EUROPE – The Head of the Serbian Convention Bureau (SCB) Milos Milovanovic, was named the Kongres Marketing Personality of the Year at Conventa 2012 in Ljubljana, 18 January.
The Hall of Fame Award at the fourth edition of the South East Europe meetings industry exhibition went to Bogdan Lipovsek, GM of the Grand Hotel Union and Hotel Lev in Ljubljana.
The Slovene capital’s Cankarjev Dom was the host venue for the trade show’s opening social evening, which included a fashion show and catering from Vivo featuring Slovene national dishes.
The Serbian CB chief told CMW he took “great pride in the fact that Serbia is the fastest growing meeting destination in Europe according to the latest ICCA statistics”.
Serbia jumped from 64th to 43rd position in the country rankings in three years, hosting 46 qualifying meetings in the latest year under ICCA review.
The Serbian capital Belgrade moved up to 28th in the ICCA city rankings, putting it on a par with Glasgow, Florence and Hamburg.
Milovanovic attributed part of the current success to the SCB widely promoting Serbia as a meetings destination using digital and social media tool. The bureau introduced its ‘Serbia Destination’ mobile app recently.
The Conventa show closes today (19 January) with organisers claiming 800 visitors.
Head of Slovenia’s Convention Bureau and Show Director, Miha Kovacic told CMW this year’s show had made great strides in improving its education and seminar offer and that plans for next year would accelerate progress on the digital marketing side and in the area of sustainability.
All stands at Conventa 2012 are made out of traditional Slovenian apple crates and main show sponsor Kongres magazine publisher Gorazd Cad promised that this year’s green approach would be “measured carefully”.
The urge to go green even extended to persuading delegates to take the stairs instead of the lift to the 6th floor show party. Conventa delegates clearly have to be fit.
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