Disney, Anaheim Target Corporate Meetings

<B> Disney, Anaheim Target Corporate Meetings</B>

By Judy Jacobs

With several major new venues and increased efforts on the part of local hoteliers and destination management companies leading the charge, Anaheim is determined to gain a greater share of the corporate meetings market--a market it has downplayed in the past in favor of association conventions.

And no one is more determined than Disney to effect that transition. The company took over the Pan Pacific Hotel two years ago and is energetically marketing the property to corporate groups. In fact, Disney's efforts have helped turn the property's market mix around.

"We've renovated it into a Disney quality property, refurbishing the hotel's ballroom and putting in a business center and a concierge lounge," said Donna Sue Davis, Disney's director of resort sales. "In the past, our meetings business had been 78 percent associations, with about 22 percent corporate, but now it's 35 percent corporate meetings."

The Pacific Hotel is geared for groups of 250 to 300 people. Facilities include two ballrooms, one accommodating 600 for banquets and 1,000 for receptions, and another seating 230 for banquets and 350 for receptions. There are also three smaller meeting rooms and an outside venue, the Garden Pavilion, which will accommodate 300 for banquets and 600 for receptions. A tea room, which serves a high tea hosted by "Mary Poppins," has become a popular venue for spouse events.

Disney expects to entrench itself even more firmly in the corporate market with the opening of its new California Adventure theme park. Among the highlights will be a Hollywood district with its own television studio, a beach scene with a boardwalk and classic rides, a section celebrating California's natural beauty and a wine country experience produced in partnership with Robert Mondavi.

Along with the new theme park will be Disney's 750-room Grand California Hotel, which is scheduled to open in January 2001. "The hotel is being built with small corporate and incentive business in mind," said Davis. "It will have a rustic grand old California theme and be very upscale." The Grand California will include 20,000 square feet of meeting space.

The new theme park and hotel are part of The Disneyland Resort, which will incorporate The Disneyland Center, a public esplanade of themed retail, dining, and entertainment experiences connecting the new theme park with the existing Disneyland park.

While Disney's new attractions and new resort are expected to increase its role in the meetings and incentive market, other hotels also are striving to get a bigger share of that market. The Anaheim Hilton is one of them.

"About two years ago we increased our sales staff from one to four people, and it paid off," said Linda Simpson, Hilton's director of sales and marketing. "Between 1995 and 1997, our corporate business increased by 30 percent. We have done that by targeting territories with a high concentration of corporate headquarters, and we continue to research new opportunities. We now make monthly trips to Silicon Valley, for example."

The Hilton also has upgraded some facilities and services to cater to the discerning business traveler. "We now offer remote checkin at the airport, on the bus from the airport or at the porte cochere, so people never have to stand in line for their keys," Simpson said. "In addition, each guest room has two-line phones. And we now have a 25,000-square-foot fitness center and offer 5 a.m. aerobics classes to cater to the East Coast corporate market."

Complementing the efforts by Anaheim's hotels is a handful of new venues that appeal directly to the corporate market. Foremost among these is Tinseltown Studios, a 700-seat themed dinner attraction. The $15-million facility is the first of what owner Ogden Entertainment hopes will be a series of Tinseltowns across the United States.

Tinseltown predicts that meetings and incentives will be a large part of its business. "One of the reasons we located our flagship in Anaheim is because there's such a tremendous amount of meetings business," said Jim Garber, a former Disney executive who now serves as president of Tinseltown Studios.

"The intent is to create the experience of attending a Hollywood event," said Garber. "People will walk through a studio lot, past TV cameras and our own cast of autograph hounds. Our goal is to make the guest the star. We'll even interview people as they are entering and create a pre-dinner broadcast."

Inside the studio, Garber said, the theater lobby will be decorated in art deco style with Hollywood memorabilia. From there guests enter the main dining room, which will have a large stage with two 9-foot by 12-foot screens on each side and tables seating four or eight, where they can watch the show and enjoy a three-course meal.

"The show is a one-hour television show that will include a medley of great musical moments in films," Garber said. "Interspersed we will give awards to the best actors and actresses, who will actually be chosen from the audience. We will select four men and four women, film them in our studio during dinner and insert them in the movie."

The Tinseltown show also can be customized to incorporate a group's own awards, film clips, commercials or other inserts. For instance, "Companies can put in commercials for a new product launch," Garber noted, or "we can also do satellite transmissions, of, say, a company president who can't attend but who still wants to address the group."

Several other unique dining venues have been created in the old Anaheim Stadium, which reopened April 1 as Edison International Field and now is operated by Disney Sports. A $117-million makeover included two private dining clubs that are available on non-game days. The Diamond Club, an elegant restaurant with subtle baseball touches throughout, seats 240 people (350 if the patio is used). The more informal Knothole Club specializes in tapa-style cocktail parties for up to 200 people. The upscale Homeplate Club is expected to open by early next year.

Other Edison Field venues are available on game days. The Hall of Fame Room/Museum of California Sports Stars seats up to 60 people (175 with the patio) for sit-down affairs or 225 for cocktails. Two outdoor venues, Gate 5, accommodating 350 to 500 people, and Gate 6, seating up to about 150, are available for groups who wish to attend the game. Those groups also can take advantage of a pre-game picnic area.

Another attraction expected to draw the corporate crowd is the Block at Orange, an outlet mall being developed by The Mills Corp., which operates outlet malls at various locations around the country. This one will be a bit different from its other operations, however. The Block will be significantly more upscale than similar shopping facilities and will devote more than 60 percent of its space to entertainment and dining.

Entertainment venues there will include Graham Central Station, which incorporates seven nightclubs--Bell Bottoms for unes of the 1970s and '80s, Denim and Diamonds for country, an Alley Cats piano bar, Starz karaoke bar and The Zone sports bar among them. The Block's GameWorks Studio will have a Hollywood theme with interactive virtual reality games in a Hollywood movie-set environment. The Back Lot Cafe also will have a Hollywood theme, treating guests to a re-creation of the type of dining experience typical to crews working on film productions.