The APEX glossary defines a second-tier city as "A city where the space limitations of the convention center, the hotels, or the air lift, make the city more appropriate for smaller meetings and events." But that definition only tells part of the story. For example, no one would call New York City a second-tier city. However, while the city's Javits Center ranks first in attendance and second in number of shows among all convention centers nationwide, it ranks 18th in overall capacity.

Looking at the criteria for the various tiers, the definition hits a snag right away. A second-tier label: Good or bad? The Destination Marketing Association International (DMAI) doesn't use any "tier" terminology, avoiding the labeling altogether.

The one point of consensus: The definition of tiers shifts with every planner, every city. Some cities embrace the label and others shy away from it.

"I love the term," said Jeff Hewitt, senior director of sales for Visit Charlotte, the Charlotte Convention & Visitors Bureau. "I think it comes down to being who you are. I don't view it as a negative unless you're trying to overstate your capabilities. It's just knowing what you are and what you're not."

Not everyone agrees

"My concern with the second-tier city tag is how groups that book with us feel about being considered as 'second tier' themselves?" said Robert Lander, president and CEO of the Austin Convention and Visitors Bureau.

Hewitt views first tiers as "the major markets with enormous capabilities." The capabilities aspect is undeniably a factor: Number of rooms and convention center capacity certainly separate a first- from second-tier. But then there are the less quantifiable measurements: The draw of the city. Accessibility. And on those last two points, smaller cities often feel the lines have blurred between the tiers to the point that, well, size doesn't matter.

"The stigma of the second-tier label has been diminished over time," said Butch Spyridon, president of the Nashville Convention and Visitors Bureau. "For the most part, planners look at the destination and facility and not necessarily how big a city is. We have always attempted to position Nashville as a smaller destination with all of the appeal, facilities, and amenities of a larger destination." "Tier labels have really shifted during the years," said Michael Smith, vice president of the Portland Oregon Visitors Association. "The tier is really based on the size of a convention product, not the quality. Our product is outstanding. It's just not as big."

"It used to have a derogatory connotation, not being as good as a first tier," said Steve Carey, president of Blink Communications, a Washington, D.C.-based conference production company specializing in nonprofits. "Now what it means is how big is the exhibition space? How many rooms? What about transportation?"

Ask planners for their definition of the tiers, and they tend to throw out names instead of numbers: They know second-tier cities when they see them. There's Charlotte with 4,400 guest rooms within walking distance of the convention center and 2,800 to 3,000 of those committable per night. With a capability of 4,000 to 5,000 on peak night, Portland's "best market" is in the 1,500 to 2,500 range. Nashville has 30,000 rooms with 5,000 downtown.

But there's a downside for some cities to the quick, ambiguous groupings.

Take Indianapolis, with 28,000 rooms in the metropolitan area … and 3,000 hotel rooms connected by a walkway to the convention center. After a convention center expansion to be completed in 2010, 4,000 rooms will be connected to the center. An ideal group is 8,000 attendees requiring 3,500 on peak night.

"For us the second-tier label is more a con than a pro," said Doug Bennett, vice president of sales for Indianapolis Convention and Visitors Association. "That segment of cities can be pretty wide. The perception is not always a practical portrayal of a city's ability to host group meetings. Planners will just for convenience draw comparisons, and that may not be accurate."

The Big-Fish, Cheaper-Pond Concept

Big fish come up plenty when discussing tiers. Everyone wants to be one. And ideally, they'd like to be a big fish enjoying great prices.

"Clients tend to get better prices all the way around," Carey said of second-tier cities. "Convention centers or hotels tend to be smaller, so all of a sudden you're kind of a big fish. We all know everybody should be treated the same, but it's just natural if somebody has 600 of your 800 rooms, they're going to get a little more attention. Working with nonprofits, I want to bring them a high level of service, and I can better do that in a smaller city."

The attention can come down to more than just the percentage of rooms taken up. For cities that place a premium on group business, relationships go across the board.

"Here you own the whole city," Indianapolis' Bennett said. "You're not competing for restaurant tables or cabs or for hospitality in general. And our relationship with our community is closer, which translates into providing services for a group that larger cities don't have access to. You gain the benefit of our relationship being stronger with our mayor, our local media, our police department."

"Getting the city's attention is a priority for smaller conferences," said Dyanne Hughes, CMP, associate executive director of the American Association of School Administrators. "Even some larger events prefer not to be one of three or four conferences in a city."

And sometimes smaller cities can come out ahead on the accessibility question.

"We've found it [the label] to be a positive for us," said Julie Calvert, vice president of marketing for the Greater Cincinnati Convention and Visitors Bureau. "That's especially been true since Sept. 11, because people want to meet in areas that are more accessible, and we're within four hours of 60 percent of the nation's population."

Not that opting for a smaller city comes without risk.

"I just completed a conference in a third-tier city that went well but not without challenges due to the size of the conference and infrastructure of the city to handle it," Hughes said. "The cons can be the city infrastructure, and inter-property coordination may not be at the same level of a first-tier that does one conference after another."

Cons might be perception rather than fact. But attendees' perceptions can be a powerful thing if they're not corrected.

"There's an assumption made that there's nothing to do in some of these cities," Carey said. "And the fact is that there are historical places, great restaurants, so much to do with the arts, maybe Double-A or Triple-A baseball or a wonderful theater. There's a lot more to do than people expect."

Working That Much Harder

Convention bureaus' focused, intensive efforts to counter that perception of smaller cities has paid off, according to Carey.

"The effort that convention and tourism bureaus are making is much stronger - they're addressing those concerns immediately," he said. "'You think there's nothing to do?' They're meeting that [misperception] with pictures, bold type, confronting it head on."

Confronting faulty or old perceptions about a destination is only one prong of a marketing approach. Second-tier cities must concentrate on name recognition and branding in a way the largest markets never need consider.

"Second and third have to work a little harder to earn the business," Smith said. "In the past I would have called a client, said I was from Portland, and they'd ask 'Portland, Maine?' That's not the case anymore, but in terms of what Portland has to offer, big fams [familiarization trips] still are so important. The general reaction once they visit is, 'I didn't know about that.'"

He also noted the impact - or lack thereof - of a hotel chain.

"When you have the larger hotels, you tend to have the weight of those corporations behind you," he said. "We have moderate-sized hotels [no more than one of each brand], so when the weight of their national sales office comes into play, it's really not going to be pushing it toward Portland."

"People hear Charlotte, and they're not sure whether that's Charlotte or Charleston or Savannah - they know it's somewhere in the South and they might have been there," Hewitt said. "We know that we are an undiscovered commodity. We live and breathe it every day."

The plus of being "an undiscovered commodity?" The impact of an actual visit. Hewitt calls it the "ah-hah moment." "When we bring someone to Charlotte now, and they have the chance to see, touch, taste, and experience everything there is to offer now, there is almost without exception that ah-hah moment," he said. "We love getting people here to see their eyes open and chins drop and hear them say, 'Oh my goodness, I had no idea.'"

For Carey, that moment of realization can be equally striking.

"I'm supposed to carry a message so attendees feel proud to be part of an organization, and the city is doing the same thing, showing off how proud they are of their place," he said. "I've heard many people say of Austin, Nashville, or Charlotte, 'Oh, I'll be back here. I didn't know they had this.'"

And if the city sells its product well enough, the appeal has nothing to do with convention center size or number of rooms. It's a gut reaction from attendees.

"First-tier cities are always a draw," said Eleanor DeMoors, CMP, director of meetings and exhibits for the National Telecommunications Cooperative Association. "Second-tier cities are, too, as long as they are desirable locations - a warm climate is nice - because we are a bigger fish and that really helps us. As long as the location is a big enough draw where attendees want to see the city, we're interested."

She noted that in recent years her meeting in San Antonio drew significantly bigger numbers than Miami. "It really depends on what attendees perceive," she said. "The perceived safety of the city and also the nature of the city matters. Our members are a little older, so South Beach maybe didn't appeal to them as much as San Antonio."

The Business of Branding

"It's hard for a city to maintain its unique and authentic identity in today's franchise environment," Spyridon said. "It's the homogenization of America's cities. Malls begin to look alike, restaurants begin to look alike.

Part of our brand promise is an unpretentious, authentic atmosphere. As important an element as any convention center is 'what do you do to make yourself different?'"

New York or Washington, D.C. or Chicago may not need to worry much about what sets them apart. But second-tier cities need to carve out a specific, irresistible niche.

For Nashville, it's been about broadening the country music image, emphasizing air service, facilities, restaurants, architecture, and a broader entertainment scene. The emphasis on organic and local grown foods, combined with Oregon wine, distinguishes Portland's restaurant scene, and the city's environmentally friendly policies make plenty of news.

When major changes take place, marketing has to shift into high gear. Major expansions can mean a whole new market.

With the doubling in size of its convention center in 2002 as well as a new special events center, Austin's convention market "shifted to a higher plane," according to Lander. The expansion was followed by the opening of an 800-room convention center hotel in 2003.

Hewitt listed three different perceptions of Charlotte: "One: The vast majority of people who have never been here other than passing through the airport. The general consensus is it's a nice city and they've heard great things about it," he said. "The second layer would be those people that have come to Charlotte more than 24 months ago and have a perception based on the reality at that time. They've been left with the idea that there's nothing to do in Charlotte. Then there's the third perception that we're now in the process of creating."

As the second largest financial city in the nation, Charlotte has seen a building boom galvanized by a flood of young professionals seeking high-rise and condo living.

"So with this tremendous influx of young professionals, restaurants and nightclubs are just popping up," Hewitt said. "That in combination with the 700-room Westin (an anchor hotel) created a capacity that really changed our business mix."

More and more, smaller cities are looking hard at whether or not they need to update meetings infrastructure.

A Whole New Focus

The post-Sept. 11 slump brought the importance of convention business into stark relief. Once they were gone, those tourism dollars seemed all the more valuable to destinations.

Cities wanted the money back … and that meant pulling the people in. "Cities or counties or states see that if they bring in stronger convention and visitors bureau staff - if they bring in people who generate enthusiasm - they'll see the revenue coming in," Carey said. "That affects the people you can hire to the venues themselves to city government and how much money they're putting into infrastructure."

"We're well past the point of having to prove the point, and what happened after Sept. 11 was an example of that," Smith said. "Tax revenue drops when tourism drops."

So the question for second-tier cities wanting a bigger piece of the pie becomes how to improve infrastructure wisely … and with the best payoff.

"The meeting industry had definitely drawn its share of attention," Spyridon said. "In some instances it's become a quick fix politically, a quick fix without giving all the attention necessary to succeed. But it has also drawn the attention of cities that have seen success and are leveraging that on a much larger level."

He doesn't see Nashville wanting to go over the biggest pieces of meetings business, the ones the city's facility size rules out at the moment.

"As you look at cities that have built or expanded to a mega-facility, that's where the fall off is," he said. "The growth is in the medium-sized groups. We're looking at the 80 to 90 percent of the market, not the 10 to 20."

In Indianapolis, along with the convention center expansion, there are plans for a new stadium, a new headquarter hotel, and an airport expansion.

"The city poured millions of dollars into renovating arts and cultures," Bennett said. "It's all by design over a 20-year period. There aren't many cities that match Indianapolis for being well-designed and laid out for group business."

Virginia Beach decided a big investment was well worth the expense. Virginia Beach's old convention center held 180,000 square feet, whereas the new facility will offer 516,000 when completed. The center, with 300,000 square feet of space completed, opened in July 2005.

"We simply outgrew our old convention center, and we didn't have the amenities we knew we needed," said Pam Lingle, communications manager for the Virginia Beach Convention Center. "We were losing conventions because we had no ballroom and we had very limited prefunction space."

A citizen committee of 57 people agreed to start over with the convention center, which will catapult Virginia Beach into national markets it didn't compete for previously.

Ultimately, each destination stands on its own, no label worth as much as personal experience and word-of-mouth.

"I don't care what you call us as long as you call us," Hewitt said.

SMALLER MARKETS Survey Highlights Second-Tier Strategy

Ernst and Young's first Destination Performance Survey offered a window into the workings of second-tier cities. Sent to 518 convention bureaus and tourism authorities across the United States, the survey found that many smaller-market convention and visitor bureaus believe that they compete with larger venues.

Smaller markets are more likely to effectively compete against larger national markets if they first understand their destination?s advantages and disadvantages, said Brian Tress, senior manager with Ernst and Young's Hospitality and Leisure Services Group.

We're advising them to be practical, by investing scarce municipal assets in targeted improvements in tourism product and marketing infrastructure.

He added that smaller markets often have a built-in competitive challenge based on limited resources and slow-to-change factors like airlift. They need to capitalize on what investments will give them the biggest bang for their buck, he said.

The survey found that the majority of tourism-related projects under construction or planned over the next five years involve infrastructure and product development improvements for the community ? including airports, highways, parks, and museums. Projects planned for longer terms included convention centers and headquarter hotels.

This indicates that communities are starting to focus on how to get visitors to come before they build places for them to meet and sleep, Tress said.

G.P. MORE OPTIONS Airfare Competition Takes Off and Helps Second-Tiers

Accessibility used to be an easy check on the list for the largest destinations and a problem for smaller ones. But expansions by low-cost carriers and increased competition in airfares across the board have meant more options in second-tier destinations.

A tight economy meant lower fares mattered even more to a wider segment of business. A growth in the presence of Southwest in Nashville, for instance, has proved a major strength for the city.

Prior to Sept. 11 there was little bit of we need more first class seats after Sept. 11 it hasn?t been a question. People appreciate the value and the service much more than they are concerned with the upgrade, said Butch Spyridon, president of the Nashville Convention and Visitors Bureau.

And as Southwest grew, a larger trend sparked. We've seen a lowering of the cost across the board, Spyridon said, as all the carriers reduced their prices as Southwest increased its dominance.

A similarly helpful battle of airfares has played out across the country.

One of our strengths is we are not a hub; we have diversity of service, said Michael Smith, vice president of the Portland Oregon Visitors Association. With the competition, we're getting better nonstop service to the East Coast and outstanding international flights.

Airports themselves factor into the equation. London-based SkyTrax Research rated Greater Cincinnati/NKY International Airport No. 2 nationally in passenger satisfaction. The recognition follows last year's No. 1 SkyTrax ranking and a No. 2 ranking from J.D. Power and Associates.

The airport is a reflection of the management and board of directors, and they're very interested in customer service, said Barbara Dozier, vice president for sales and marketing at the Northern Kentucky Convention and Visitors Bureau. She complimented an ambassadors program at the airport.

Volunteers, a lot of times retired professionals, staff the airport, and they have a unique relationship with customers, she said. They'e very proud of their community and committed to the airport.

Delta dominates at the hub airport, and Delta's change in fare structure the introduction of SimpliFares, helped the market tremendously. We are a second-tier city with first-tier accessibility, Dozier said.

When the National Telecommunications Cooperative Association (NTCA) held recent annual meetings, San Antonio proved to be easier to reach than Miami, according to Eleanor DeMoors, CMP, NTCA director of meetings and exhibits.

Miami wound up involving more legs of flight for many members, she said. We have a rural membership who already have a flight to get to a major airport, so for us, the fewer legs the better. That matters to them even more than cost.

G.P. UNEXPECTED COMPETITORS Squaring Off Against First-Tiers

The slow economy and drop in tourism travel led to unexpected competitors for second-tier markets: First-tier cities.

Our market has stayed consistent, said Michael Smith, vice president of the Portland Oregon Visitors Association What we have seen is that groups who would only have looked at second-tier cities now look at first-tiers because those cities need the business.

In terms of the West Coast, we're rooting for San Francisco and Seattle to get healthy, because if they'e healthy, their rates go back. San Francisco would never have looked at some of the business they'e taken over the last few years.

For groups, those offers could be too good to refuse.

During our soft period during the post-Sept. 11 environment, the first-tier cities became far more aggressive in pursuing business that was typically perceived to be second-tier type of business, said Jeff Hewitt, senior director of sales for Visit Charlotte, such as groups that might occupy 100,000 to 300,00 square feet of exhibit space. We had a lot of customers saying they really had to go with the offer of some other city because they viewed it as a unique opportunity to capture exceptional rates.

Within a single city, groups found high-end options were surprisingly accessible.

First-tiers were bringing down their prices, and we were able to get into higher-priced point hotels that I normally wouldn?t be able to afford, said Eleanor DeMoors, CMP, director of meetings and exhibits for the National Telecommunications Cooperative Association.

She thinks prices are coming back: When looking to book a future annual meeting, DeMoors found that a first-tier exhibition hall alone would cost a fourth of her profits. So she went with a second-tier city instead. Hewitt agrees that the pricing lines are solidifying again. Now that the economic scales are kind of back in balance, business levels are more normal, he said. the second-tier perceived value is back in line.

G.P. MAJOR CONSIDERATIONS Measuring a City's Attractiveness

What is it that makes a city the ideal place for conventions and exhibitions? Is it the quality of its restaurants, the variety of entertainment it offers, or perhaps its reputation for safety that attracts meeting planners and attendees?

George Fenich, Ph.D., professor at the Lester E. Kabacoff School of Hotel, Restaurant, and Tourism Administration at the University of New Orleans, along with master?s candidates Mehmet Alici, and Paula Silva set out to answer that question in their research study, A Taxonomy for Comparing Cities That Attract Conventions. Their results were featured in a poster presentation at PCMA's 50th Annual Meeting held in Philadelphia last month.

The research, which undertakes an analysis of all 137 cities in the United States with convention centers and takes into account 13 previous studies on the topic, found that all of them identified the following as major considerations for convention planners: hotel room inventory, restaurants, air transportation, and convention center space. Restaurants and air transportation were the most often mentioned attributes in the studies.

As Fenich, Alici, and Silva point out, previous research has determined that convention attendees spend $76.16 for food and beverage per day, for an average stay of 3.6 nights  and the quality and quantity of food at conventions prompts more comments from delegates than any other aspect of the convention. Air lift to destinations is another primary concern. Delegates choose flights based on a balance between cost and convenience.

In all, Fenich, Alici, and Silva came up with 10 different rankings for all attractors in addition to restaurants and air transportation: hotel room inventory, square footage of convention center exhibit space, local transportation, leisure activities, arts and culture, overall cost, safety, and climate  and selected the cities that ranked No. 1 for each attribute.

Ratings from this research showed similar results from previous studies in several of the areas. For example, restaurant rankings indicated that New York fared first compared to the other 136 cities. Atlanta scored No. 1 in air transportation, Las Vegas scored first in hotel room availability and convention center space, and San Francisco was ranked first in local transportation.

Look for more about this study in an upcoming issue of Convene. 

° Contributing Editor Ginny Phillips is a freelance writer in Birmingham, Ala.