A
S THE SUN RISES over Biscayne Bay, a well-caffeinated
team of Miami conference attendees huddles around a tablet computer await- ing their Mission: Impossible assignment. Over the next four hours, they will race
Segways down South Beach, shred the turquoise waters of the Atlantic in a Miami Vice–style cigarette boat, swoop over the Gold Coast in an executive helicopter, strap themselves into an airboat for a luncheon rendezvous in the Everglades, and return to their quarters on the backs of Harley-Davidson motorcycles. With luck, they may even beat their competition to the sunken treasure at the bottom of the hotel pool. Top-secret missions, motorcycle road rallies to Key West, and a once-in-a-lifetime chance to meet Donald Trump on a tour of his Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach have replaced golf and spa as the incentives of choice for Miami-bound groups, according to Rachelle Stone, a Miami-based vice president with AlliedPRA, a destination management company (DMC). “Tey’re tired of being talked to,” she says. “Tey’re tired of lunch-and-learn. Tey’re tired of watching four VIPs on stage doing an Iron Chef competition. Now they want to be the ones with the aprons on. Tey want to be interactive. Tey want to get their hands in the flour.”
THRILL SEEKERS In recent years, a new generation of conference goers, incentive travelers, and meeting planners has come to view golf and spa like the old chicken-or-steak option from the Mad Men days. It’s not that they dislike a spirited round of golf or a relaxing hot- stone massage. It’s just that these incentives alone no longer move the needle as they once did. Jim Ruszala, corporate consultant and director of marketing
for Maritz Travel, says it’s not just twentysomethings who have cooled to the traditional golf and spa lineup. A recent Maritz Travel Insights survey of clients’ employees found that golf ranked ninth in interest among incentive program participants ages 20 to 40 and tenth among those over 40. Similarly, spa treat- ments ranked fourth among ages 20 to 40 and sixth with the 40-plus crowd. What activities did the participants favor instead? Ruszala says
Previous page: Taking the road less traveled—on bikes. Opposite, clock- wise from top left: Zip-lining for a change of pace; an ice-carving competition; horsing around; hiking’s rich rewards.
there was surprising unanimity across age groups on the current top three—and they’re a long way from the fairway or massage table. Te top three included meeting a popular entertainer, actor, or musician; participating in beach, sun, and water activities; and engaging in novel new experiences and destinations, either close to nature or linked to history. “It’s not to say that golf should be off your dance card,”
Ruszala says. “It certainly should be on there. But people re- ally want to play their passion today. It gives them something a little more motivating to look forward to. If they’re into snor- keling, fishing, horseback riding, hiking—those sorts of activi- ties—they want to share those interests with colleagues. Unit- ing around a passion gives them an essential point from which to grow a relationship.” Ruszala says several coinciding societal shifts—including the
economic reset, the four-generation workplace, and reality TV— have brought about a sea change in the types of activities that create a buzz around the watercooler. “Te multigenerational workforce drives this quite a bit,” he
says. “Also, reality TV. It’s no longer the major networks—now it’s the Discovery Channel, the History Channel. Cable has reformat- ted how we do a narrative. From Orange County Choppers to Pawn Stars, people like learning about things in experiential ways.”
“They’re tired of watching four VIPs on stage doing an Iron Chef competition. Now they want to be the ones with the aprons on.”
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FUN AND GAMES Hands-on physical activities like kayaking, biking, falconry, archery, and zip-lining have long been the rule rather than the exception for Jennifer Leto, senior meeting planner for Hess Corporation. “My groups have never been into spa and golf,” she says. “We have a lot of engineers and geologists, scientist- type personalities who are older, in their 40s, 50s, and even 60s. Tey want the adventure sports. It’s not just for young people.” Leto’s experiences underscore the importance of not stereo- typing these new, more active interests by age group, gender, or job classification. Case in point: a recent geocaching event, a sort of high-tech treasure hunt in which the clues and coordinates are displayed on a handheld GPS device. It went over just as big with her veteran petroleum engineers as it might with a group of iPhone-toting teens. “Tese guys love gadgets,” she says. “Give them a gadget and
they’re good. Tey have to be doing something that tests their knowledge or gives them a puzzle to solve. Tey don’t like relax- ation-type activities.”
Leto contracts with DMCs like Rachelle Stone’s to ensure
that her groups enjoy all the thrills while remaining well out of harm’s way. “Our main concern is always safety when we do these
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