Confident that the industry it serves now has experienced the worst of economic times and is poised to see growth both in its own membership and corporate spending, the Society of Incentive & Travel Executives' incoming president plans to embark upon several initiatives to broaden the association's appeal to international and younger incentive professionals and better define the benefits of membership.
Roger Tondeur, CEO of Geneva, Switzerland-based MCI Group, a network of European incentive travel and event management companies, will assume SITE's top position for one year at the conclusion of the association's annual conference, held Dec. 3-7 in Reykjavik, Iceland. Tondeur, who will be SITE's first president from Europe in three years, succeeds Bill Vastine
(Meetings Today, Nov. 11, 2002).Though Tondeur begins his term during a difficult time for the incentive travel industry, with international travel limited and many corporations avoiding certain types of incentives, he said the worst already has happened and better times lie ahead.
"The bottom of the wave is over," Tondeur said, "but 2003 has been a tough year. Business has been down, in some cases 20 percent to 30 percent. Hotel occupancies and spending by corporations are all down. The pure incentives, those that are self-financed by sales increases, are not down. But half of our business is event-related—dinner meetings, sales meetings, which are part of the wider world of incentive travel—and they have been hit hardest. A lot of those were zapped." Chief among those have been international incentive events, particularly those that involve travel between the United States and Europe.
"It's been a problem," Tondeur said. "First came Sept. 11, then Iraq. People in North America don't want to travel outside, and Europeans don't want to travel to North America. It used to be a very attractive option for Europeans, but now their incentives are staying within Europe." Tondeur blamed current events for the lack of international incentive travel but believed the situation is temporary. "There is polarization through insecurity in the business," he said. "North America is not as much of a role model as it used to be, but I believe it will balance out and go back."
Other international issues likely will occupy Tondeur, as SITE's first president from Europe in three years
(Meetings Today, Nov. 13, 2000). Noting that 60 percent of SITE's 1,800 members reside outside of the United States, Tondeur plans to emphasize the association's benefits to international incentive travel industry members. "In the United States, SITE fulfills the role as a national association and as an international association," he said. "In Europe, there is a tendency for national associations to be very strong—English, French, Dutch incentive associations. It's important to get SITE accepted as the leadership association."
Tondeur plans to help accomplish this by continuously emphasizing SITE's educational and academic offerings, its networking opportunities and the research published by its foundation. These moves, he hopes, will increase association membership, which he said slipped by 10 percent by the end of 2002 but has stabilized this year. One area is ripe for increased membership, Tondeur said: "We need to work to make it sexy for young people to be a part of SITE. We have good educational and networking opportunities, but the problem is getting that message to the young."
Attracting membership in a slow economy, Tondeur added, demands an emphasis on the building blocks of incentive travel management. "It's about networking and exchanging best practices on how to do well in a difficult time," he said. "A lot of our companies are doing poorly, there's staff reductions, and we want to talk about how to act in these times."