Dotting the Country The Wildlife Society met in Portland in 2012, starting a Three-City Alliance annual conference rotation — Milwaukee this year and Pittsburgh in 2014.
T
Destination Relations
For years, second-tier cities have started — and dissolved — partnerships. But one alliance between three cities has found a formula that works. And it’s based largely on friendship.
he competition to get group business is fierce among destinations. But some convention bureaus in second-tier cit-
ies have looked to like-sized cities on both sides and in the middle of the United States as friends, rather than foes — forming alliances to jointly market their similar yet geographically diverse destinations to associations whose meetings rotate on a regional basis. “Despite competing for business, the destination marketing industry is an extremely collaborative [one] that recognizes the value of partnerships,” said Kristen Clemens, vice president of marketing and communications for Destination Marketing Association International (DMAI). These collaborative efforts, she said, “happen when opportunity and relationships allow.” Over the past decade, several multi-city alliances have sprung up — including those between Spokane, Hartford, and Madison; Balti- more, Sacramento, and Fort Worth; Dallas, Fort Worth, and Irving; and the Capital Cities Collec- tion, made up of Providence, St. Paul, Raleigh, and Baton Rouge — and fizzled out. Spokane, Hartford, and Madison, for example,
no longer have an official alliance due to some of the members’ restructuring changes and budget