests. State-of-the-art audio-visual equipment, wi-fi access, easels and tables, and a business center are among the amenities available at this new New York hotel.

Read more about meeting hotels and special event facilities in New York City on the Cvent Destination Guide.

Are you looking for information on transportation in Atlanta? Or maybe San Antonio transportation options?

Maybe you need to find some Chicago meeting stats, such as its hotel inventory or average taxi fare from O'Hare International to downtown hotels. Or, you may just need some information on Toronto entertainment options for your big group.

To find all this and more, check out the Cvent Destination Guide. This comprehensive resource is a one-stop shop for meeting and event planners who need to know more about a a city's hotels, meeting venues, attractions, transportation options, promotions and more. With over 100 cities profiled worldwide, you no longer need to hop from website to website trying to find the information you need, whether it's in order to select a final meeting site or get started on planning the logistics of your event.

Visit the Cvent Destination Guide today!

Offering a rich history and vibrant culture, Budapest, Hungary, has a well-deserved nickname of "Queen of the Danube." Not just full of leisure attractions, such as world-famous thermal spas and grand palaces and museums, the city is also a great destination for meetings and events.

Budapest offers its Congress & World Trade Center for international business conferences and events, as well as a number of smaller venues where planners can treat their meeting guests to authentic Hungarian experiences. Read about all the options for your Budapest meetings, such as hotels, convention venues, restaurants and more, on the Cvent Destination Guide.

Coming in at number 8 on ICCA's top congress cities worldwide, Stockholm is an ideal meeting destination. It has also recently garnered praise such as the European Green Capital Award 2010  for being a front runner in its commitment to solving environmental problems. Plus, in the space of a year it dropped eight places in the list of world's most expensive cities to number 31—meaning its a more affordable option over destinations such as Moscow, Tokyo and London.

For more information on hosting events in this great Nordic city, from Stockholm hotels to conference venues to attractions, make sure to visit the Stockhom meeting planning profile on the Cvent Destination Guide.

Last week, Holiday Inn saw the opening of the first key card hotel. This week, another first: the new Holiday Inn Santo Domingo opened as the brand's first property in the city, as well as the first in the Caribbean to incorporate its new hallmarks that are part of a $1 billion brand relaunch program.

"We are excited to introduce the Holiday Inn brand to one of the most thriving cities in the Caribbean," said Alvaro Diago, COO, IHG, Latin America and Caribbean, in a statement. "Additionally, we are thrilled to bring the new standards and hallmarks of the Holiday Inn brand to the Holiday Inn Santo Domingo as we know guests to the hotel will be extremely satisfied with the relaunch changes they experience."

Located on one of the city's main avenues, the seven-story hotel boasts 141 rooms, a 24-hour fitness center, outdoor rooftop swimming pool, Aromas restaurant, Level 2 bar and lounge, and plenty of guest parking. Business travelers enjoy an on-site business center and complimentary wifi and high-speed Internet in all rooms and public areas, as well as two meeting rooms. The hotel also boasts 190 square meters (2,045 square feet) of exhibit space.

View more information about meeting venues in the Dominican Republic on the Cvent Destination Guide

In these tough economic times, you'd think that international meetings would see a decline in attendance, perhaps an even bigger decline in attendance than that of domestic meetings. However, a recent survey from the International Congress & Convention Association (ICCA) reports otherwise.

In a survey of 120 association executives, over half of respondents reported significantly higher attendance (9.3 percent), slightly higher attendance (15.5 percent) or flat attendance (37.1 percent) at 2009 events compared with 2008. Still, 32 percent of respondents reported a slightly lower revenue, but only 14.4 percent reported "significantly lower" financial support from sponsorship and exhibition revenue, according to Successful Meetings.

"We've consistently claimed that international association meetings are the most resilient and recession-proof sector in our industry, and these results provide great evidence to support this view," ICCA CEO Martin Sirk said in a statement. "They're certainly not immune from the downturn, with 70 percent indicating that they had suffered some negative impact, but the detailed positive results demonstrate the sense of including international associations in any long-term strategic business mix."

The survey suggested that organizers may pull back on meetings for 2010, but most intend to keep their programs by selecting better value destinations, renegotiating contracts and making budget cuts. Lucky for these event planners, it's never been easier to compare and evaluate international meeting destinations than with the Cvent Destination Guide. With over 25 meeting planning overviews of cities outside the United States, the Destination Guide is your ultimate resource for international events.

Berlin has been a popular meeting destination for years, ranking among the top 5 meeting destinations on the International Congress and Convention Association (ICCA) list for the past three years. This year, it continues to run the convention industry in Germany, attracting 3.97 professionals between January and June 2009. These visitors attended 50,850 events.

According to the Berlin Convention Office and Berlin Tourismus Marketing GmbH, the proportion of national meetings and conventions rose by two percent to 81 percent this year. Additionally, guests are staying longer in Berlin. The average length of stay rose from 1.6 days to 1.7 days.

"Association congresses in Berlin attracted the most participants from around the globe in 2008," said Heike Mahmoud, director of conventions of BCO, in a statement. "Not only are more professional visitors coming to Berlin, they are also staying longer. This can be attributed more particularly to the excellent offerings of the German capital as a convention destination: six convention centers and halls, the most up-to-date hotel landscape in Europe, 1,500 cultural events every day and excellent value for money—this combination has proved to be extremely popular with both event organizers and participants."

To find out more about these Berlin hotels, venues and more to start planning your events, visit the Cvent Destination Guide.

In good news for frequent fliers and business travelers, U.S. airlines' 2009 on-time performance continues to improve over 2008, according to FlightStats. Its August numbers for this year showed the top 36 U.S. air carriers as having a combined on-time performance level of 79.3 percent, up from 77.3 percent last year at this time. It is also an increase from the 77.6 percent level the previous month.

Which airline carriers are your best bets for punctual flights? The top 10 U.S. airlines for on-time performance in August were:

• Hawaiian Airlines (94.35 percent)
• Freedom Airlines (89.57 percent)
• Horizon Air (88.25 percent)
• Frontier Airlines (88.2 percent)
• Chautauqua Airlines (86.1 percent)
• Alaska Airlines (85.33 percent)
• Shuttle America (84.56 percent)
• Allegiant Air (84.28 percent)
• Southwest Airlines (83.61 percent)
• SkyWest Airlines (83.44 percent)

Alaska, Southwest Airlines and Continental were among the other top runners who surpassed the 80 percent on-time level.

When attending or planning your next meeting or conference, taking into account an airline's performance may help you plan a smoother trip. You can always check out the main airport—and airline—information of destination cities across the country at the Cvent Destination Guide to get started.

The Singapore Tourism Board is expanding its "BE in Singapore" campaign to meeting and incentive planners. Started in March, the campaign will now run until February 2010, offering groups booking a minimum of 150 visitor room nights significant financial incentives for marketing, bidding, hosting fees and support for distinguished speakers.

"Singapore understands the challenges that the meetings industry is going through, and we are showing our support and long-term commitment to a vital and dedicated group of visitors," said Kershing Goh, regional director, The Americas, Singapore Tourism Board (based in New York), in a statement. "The industry is a critical component of our destination’s tourism infrastructure, and this campaign provides substantial economic relief, while encouraging new meetings in Singapore."

The BEiS campaign also includes an overseas marketing initiative to help smaller events through a Special Assistance Scheme for Value Events (SAVE). Meeting planners looking to host an event in Singapore can also find additional deals with the STB's "2009 Reasons to Meet in Singapore Campaign," which offers accommodation and meeting promotions.

If Singapore meeting is in your future, make sure to explore the Singapore meeting planning profile on the Cvent Destination Guide. Explore hotels, unique venues, convention centers, attractions and more!

Just a stone's throw from Boston, Cambridge is a convenient alternative for meeting planners. Sharing Boston's convenient port of entry—Logan International Airport—and its top-notch convention facitlies, such as the Boston Convention & Exhibition Center, Cambridge's various special event venues make it stand out as a great New England destination all on its own.

Read all about the hotels, restaurants and venues for private events in Cambridge at the Cvent Destination Guide.

According to the International Congress & Convention Association, Germany is a hotspot for meetings and events. In fact, in 2008, the country ranked as the number 1 destination outside of the United States to host an association meeting, having hosted over 400 of them last year. Lucky for planners, Cvent has made it even easier to plan and book events in Germany, having just launched the Berlin meeting planning profile on the Cvent Destination Guide!

With over 500 hotel rooms and several large convention facilities, Berlin is a top-notch destination for your international events; in fact, it ranked number 5 on ICCA's 2008 list of the most popular cities for international association meetings. From unique Berlin venues such as the Chamaleon Theater to traditional facilities such as the Internationales Congress Centrum Berlin, it's never been easier to find space for your events in Berlin.

With the addition of Berlin, the Cvent Destination Guide is your go-to resource for international events. With comprehensive meeting planning information for more than half of the ICCA's top 10 destinations—and plenty more on the way—on the Destination Guide and our ever-expanding database of international hotels and venues, it's easier than ever to start planning your international meetings through Cvent.

We have talked to many CVBs and DMOs who are running interesting meeting planning promotions. At HSMAI's Affordable Meetings National, I met with the Fort Worth CVB, who showed me their meeting planner promotion and I thought it was unique.

The Arlington, Dallas, Fort Worth, and Irving CVBs have partnered together to offer a meeting planning promotion that covers the DFW metro area. They describe the promotion as "the nation’s first multi-city, multi-brand, attrition-free program." The promotion caught my attention because Dallas is the fourth largest metro area in the U.S. and I like the idea of limiting the risk for event planners associated with attrition to stimulate meetings. It is great that Dallas hotels, across chains and brands, can work together to put together a stimulus plan like this for meeting planners. They are offering value beyond just a simple cash back offer or discount. These are details of the promotion

• No-attrition room contract to groups of all sizes that book and complete their meetings before June 30, 2010

• 20% discount on group ground transportation

• Group discounts on American Airlines

You can check out Dallas on the Cvent Destination Guide, or contact the Dallas area CVBs on the Cvent Supplier Network for more information.

We've added our 12th Northeastern city profile to the Cvent Destination Guide! Explore gorgeous Wilmington, located in the serene Brandywine Valley. Offering not just a picturesque setting, it's also very convenient, as the city is fewer than two hours away by train from major destinations such as New York City and Washington, DC.

Once in the city, planners are met with a wealth of traditional and unique meeting venues. The Chase Center on the Riverfront offers 87,000 square feet of space including the grand 12,800-square-foot Riverfront Ballroom. Museums such as the Delaware Art Museum and Delaware Center for Contemporary Arts make for elegant backdrops to receptions, dinners and more.

The Cvent Destination Guide features detailed profiles of over 100 cities worldwide. For easy comparison of key meeting stats, venue options and more, visit the Destination Guide today!

If you’d like your group to experience culture, cuisine, and class at your upcoming meeting or event, then be sure to select The Intercontinental Mark Hopkins in San Francisco. Located on the top of the historic Nob Hill and at the crossing of three cable car lines, your guests can take in all the splendor of the Northern California surroundings at this San Francisco meeting venue.

One activity available for your group at the Intercontinental Mark Hopkins is a modern speakeasy, taking guests back to the days of Prohibition when the hotel was originally constructed. Your group can relive the excitement of a speakeasy with a visit to Bourbon and Branch, a modern re-creation of the roaring twenties experience. There, a host will provide the group with a history of the 1870’s era building and serve them a complimentary amuse bouche and market-fresh cocktail of the day.

After guests get a taste of history, they can experience the San Francisco Bay area with a ride on the city’s historic cable cars. Don’t forget to start the day off right though, with a breakfast at the InterContinental’s “Top of the Mark” restaurant & bar. There, you can enjoy breathtaking 360-degree views of the city by the Bay. Hotel guests can also come back later in the day to choose from over 100 martinis on the extensive drink menu and watch the sunset while listening to live music.

These activities are but a few of the highlights that your guests can experience while staying at this San Francisco event venue.  To learn more about San Francisco as a meeting destination and hotels in San Francisco, check out our Cvent Destination Guide.

View more information about The Intercontinental Mark Hopkins on the Cvent Supplier Network

Barcelona's world-class convention facilities, accessible, sunny location, and unbeatable attractions have helped land this Spanish city a constant spot on the International Congress & Convention Association's list of the most popular congress cities. In fact, it was recently ranked number 3 on ICCA's list, having hosted 136 meetings in 2008.

Meeting planners can host receptions, tradeshows, conventions and more at Barcelona venues such as the Palau de Congressos de Catalunya (home to 35 halls and rooms) and the Barcelona International Convention Center (which encompasses over 25,000 square meters of space). Special event spaces such as the captivating L'Aquarium de Barcelona and Gaudi masterpiece Casa Batllo are also capable of making your meetings unforgettable.

Read more about Barcelona events and meetings at the Cvent Destination Guide. And don't forget, you can search and compare over 200 Barcelona hotels on the Cvent Supplier Network.