“Table of Eight” –

HSMAI Meeting April 3, 2009 – Holiday Inn Ft. Myers Airport at the Town Center.

Or a “West Coast Thank You”

As you know by now, our “Table of Eight” column is an occasional recap of our monthly meetings. This month, I’m changing format by sharing with you our Chapter President’s recent email. This is what Stacie Faulds had to say about the event:

“A special thank you to Beth (Rice) for coordinating a very successful meeting planner panel in Ft Myers today. And thank you to Julie (Wernick) for attending and handling registration.

It was a great turnout (55+ attendees), with an interesting mix of hotel salespeople and CVBs. In fact, there were 5 CVBs represented, including Jack Wert, Exec Dir of the Naples/Marco Island CVB. The brand new Holiday Inn was fantastic and the panel and moderator (Sal Dickinson) were fab. Everyone was impressed that Bill Briscoe participated. Time flew quickly and Sal only got through half his questions...so a sequel is a definite. I think this could be an annual event easily. I think that Bill Briscoe and the CVBs (Lee County, Collier County, Charlotte County, Broward County and Palm Beach) gave the luncheon, and our HSMAI chapter, major credibility. There is strong potential for membership growth on the west coast.

Beth is tallying the survey results, so we will soon see how it was received by our attendees. Until then, hats off to her for all her hard work."