The Shreveport-Bossier Convention and Tourist Bureau assisted the Miss Universe Organization with planning the 2018 MISS USA and 2018 MISS TEEN USA pageants. This year’s pageant marked the 20th anniversary of the competition’s first appearance in the sister cities of Shreveport-Bossier.

From November 1-8, 2017, Santa Monica welcomed more than 7,500 global film leaders at the 27th annual American Film Market (AFM), the world’s largest motion picture business event. During the eight-day conference, producers, distributors, sales agents, directors and key members of the worldwide motion picture and television industry from 80 countries convened for screenings, deal-making, panels, networking and parties. More than 90 percent of the world’s films are financed, produced and/or distributed by AFM participants.

Local DMC Camelback Adventures had the pleasure of working with Robyn Abbey, owner of Chriselle Management Inc., planning and executing a program at the Fairmont Scottsdale Princess Resort in Scottsdale, Arizona, for her client’s Top Performers Club meeting.

On Jan. 21, 2018, 1,500 college theater students from across the region descended on Greater Des Moines for the Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival Region 5. Celebrating its 50th year, participating students came from Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota and South Dakota for a wide range of professional development opportunities in all areas of theater.

Comply365 is an innovative software company headquartered in Beloit, Wis., and holds Connections365, its annual users conference, in the fall. Typically, the company hosted Connections365 in large cities such as Dallas, Chicago and Orlando for its primarily airline-based clients. In 2016, Comply365 decided to change things up and hosted the conference in its hometown of Beloit, welcoming more than 200 attendees from across the country and globe for a two-day event in the Midwest.

Aerialists hung from the rafters pouring Champagne. Electronic violinists meandered through the crowd on stilts. Benjamin Franklin looked on from his elevated perch inside the museum that bears his name. This was no average cocktail party. It was the opening event for the 2017 RIMS Conference and Exhibition in Philadelphia. These ideas were born nearly a year prior as the Philadelphia CVB assisted RIMS in hosting its INsite Tour, a two-and-half-day-long scouting trip for RIMS meeting planners and their major exhibitors.

In March 2018, Los Angeles welcomed over 200 ConferenceDirect associates who collectively represent over 50,000 in annual booked room nights for Los Angeles. The conference was an overwhelming success and took place March 25-29 2018.

How do you facilitate $130 million in international travel buying, international relationship building and showcase your own destination in three days? That’s the question the Kalispell CVB pondered when successfully bidding for Kalispell, Montana, to host the 2018 International Round Up.

In the summer of 2017, seven years of work on the part of the region’s horticulture sector resulted in the arrival of 350 garden writers for the Association for Garden Communicators annual conference, the GWA Annual Conference & Expo. Visit Buffalo Niagara also helped facilitate the event.