The Convene Hospitality Group (CHG) president and CEO spoke to Iain Stirling on data-driven expansion, the Mallory launch, and transforming the meetings industry
IS: When we first spoke a couple of years ago, you had ambitious plans. Looking at what you’ve achieved, you’re clearly delivering on them.
RS: Absolutely. We’ve opened new venues, expanded into new markets, and strengthened our partnerships. But what’s most exciting is that we’re really just getting started – the pipeline ahead is even more ambitious.
IS: Let’s talk about the Mallory. This represents something quite different from your current portfolio. How did it come about?
RS: It’s tied directly to our rebranding as Convene Hospitality Group, which reflects a strategy we’ve had for some time. The etc.venues acquisition in London was partly catalysed by our belief that there was an opportunity to create different brands and product offerings that address the unique needs of our clients across meetings and events.
Last year, we brought in McKinsey to help us with customer segmentation and market sizing work. We broke the entire meetings and events industry down into six global segments where we felt we could compete. Within those segments were different use cases – small offsites, training sessions, town halls, investor days, board meetings, award dinners, incentive trips, gala dinners, fundraisers, multi-day conferences, product launches, brand activations – the list goes on.
What we discovered through extensive client conversations and survey work was that Convene was doing an incredible job catering to two of these segments. etc.venues, when it was originally created, was also focused on two segments – it had lost some focus but was still performing well in those areas. However, there were two segments we weren’t adequately serving through either Convene or etc.venues, although we were doing some special events work.
The Mallory, which will eventually become a new brand and collection of venues within the CHG portfolio, is focused squarely on special events, brand activations, and experiential work. It leans much more towards the social side. Our research showed these two segments potentially have the largest growth opportunity.
It also allows us to grow inorganically through M&A, which is challenging for Convene and etc.venues. Those brands grow organically – we find a location, design it, build it. But iconic event venues exist everywhere, often owned by small businesses with no real scale. We believe there’s potential to acquire multiple locations.
IS: When does the Mallory open?
RS: Q3 next year. And we’ll announce two more special event venues in the next couple of months.
IS: You’re not waiting to see how the Mallory performs before opening others?
RS: No, we already know. That’s why we do the research. We know how much our clients are spending, what they’re spending it on, and where they’re spending it. We’re very data-driven – everything is data-led.
From our conversations and research, we’re already booking the Mallory now. We have strong conviction that if you design the right product and deliver the right experience, the demand is there.
IS: Do you have a target number of venues over the next few years?
RS: We have 40 locations now. With this announcement and another location we opened this week – a business we’re acquiring out of bankruptcy with two sites – our plan is to double the footprint organically over the next five to six years. If we pursue M&A, we’d add to that.
Organically, we can open five to seven venues annually across the different brands. Over five years, that’s 25 to 30 locations. The M&A opportunities are becoming increasingly interesting.
IS: Are you looking beyond the UK and US?
RS: We’re educating ourselves about Europe, but nothing’s in the pipeline. The US still has enormous room for growth. We’re only in seven cities. In New York, where we have 16 or 17 locations, we could probably reach 30 with our multi-brand approach. We’re not in Miami, Nashville, Atlanta, Dallas, Austin, Toronto, San Diego, or LA. There’s substantial room to expand.
IS: San Diego is on the radar I hear?
RS: It’s a significant meetings market. PCMA was there last year. Our strategy is simple: listen to your clients, ask where you can serve them, and identify what you can do differently. It’s more places, more ways.
The MalloryIS: You also have a membership product for workspace use?
RS: We have different products, including membership and high-end co-working in some locations, but the core of our business remains meetings and events.
IS: Is the Mallory your largest venue?
RS: No. Hudson Yards is almost 80,000 square feet. The Mallory is 50,000. The average Convene venue is around 60,000 square feet.
IS: How does the space at the Mallory differ from your other venues?
RS: It’s a stunning industrial space with double-height ceilings – 25 to almost 30 feet. The building itself has tremendous character as a turn-of-the-century asset. You’ve got exposed brick, ornate windows – for someone who designs and develops venues, what’s special about these Mallory-style properties is that the real estate often has so much architectural character that you want it to tell the story.
The largest space is almost 8,000 square feet, column-free, with beautiful double height. We have an incredible pre-function space downstairs with a bar for receptions, and a third floor that’s flexible – it can serve as pre-function space, reception area, or breakout rooms. For weddings, you have pre-function rooms for preparations and all that.
IS: Why create Convene Hospitality Group? What was the thinking?
RS: Look, we’re not doing anything revolutionary. What Ennismore is doing in lifestyle hospitality, what hotel brands have done, what Major Food Group and Danny Meyer have done in restaurants – it’s this house-of-brands approach. By creating CHG, it’s much easier to articulate to our clients that Convene is Convene, etc.venues is etc.venues, and the Mallory is part of this collection. It creates clarity and flexibility to create new brands, acquire brands, and have it make sense to our end users.
IS: We recently published a piece about your teams handling design and architecture with a distinctive style. How involved are you in this process?
RS: I still sketch – tracing paper sketches with our design team for every venue. We have an incredibly talented design and product team. We work with amazing partners globally, depending on the venue. It takes a village, as you know. But I’m still very involved in space planning particularly.
IS: Are you still privately owned?
RS: Yes. Our investors are Ares Management and Brookfield Asset Management. We were involved in a strategic partnership with Gencom and Hudson’s Bay Company through our acquisition of etc.venues. We raised over US$266 million in funding. Through Convene Hospitality Group, we have a stated focus on growing our physical network of premium venues rather than real estate investment funds at present.
IS: What’s next. Can you share anything?
RS: We’ve got exciting developments happening. Obviously, there’s a lot going on in the US. Stay tuned – we have some strong announcements coming over the next few months.
IS: Things are certainly moving rapidly at CHG.
RS: Credit goes to our teams. The product team does outstanding work. But most importantly, you can design beautiful spaces, but if the on-site experience doesn’t deliver, it’s meaningless.
All the credit goes to our on-site teams. They care deeply and do everything they can to surprise and delight our customers, day in and day out. We’re going to serve almost 1.5 million event attendees this year. To do that consistently, globally, across almost 40 locations is not easy. They deserve all the credit.
IS: When you started this, did you expect to be in this position today?
RS: We should be further along, absolutely. If the pandemic hadn’t happened, we’d already be there. But look, we’ve always believed there was an opportunity to build a very large global business since the beginning.
Everything takes time. There’s no such thing as overnight success. Every major brand that’s a household name today has taken 20, 30, 40, 50, 100 years to build. What are we, 16 years in? We’re young. I was just talking to someone from Amazon earlier – Amazon’s only been around for 25 years. It’s still young.
We’ve got tremendous opportunity ahead, a lot of work to do, and a lot of fun to be had. We’ll continue figuring out how we can serve our clients in more places, more ways. And this idea of bringing multi-brand, multi-product offerings to meetings and events at a platform level – no one’s done that. To me, that’s the most exciting thing: transforming an industry.
