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Crunch time for transparent pricing

Director of event services at leading agency Inntel, Amanda Stranack says the credit crunch is prompting keener cost comparisons.

With the ongoing credit crunch, conference centres and purpose-built meeting venues stand a better chance than many other venues to pick up new business. When budgets are under pressure, very often the first thing to go is residential meetings.

Clients can make considerable savings by condensing programmes into one day, thus avoiding paying for dinner, bed and breakfast. This approach creates an opportunity for clients to consider venues without bedrooms - good news for dedicated venues.

However, to grab this opportunity, they must streamline their pricing and services.

If the primary reason for moving from a residential to non-residential event is budget, then it is a ‘no brainer’ that cost is key if conference centres are to fully exploit this opportunity. However, when you do a comparison for a day meeting in a hotel or conference centre, the conference centre will invariably be more expensive.

The biggest issue with conference centres are all of the mandatory ‘extras’. These are charges for services that hotels cost as an integral part of their offering.

On receipt of a quote from such a conference venue you may find that a market comparable DDR is offered, but you cannot skip the small print as this will usually explain that costs for security/stewards/power/rubbish removal etc, are not included in the price. The event cannot go ahead without these services so the event organiser will have to go back and clarify prices for these items in order to get a true costing.

As an illustration of the complex rate structures and the persistent feeling that everything is charged as an ‘extra’, here is a recent ‘clarification’ on a quote for security at a venue: ‘Security £160 + VAT -– charge is per guard. So it is £160 + VAT for every 200 guests in house. Based on your numbers of 300/320 it will be £160 + VAT total. If numbers go up to 400 it will be £320 + VAT... make sense?’

Clearly the provision of security through both set up and the event itself is a cost to the venue and has to be passed on to the client, but the method of passing the cost has to be made simpler.

In the current environment I believe that conference venues have an opportunity to increase market share. However, they need to streamline pricing structures by incorporating these ‘mandatory extras’ into the DDRs/room hire rates in order to compete with the straightforward pricing structure of hotels.

For more, visit www.inntel.co.uk