According to the Florida Tourist Bureau, last year, there were over 48.7
million visitors, 63,000 meetings and conventions held in Florida plus who-know-how-many unreported events. Without question, Florida is the leading meeting location in the country because of its great, year-round weather and excellent facilities. If you want to mix business with pleasure, Florida is the place to go. Your facilities are usually located right on the beach, within walking distance of night life and restaurants, so little or no transportation is required.
After a meeting, participants can go golfing, deep-sea fishing, eat some of the best seafood in the country or just loaf on some of the best beaches in the world. You can't do that in New York, Chicago or San Franciso.
This guide explains what's available to meeting planners in all of Florida locations that have some kind of meeting facilities, regardles of size. We cover small towns and big towns, coastal towns and inland towns like Orlando. Most towns have at least something to offer and the popular tourist areas and large cities have lots of facilities to choose from. The towns are listed alphabetically and includes venue descriptions, floor plans, facilities, source of everything from bus transportation and caterers to lighting and printers and the names, addresses, telephone numbers of contact people for each service. The book opens with an Introduction on why Florida as a meeting or convention location, tips on planning a trouble-free event from professional planner contributors, how to organize a meeting or convention from start to finish, how to utilize available services at the location, etc. Also included in each area are the names/address/phones of support services planners can call to arrange bus transportation, food, speakers, lighting, sound systems, limousine service, etc.
Part Two lists hotels in each of the areas (names/addresses/telephone/fax/number of rooms/facilities/rates, etc.) and what they offer meeting planners/conventioneers. Many hotels have special services they offer meeting planners who will bring a group onto their property for a stay. Using this information, anyone responsible for planning an event will know exactly where to go in Florida and what's available at that location so they can do some advanced planning. If they don't know where to hold the event, this information will stimulate their imagination.
The authors of this book have lived in Florida for over thirty years and have written several non-fiction books on Florida (The Florida Where-To-Stay Book, The Live-In Florida Book, The Tampa Guide, Cheap Eats/Florida, The Sunshine Almanac and Book of Florida-Related Stuff, etc.)
