President and CEO Bob Bedell's connection to the Indianapolis Convention and Visitors Association (ICVA) stretches back decades. After time with Marriott Hotels and Resorts, he started his own consulting company. He joined ICVA as senior vice president of sales and marketing from 1986 to 1993, then left to become president of the St. Louis Convention and Visitors Commission. He returned to Indianapolis in 2002 as president of ICVA. Bedell has announced he'll be retiring in June after leading the association for six years.

What do you consider your biggest accomplishments?
In the six years I've been back, I feel like I've been able to finish what I was part of from 1986 to 1993. In that earlier time, we laid the foundation for what the Indianapolis product has become today. When I first got here in 1986, Indianapolis was a state and regional destination, and certainly not much of a leisure destination other than Indy 500. We talked a lot about building a convention package that would be convenient and connected. We talked about critical mass, about being sure that retail development, hotel development, and restaurant development would be compact and within walking distance.

That started happening in those earlier years, and it continued during the nine years I was gone. Since I came back, I've been part of putting the icing on the cake. We've had the chance to work on the legislative approval of funding for our facilities: the brand new Lucas Oil Stadium opening in 2008 and the expanded convention center that will be connected with Lucas Oil and will be operating in September 2010.

We've also been able to get city approval and funding support for the new JW Marriott Complex that will also be connected to our convention center and stadium. So we've been able to expand the facilities and add the missing ingredient - a major headquarters hotel to go along with the current package."

What have been your greatest moments with Indianapolis?
One of them involves the whole process of getting legislative approval in 2005 for the funding of the expansion. I remember the day that the mayor and the mayor's chief of staff said to me in a meeting that if [the process] was going forward, I was going to have to work full-time for the rest of the legislative session to try to get that done. They explained to me that they thought it was going to be almost an impossible task.

I came back and called a meeting of our whole staff and asked if they were up for it. I said I was going to ask them to give a lot of themselves and a lot of their personal time: To make an impact at the statehouse, it had to be more than me. It had to be making our case constantly, day-to-day. The entire staff bought in and participated. We were all at the statehouse virtually every day for the rest of the session. During their lunch hours, some staff would go early and some would go late so we'd have a presence from late morning until early afternoon. A lot of legislators said it was our constant presence and hearing our story that led to us getting the funding.

I would also say that the hosting of PCMA's Annual Meeting in 2004 was a highlight. I really think hosting PCMA put Indianapolis on the map and put the city into a lot of convention and trade show planners' minds. We're still feeling the benefits of that today.

Thirdly, we worked for four years to prepare to host an FFA [Future Farmers of America] convention, the largest convention we have here on an annual basis. It's got 55,000 people and uses about 12,000 rooms a night for four nights. We brought the community together in 2006 and had the convention go off without a hitch. That was a proud moment.

What would you have done differently?
I don't have a lot of regrets, but there are a couple of things I wish I'd been able to accomplish. The downtown Indianapolis market is thriving - the metropolitan area and state of Indiana basically are not. Our occupancy in downtown is about 70 percent and occupancy in the state of Indiana is in the low 50s. I wish I could have had the time to figure out how to create additional demand in suburban Indianapolis and central Indiana. It's important that our entire market be healthy, not just downtown.

Secondly, I wish I was able to accomplish selling Indianapolis on the potential upside of a more comprehensive approach to leisure marketing. It's easy to convince people of the direct benefits of convention marketing - it's harder to convince them of the direct benefits of leisure marketing.

What do you predict for the future of this industry?
I think the bar just keeps being raised in terms of product quality and service and customer expectations. I'm old enough to remember when shows outgrew the spaces of the largest full-service hotels and had to move into convention centers. Today I'm seeing convention centers that look like the largest full-service hotels. The level of finishes, the level of services for major citywide conventions involves the same expectations that a group of 25 has at a luxury hotel. I don't think the competition shows any signs of getting easier. I think for the next 10 years we're looking at continued growth.

What were your biggest challenges?
The things you can't control. There's an awful lot that those of us in the convention bureaus deal with on a daily basis in terms of bidding and hosting and servicing that we can't control. That makes the job and the industry especially challenging and stressful. If someone says, 'If you work 12 hours a day for five days, this will be the outcome," there's no stress involved. But if someone says, "You'll work 12 hours a day for five days and have no say over the outcome," that's stressful. And that's what we deal with in our business.

We deal with a very complicated sale. We deal with planner contacts and the hierarchy of the association or corporation, but then we're dealing with site selection groups, with boards and with all the politics that exist within the associations. And we do the best that we possibly can.

Indianapolis has always been an underdog. That's made it especially challenging, but it's also made it especially rewarding to win.

How do you plan on spending your time when you retire?
I'm going to give this whole idea of retirement its full chance to consume all of my time. In no particular order, I'm really looking forward to having more time to spend with my immediate and extended family. I haven't had the time to be with my grandchildren as much as I would like. I love to play golf and fish. I love to travel and read - there are a lot of things that I think will keep me busy. I'd also like to get involved in some volunteer work, to work with children in some way and give back.

What advice would you give those who are hitting their stride in this industry?
If your competition is getting bigger and better, and if your competition is sharpening their service, if you expect to remain competitive, you need to at least stay up with the competition. I don't think anybody can afford to sit back and relax and expect that their product will remain relevant and that their business levels will be maintained.

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