Meeting Planner's Guide

Kankakee County Convention and Visitors Bureau has a new online Meeting Planner's Guide. This planning guide is designed to assist you with your meeting requirements and to provide you with the information you need to make your meeting a successful event. Download your copy HERE.

Located just an hour south of Chicago off of Interstate 57, the Kankakee River Valley offers a peaceful setting for meetings, retreats, and special events. Find the perfect location for your event from a conference center to auditoriums, classrooms, theaters, and ballrooms.  For a truly unique event consider one of Kankakee County’s historic landmarks or outdoor facilities. 

We are here to assist you with your planning and servicing needs, so please give us a call—it’s toll free: 1-800-747-4837.

How the CVB can help you

What are some of the specific services CVBs offer planners?

·        CVBs can offer unbiased information about services and facilities in the destination.

·        CVBs serve as a vast information database and a one-stop shop, thus saving planners time, energy and money in the development of a meeting.

·        CVBs act as a liaison between the planner and the community. For example, CVBs are aware of community events with which your meeting may beneficially coincide (like festivals or sporting events). .

·        CVBs can help meeting attendees maximize their free time through the creation of pre and post-conference activities, spouse tours, and hosting of special evening events.

·        CVBs can provide hotel room counts and meeting space statistics, and will keep a convention/meetings/events calendar in order to help planners avoid conflicts and/or space shortages.

Other services provided to planners include:

·        Collateral material

·        Help with on-site logistics, including registration

·        Housing bureaus

·        Auxiliary services, such as production companies, catering, transportation

·        Site inspections/familiarization tours and site selection

·        Speakers and local educational opportunities

·        Coordination of local transportation

·        Access to special venues 

 The overall job of a CVB is to market and sell a destination. A CVB wants every single client to be happy. It is going to do everything it can to match every client with the perfect setting and services for its meetings. The bottom line — the CVB is working for you.  

So, make your life easier and let the Kankakee County CVB's fingers do the walking for you!

Motorcoach Travel on the Upswing

Have you seen all the motorcoach group buses in Kankakee County lately?

If the motorcoach, tour, and travel industry were a stock, now would be the time to buy. A host of recent studies suggest this is an industry gaining momentum and barreling further into national, state, and regional tourism markets.

The Kankakee County CVB is utilizing the American Bus Association (ABA) resources with their new Motorcoach Economic Impact study. When compared to the previous study three years ago, the economic changes reflect a much stronger market for motorcoach travel. Read the entire article in Destinations Magazine.

If you would like more information on how you can help your attraction, lodging, venue or business create items to attract this booming market, contact the CVB.

5 Ways to Enhance Your Next RFP Response

If you are a hospitality marketing representative, I know you answer a lot of Request For Proposals (RFPs). And even though "dates and rates" are still part of the process, they are not the total package. Think instead of your RFP response as a way to tell your story. Yes, it will take more time to accomplish this, but in the end, it will hopefully yield more group business to your destination.

Here are five things planners ask for, the usual hospitality response, and tips to enhance it:

PLANNER PICK #1: Event Date With a Few Alternatives
TYPICAL RESPONSE: Most sales personnel look at the dates and either respond to the proposal or throw it in the trash because they do not have those dates available.
ENHANCED ALTERNATIVE: Discuss what dates you do have available. Try to determine if there is any flexibility with their company or association. Let them know there are savings to their bottom line if they can be flexible. If they still won't budge, thank them for their time and then discard the paperwork.


PLANNER PICK #2: Number of Attendees, Meeting Rooms and Sleeping Rooms Required
TYPICAL RESPONSE: If your convention center or hotel isn't large enough to accommodate the group, the RFP is discarded.
ENHANCED ALTERNATIVE: Perhaps you need to know more about the meeting before your respond. How many meeting rooms do they need and what sizes? Can you spread the meeting over several spaces instead of just one? If your hotel has the meeting space but not the hotel rooms, perhaps you work with another hotel next door on overflow?


PLANNER PICK #3: Cities, States, and Areas of Interest
TYPICAL RESPONSE: Looking at the cities the planner is considering either has you slumped in your seat or feeling you have a great probability of a win.
ENHANCED ALTERNATIVE: Looking at all the other cities and states, put together a plus and minus page compared to the competition. Tell your story by accentuating the pluses. Use referral quotes but most importantly tell the planner why they want to meet in your city. Think of it this way: give them the story that makes it easy for them to convince to their boss.

PLANNER PICK #4: Venue Requirements
TYPICAL RESPONSE: Just the facts ma'am and lots of them. Number of meeting rooms, dimensions, sleeping room types, urban, suburban, or resort hotel. Amenities. Distance from the airport and shuttle service. Restaurants and bars on premise.
ENHANCED RESPONSE: Find out more about the group. What are their interests? Are they bringing their spouse or significant other? Do they want to be downtown or out near the airport? What do they like to do after the meeting? Again, tell a story about your property and what makes it special, but tailor your response to their needs.

PLANNER PICK #5: Food and Beverage
TYPICAL RESPONSE: Usually the hotel staff includes every choice available to the planner or a very short listing of food and beverage choices. Neither alternative is particularly helpful.
ENHANCED ALTERNATIVE: If the planner is making a site visit, ask them to sample some of the menu ideas your banquet staff has come up with. If this is not possible, put together alternative menu choices for the days they are there. Determine if the group wants plated entrees or buffet style. Include healthy choices and local influences, including your beverage choices.

In summary, it is important to cover the facts about your property and destination in your RFP, but equally important is the ability to sell it. Tell your story and don't be afraid to take risks. Sell the benefits of going to your destination, convention center, and hotel. Contact the CVB for more information.

Heartland Travel Showcase was Great!

Heartland Showcase was a success.  We made some great contacts with tour group planners.  We also walked away with many ideas for creating an unforgettable experience for the traveler visiting Kankakee County.  To all our attraction owners, directors, etc., the one thing that most planners are looking for are unique experiences.  Example: Baby boomers are looking for hands on experiences.  Some of the requests were, do we have candle making classes, cooking demonstrations, quilting activities, mystery dinners and garden tours. (We had lots of inquiries regarding The Bennett Curtis House and Sunrise Farms).  Museums are still popular but they are looking for something interactive the visitor can experience. They like to take home something that they created.      

Here are a few ideas:

• Art classes with take away creations like Clay and Cocktails could be a great event for tour groups.
• At an event like BBQ Fest – visitors get to participate with vendors in creating a special recipe. An event like Klash on the Kankakee could allow participants to actually try their hand at some of the historic activities, for a real hands-on experience.
• Unique eateries could conduct behind the scenes food preparation at your restaurant for small groups.
• Museums could offer interactive tours similar to the Cemetery Walk. We already have Warren Brown performing his Mark Twain re-enactment.
• Existing attractions could offer special deals on things like ice skating, scuba diving, “how things are made” tours at farms and factories or any kind of “behind the scenes” tour.

These are just a few items we should be thinking about for 2014 and beyond.  Most of the planners are looking for sample itineraries for 2014.  So if you have any ideas please let us know.  We ask that if you are interested in promoting your attraction or event, please be ready to coordinate any activity before our visitors arrive.

Creating a Professional Proposal

A proposal is often the first documented impression that you serve up to your client representative of your property. SCENARIO: Your client wants the proposal “yesterday.” You want to give the client the proposal in the requested time frame so you rush through using a proposal you have used before. You forgot to remove references to the past client, the formatting isn’t neat and words are misspelled. If you had used a template, you would be in a better position with your client!

Yes, creating a proposal template that creates a “Wow!” from every client will take hours but they will be hours well spent. Putting together the template at a time when you are not under a tight deadline ensures a better product. After you complete the template you will have time to put it away, let it rest, and review again with a fresh set of eyes or even a new set of eyes of a trusted coworker or editor for fine tuning. When you receive a new request, just tweak your effective proposal template with specific, unique client information that is “dressed to impress!”

Creating a professional proposal template is sure way to give your location the best impression possible to potential clients. The Kankakee County CVB even has a sample template available to style your own. Additionally there are numerous examples available on the Internet by searching "professional proposals". Here is a link to a website with some great examples and ideas.

Do you have a plan?

Contingency planning is a vital aspect of any event management. Even the best made plans are unlikely to ensure that nothing goes wrong. When a major problem does occur event organisers are expected to be able to react quickly and appropriately. This ability to react stems from anticipating emergencies, accidents and problems, formulating plans and training staff in what must be done.

Industry consultant, trainer and speaker Tyra W. Hilliard, an associate professor at the University of Alabama, teaches meetings contingency planning at industry events. Some preparedness measures she recommends include the following:

• Form a crisis management team, including long-term and event-specific internal personnel as indicated by the threat and vulnerability assessment.
• Create a strategy for minimizing the impact of a crisis on meetings.
• Develop methods to inform meeting attendees about appropriate crisis prevention and response measures (e.g., emergency contact information, collecting medical emergency information on registration forms, posting and announcing evacuation routes, etc.).

Read more about contingency planning here.