How Phoenix Executes Large-Scale Sporting Events
Phoenix has earned the moniker "Championship Valley" because of its extensive experience in hosting big sporting events like the Super Bowl and basketball championships. In this episode of the Meetings Today Podcast, Lorne Edwards, chief sales officer, Visit Phoenix and Eric George, special events administrator, City of Phoenix, discuss what goes into the execution of large-scale sporting events and world-class conventions in Phoenix ahead of more major events coming to town.
*Created in partnership with Visit Phoenix
Transcript:
Editors note: The following transcription was facilitated by AI program Otter.ai and proofed by our editors. Although it is very accurate, there inevitably will be some mistakes, so please consider that when reading. Thank you.
Danielle LeBreck
Hello and welcome to the Meetings Today Podcast. I'm Danielle LeBreck, senior content director for Meetings Today. I'm excited to welcome two guests to the show today: Lorne Edwards, chief sales officer for Visit Phoenix, and Eric George, major events administrator for the City of Phoenix.
Some big events are on the horizon for Phoenix, and today, Lorne and Eric are going to walk us through what goes into the execution of large-scale sporting events and world-class conventions in Phoenix. There is a lot to dig into today and some great takeaways for meeting planners. So with that, welcome Lorne and Eric. Thank you for joining me today.
Lorne Edwards
Great. Good morning. Thank you, Danielle, it's great to be here.
Eric George
Thank you for having us.
Danielle LeBreck
Awesome. So to start, Phoenix is set to host some major events and conventions in the next year. Can you both just give us a bit of an overview of what's to come?
Lorne Edwards
Sure, I'll jump in. So yes, we're going to be hosting the women's Final Four. It's Final Four championship season here with the Women's Final Four and Men's Final Four set to take place this coming weekend. And so we're gearing up for 2026 because, as you all know, all sights will be focused on Phoenix next year as we get set to host the NCAA Women's Final Four Championship. So that's certainly in our purview. And then a year later, we have the NBA All-Star game that we're set to host in February of 2027. So the moniker that we've gotten and kind of dubbing ourselves as “Championship Valley,” that certainly continues with great mega events that we're all excited here in Phoenix to be hosting in the next couple of years.
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Danielle LeBreck
Coordinating events on such a large scale like these ones requires a lot of synergy and cooperation, I'd imagine, between many groups. So in Phoenix, how do the city officials, event planners and local businesses collaborate to create a really frictionless experience?
Eric George
Yeah, when we bring in these large events, it really activates a lot of different parts of the city organization. We stand up a steering committee that consists of 10 different working groups, and each of those working groups for everything that you could imagine, from business licensing to permitting to marketing and communications to our airport to our parking operation. Each of those working groups are responsible for putting together their operational plans, some contingency plans if things don't quite go the way that we expect them to, and, of course, to have a communication plan around those activities. So it's really a year-long ramp up when each of these events are coming, from the time that we start meeting with this steering committee until event execution. So there's a lot of steps that go into making sure that we're all aligned.
In addition to those city departments that I mentioned that are heading up those working groups, we also have other stakeholders like Visit Phoenix, like Downtown Phoenix Inc, which is a hyper-local advocate for our downtown business community and activating downtown Phoenix. So when we have all these folks at the table with our transportation partners in Valley Metro and others to make sure that every visitor that comes into our destination has a very seamless experience, that everyone's on the same page. We're all communicating with each other, and there's so many, so much crossover that goes among the working groups too, as it drills down into some of the logistical details—the transit team has to talk to the public safety team, and the streets transportation team is talking about closures and micro mobility and Ubers and Lyfts and other ride shares, Waymo autonomous vehicles here in our destination, all those things get talked about in context, or a lot of different aspects of the event planning process.
Lorne Edwards
If I could jump in too, that's a good point. But a lot of those stakeholder meetings, and you made a good point, they start, you know, well over a year in advance and the other component to that, too, is the event organizers. They're never far removed from those stakeholder conversations that we have. They are tied at the hip with us. They participate in many of these conversations in person, you know, throughout the course of the planning year. So they're always tied at the hip, involved. They're part of our working groups throughout the planning, the buildup, the leadup, you know, and networking and interfacing with all the stakeholders, so that they're fully aware and deeply connected to the process, understanding what everyone's role is and how each person, each stakeholder, focuses effort and energies on the success of the event.
So it really is a collaborative process, and I think that that certainly is a central theme and this whole thing, it's in really understanding each person's role, the collaborative effort, that desire to work together. And I think that I would venture to say that, I think that that is unique to Phoenix, because it's something that we always hear from a variety of event organizers, how closely knit our community is, which is why we do mega events so very well, and why we do conventions very well as well. So it really is that collaborative process and that spirit to work together.
Eric George
Yeah, I couldn't agree with what you just said more. I apologize for overlooking the event producers in that steering committee process, because they are integral, of course, in each of those conversations talking about what the event producer is looking for in each different activation that may be taking place as part of a large event. When we're talking about events like Final Fours and Super Bowls, there are so many different moving parts, and it really is important to have that spirit of collaboration. So yes, I totally agree with what Lorne just said, and I'll echo everything there.
And we have gotten really good at hosting these events. We're on a really good stretch right now where we had Super Bowl in 2023, Men's Final Four in 2024 as well as the WNBA All-Star game, then the 2026 NCAA Women's Final Four, as was mentioned, followed by the NBA All-Star game in ‘27 so we have a really good stretch of basketball, in addition to Lorne’s comment about Championship Valley moniker, in addition to that, we really have become this epicenter of basketball, which has really been fun for anybody who's a basketball fan to really take advantage of what we've highlighted in the last few years and a couple of years yet to come.
[Related: 4 Ways Phoenix Excels at Hosting Mega Events]
Danielle LeBreck
Yeah, like you said, so many moving pieces, communication, collaboration, I would imagine, are huge themes when you're working on these mega events. So that's great to hear. And another thing I think event organizers might be curious about that you have some great experience in is, what strategies are you using to align room blocks and availability with that peak event demand?
Lorne Edwards
That's a great question. You know, the hotel community, resort community, I think we're very fortunate here, here in the Valley. We've got an accommodation for every budget or desire type, whether it's a resort community, we have a resort that’s suited from your mid-level and upscale resort community, our downtown community, we've got over 4,000 rooms right here in the downtown surrounding the Phoenix Convention Center, which is just over a million total square feet between the three buildings, as well as closely connected and walking distance to the Phoenix Arena, which is the home of the Phoenix Suns and Mercury, as well as to Chase Field, the home of the Arizona Diamondbacks. So when you think about how closely connected our accommodations are in downtown to major event venues, and those are just the major event venues, and certainly there is a great lineup of offsite venues that can house specialty events. You know, it's close to Hance Park, which is where a lot of our outdoor events do take place, in the heart of downtown as well, that’s in walking distance to our hotel community.
The good news is that our hotel partners are part of those stakeholder groups. They are no strangers to hosting mega events, and I think over the years, they've seen the value, which is so important, the value of being involved in these events, participating in these events, and making sure that they're offering the top-notch level of service that that goes along with creating the experience that these events are known for and that we've hung our reputation on as well. So I would say that we've got a great hotel community. We work through the details of the agreements and making sure that there's a win-win approach, again, going back to the theme of collaboration here with these events, and the same holds true for our resort partners around the Greater Phoenix area as well. And we've got, I think, an enviable collection of resorts that, again, are no strangers to housing teams and participating in and all of the mega events that we do and coming to the table again, because they do see the value, they see the metrics. They see the impact of participating in these events in and what it does for the destination in general, so that we're very closely connected with all of them. They have a seat at the table. They are in on all of the conversations well in advance and working through the gears of what is going to be the best approach to align ourselves so that our community wins, the hotel community sees the value of investing in these events to create that win-win experience for the entire event.
Eric George
It's so critical to have great hotel partners for events like the college championships, the women's and men's final fours when you have team hotels, media hotels, staff hotels, all focused within the downtown core or nearby the event venues is so critical to having a great experience for all those that are visiting the destination. And you know, we recently had the WNBA All-Star that I mentioned in 2024 and working with resort partners to make sure that those players and their families coming in had an elevated experience, to make sure that everything was curated in a thoughtful way. Working with our venue partners at the arena and the Phoenix Mercury, specifically to make sure that everything was smooth on that end. I mean, it really is important to have all those partnerships. Again, it sounds like a refrain. We keep saying it, but that collaboration is really critical to the event success we've had here in Phoenix.
Danielle LeBreck
Absolutely. That event experience really starts the moment attendees land in a destination and get to the hotel. So having those partners is so crucial. Following up on that, are there any standout services or amenities that Phoenix hotels offer that really help create that welcoming environment when you kick off these large events?
Lorne Edwards
You know, you said it from the moment the folks arrive. So that experience really begins at a port of entry at Phoenix Sky Harbor, which is a top 10 ranked airport by The Wall Street Journal. Time and time again, gets rave reviews. And they're our partners. We're tied in with the leadership team at Phoenix Sky Harbor. They are part of our stakeholder group, and are part of our team approach, so to speak. So that connectivity and those experiences that we create, that gets created within our hotels, really, that sense of arrival gets elevated with signage at the airport and ways to engage attendees that are coming in for these types of events from activations, whether it's a baggage claim or different parts of the concourse, we see that sort of carrying through or pulling through to the experience that they that the attendees receive at the hotels.
A lot of branding opportunities, when we do these events, we really go all out and creating the experience to say, hey, this event is here, and you feel the energy and the excitement from the moment you touched down at the airport, from decor, from branding, from guest experiences, the amenities that are being provided all tied into the central theme of what that event is and why they're here. So if it's the NBA All-Star game or the NCAA championship games, everything that has to do with creating that experience is really part of the branding opportunities, the experiences that are curated within the hotel. So the attendees do feel that sense of excitement. It just really helps to build and drive that energy for the event.
Eric George
Yeah, absolutely. And it's such a collaboration, right, Lorne? It's so much of, what is the event producer doing? What is the city able to do to contribute to that? What is Visit Phoenix and other partners doing to elevate that experience and that excitement? Again, to use WNBA All-Star as an example, there was rave reviews from different media members and attendees on social media and beyond, talking about how well, you knew you were in the town that was hosting the WNBA All-Star when you were here in Phoenix, because the branding was everywhere, whether it was what the Mercury and on the team side, what they did to help support the event, or what the league did as they were coming into our destination, you saw it everywhere. It was on the light rail trains. It was at the airport. There was a lot of different branding and decor all throughout the city.
I will also mention to you—talk about the airport experience. You know, our team at Sky Harbor does such a tremendous job. In 2023 we hosted Super Bowl, and it was the busiest airport in the world that day. On Monday, following the Super Bowl, it was their busiest day ever. And yet, the wait time at TSA was never more than 22 minutes. And that really is a point of pride, and something that we've continued to message and really their mantra now is every day is the Super Bowl, because we're such a popular destination for tourism overall, that really, it doesn't stop. And it's really just a testament to the hard work and effort of the entire staff over at Sky Harbor. But they do such a great job.
And in terms of the activations that they put together, they did some really fun things. I've talked about this theme of basketball. You know, sustainability is a real priority of us in the City of Phoenix, and that's woven throughout many of these events. And one thing that they did during Men's Final Four last year was have some waste baskets that were branded, wrapped to look like basketball hoops, hey, put your waste or your recycling in these in these units as you're disposing of them, to just kind of have a little fun with it, understanding that all these people that were coming into town as basketball fans could embrace and kind of what weave in our goals as a city to what they're seeing as they as they land at the airport. So yeah, such a great, important touch point as folks first land in our destination.
Lorne Edwards
Well, the good thing, too, Eric, is, you know, we've got a team that, if we know we're next up on next up to bat, you know, for example, the NCAA Women's Final Four, we've got a team that will be on the ground in Tampa previewing and being there to whether it's to take photos, look at how the other cities are activating their hotels and spaces and airports and bringing those ideas back. So as we look ahead, we can say, Okay, well, you know, this is what the city did. This is what was done. This is how they activated the airport the year prior to when we're on show. And so we're bringing all of those ideas and intelligence back and weaving them into our planning process and into our activation strategy and I won’t lie. We've got friends in a lot of cities too. So there's a little internal competition too, because we want to do it better. We want to stand out. So we really invest into going to and attending the year prior’s events so that we can really be much smarter and continue to build upon the success of the event.
Also, to the point of local partnerships. These events are not just for out-of-town visitors. This is also for our local community. So how do we create that energy and excitement locally, as well to our residents as well as our visitors alike, too. So you know, things like wrapping our transit, our buses and our light rails. And how do we market these events? Because these events have to be community-uplifted events, and we want to make sure that we get our local residents involved and engaged and excited to welcome our visitors that are coming in to experience all the great things that the event offers and all the great attractions that we have here in Phoenix.
Danielle LeBreck
Yeah, such great proactive ideas. I love that. You know, you touched a lot on what the hotel community and what the airport does for a lot of these large-scale events. Multiple special event venues also need to be activated, and sometimes it can get easy for attendees to get lost in the action. So how does Phoenix help attendees stay connected and engaged and energized across multiple different venues and activations?
Eric George
Well, one strategy that I can highlight is, as we have the planning process, and we have a marketing communications working group that specifically talks about how we're communicating externally, so working with the event producers and the venue partners to make sure that there's a feeling of connectivity. And we can do that digitally through messaging. A lot of the clients, the Super Bowl has their one-pass app. Final Four has their app, so there's opportunities to communicate directly to those fans, locals or visitors. But in addition to that, there's so much opportunity to engage people on the street level. And I mentioned Downtown Phoenix Inc earlier, they're a wonderful partner. They have a team of ambassadors in our downtown so that if you're in town in Phoenix for a meeting or coming to a sporting event at the arena or at the ballpark, Chase Field, where the Diamondbacks play, as you're walking around our downtown, there are these friendly faces, walking ambassadors, who are basically concierge there to tell you where's the best restaurant to go to for late night eats or to grab a happy hour etcetera. And they can direct you all over our destination. So there's a great opportunity to help people feel welcome in our downtown. And I think that's one huge piece of that puzzle.
And just having the different venues at the table and all these collaborative conversations to make sure that people feel connected. I'm again going to use an example from WNBA All-Star, where we had the fan event WNBA Live at the Phoenix Convention Center, and then the game itself and some of the other basketball-related activities at the arena. They're really close to each other, but in the summer in Phoenix, we had to be really thoughtful about what that connectivity looked like as people were arriving in downtown, whether it was from public transit, coming from a hotel, whether they were driving in and parking in one of our garages, to understand what the parking experience, or that light rail experience, or coming from your hotel and walking as a pedestrian, what it looked like, what those walking paths look like to get to those event venues, and again, really collaborative conversations to be intentional about how that could be done. We had water distribution stations set up in that situation because it was in the summer, and we really wanted to make sure we were being thoughtful about how folks who came into Phoenix were treated to the best possible hospitality as they were coming to these events.
Lorne Edwards
Eric, you brought up a good point about marketing too. You know, we pay very close attention. If it's like college basketball, whatnot, we pay very close attention to the bracket. So we have a sense of how different schools are advancing throughout the tournament, so we can turn on a marketing spigot within those locales. So as they progress to the tournament. We start, you know, turning on a lot of our out-of-home messaging in those markets where those teams exist to get their fans excited about potentially coming to Phoenix and we've got a great marketing team. And I would encourage attendees to check out what we create on visitphoenix.com, and so it's all the things that they can do during the tournament, but it's also we want them to stay in the destination as long as they possibly can, either before or after the event is over, to really explore the state and all the great things that the destination has to offer. So maybe it's a trip to the Grand Canyon or Sedona, things to do, around the event. So it's not just coming in, staying for the event and then leaving. We want them to really explore the state and see as much and do as much. And of course, spend their dollars right here in our community as well. So it's a great opportunity for us to market, to get people energized and excited.
We've got a tremendous amount of content of things to do on our website, which is then connected to the event organizer’s website, so attendees can click on it, see what's happening, stay engaged with all of the special events, entertainment opportunities, things to do, hiking, biking or really exploring the state and immersing themselves and what's happening outside of the venue itself, and I think that that really adds to that whole experience, and other reasons why we do so well with these events,
Danielle LeBreck
Putting these events on, it's a complex task, and I would imagine there are some logistical challenges. What are some of those challenges? And how do your teams really try to stay ahead of them?
Eric George
I think it's really expecting the unexpected and being prepared for whatever may come at you, because despite the year-long process or more that we spend planning for a final four or a Super Bowl or an all-star game, at the end of the day, there's going to be something that, boy, just kind of throws a curve ball, and we just have to be ready. And that's why I said we set up that steering committee, and each of these 10 working groups is responsible for putting together their contingency plans. So light rail might have a great plan of what public transit is going to look like, but heaven forbid, there is a car accident that occurs on the light rail track, they have to be ready to pivot.
So those are the kinds of things that we're constantly working out, those kind of “what if” scenarios to make sure that from a safety standpoint, from logistical operational standpoint, that things continue to run smoothly throughout the destination and every one of those different operational groups. So it's hard, it's hard to pinpoint one thing that we expect, because I think it could be one of 1,000 things. And we just want, we want to anticipate as much as we can. But I think the best way is just to be on our toes, be prepared, be communicative, and as long as we're collaborating with each other, we have the opportunity to be successful.
Danielle LeBreck
Absolutely proper preparation is key, although any event organizer will tell you it's nearly impossible for any event to run without at least one snag. But those learnings can teach us a lot about how we approach future event planning. I'm wondering if one of you could share an example of a past event where you identified some lessons and implemented changes for future events.
Eric George
Well, I mean, it's not a grand example, but you know, for the WNBA All-Star, we were looking for opportunities to create more shade, just because some of the line queuing got to be a little bit long at times. And we were like, well, how can we continue to work with that security provider that the event has to make sure everyone's safe, but make sure that we're able to provide some shade as well. So, you know, after the first day, it's like, you know what? We're gonna have to pivot and bring out some additional shade canopies out here, and brought some tents in and some fans to supplement those cooling fans that we already had. And again, this wasn't an unforeseen thing, that it was going to be hot, but we wanted to make sure that people were as comfortable as possible. And, you know, we saw something one day and just reacted to the next day to make sure that it was even better than it was the day before. So that's one example that comes up. So again, it's just collaboration and making sure everybody's on the same page as we continue to work through these items.
Danielle LeBreck
Yep, large events and conventions too. It's really important to, I would imagine, analyze them following their completion. The work isn't done when attendees leave. There's so much effort and money invested into these programs. How do you all gather and analyze feedback from attendees, event planners, your local hospitality partners, after major events, and what sort of metrics are you looking at to assess the success?
Lorne Edwards
Well, certainly, we look at all of our industry metrics, whether it's through our event impact calculators that we run rev par indices. You know, how does our hospitality community perform? Pre-event, post-, during the event and after events. So we kind of look at it holistically, all the industry metrics, whether it's, you know, occupancy level, rev par levels, to see how they perform. And though that's from a hospitality community standpoint, you know, we look at also spend. We've got a lot of data points right now where we are looking at things like visitor spending in the community throughout the course of an event as well. And you know, we take back all of those different metrics and following up post-event, we really look at all of these metrics to say, hey, you know, we had this many visitors. This is the impact of this event. And it’s not just the event too, because, you know, people will come time and time again, so there's residual opportunities for further impact, not just during the event, but well after the event has come and gone.
Eric George
And I'll compliment you and your team, Lorne, you guys do such a good job analyzing data and sharing it with Visit Phoenix members to help make decisions on how to plan for the future. So I think you guys do a tremendous job when it comes to that.
Some other things that that are done locally. The convention center surveys every event planner that comes through, so every client that comes through that's putting together an event at the Phoenix Convention Center, whether it's a convention or a small meeting or a tradeshow, you're going to receive a survey afterward, and that survey will give you the opportunity to provide feedback to the venue of what services went super well, what opportunities there might be for improvement. So that's something that is really important to us in the city of Phoenix. And I will also add that for these large events that we're talking about, the mega events, the Super Bowls and Final Fours and the like. Oftentimes, those clients will work with local Arizona State University to perform economic impact reports, to get robust data and intercept surveys for attendees who are coming to those events, to find out how far they're coming from, and some of that do a little bit of a deeper dive on some of those existing tools that we already have in our toolkit to further explain what the impact is to our region, so we can report that out to all the stakeholders.
Danielle LeBreck
Excellent. That's all great. Well, that's all the time we have today. You have shared so many interesting insights and lessons. I think our listeners will walk away with a lot of great info and inspired to bring some meetings and events to Phoenix. So thank you both for sharing.
Lorne Edwards
This is great. Thank you for having us.
Danielle LeBreck
For our listeners who are interested in planning events in Phoenix, be sure to check out Visit Phoenix's website, visit phoenix.com/meetings. You can also discover more about Phoenix and other destinations at meetingstoday.com. Thank you again to Eric and Lorne and thank you all for listening to this episode of the Meetings Today podcast. Don't miss an episode and subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. Thank you.
