Wowing the Delegates : L.A. on Stage as Host of Travel Convention

Like a starlet primping for the big screen test, Los Angeles is getting ready to do its song and dance for a really tough crowd: travel professionals who have been there and done that and, during the next few days, will be doing it right here.

The Los Angeles Convention Center is housing the biggest international travel industry trade show in the nation, the annual Discover America International Pow Wow, which runs today through Wednesday. The convention, which is not open to the public, brings together thousands of international buyers and domestic sellers of travel product for a frenzy of wheeling and dealing.

“This is a tremendous opportunity to showcase L.A. to the very people who will be advising travel consumers around the world,” said George D. Kirkland, president of the Los Angeles Convention and Visitors Bureau.

Pow Wow can mean big business, especially to the host city. Los Angeles last hosted Pow Wow in 1985, when the city was still giddy from the success of the 1984 Summer Olympic Games. The ensuing 11 years have brought enough image-tarnishing disasters and economic downturns to sink any industry, but tourism remains the region’s second-largest employer, accounting for more than 400,000 livelihoods and $20 billion in annual economic impact in Los Angeles, Orange, Riverside, San Bernardino and Ventura counties. In fact, the Southland tourism industry surprised everyone with the strength of its rebound last year.

Pow Wow is attracting more than 5,500 delegates from 70 countries as well as 400 media representatives, who will be giving the Southland close scrutiny. They have booked all of the downtown hotels to capacity and have filled two in Universal City as well. They will spend a fair amount of loose change in souvenir shops and restaurants.

But the real money lies in future business that the convention creates.

Pow Wow will generate an estimated $3 billion in international travel to the United States, and about 10% of that ends up coming to the host city during the next two or three years. For Southern California, that could translate into $300 million in increased visitor activity, creating 4,400 new jobs, the convention bureau figures.

Pow Wow is a peculiar sort of convention that is more like an impromptu shopping center of travel. Those who attend are interested in buying or selling those things connected with getting away from it all, including tours, hotel rooms, air travel, cruises, rental cars, transportation and travel services. Delegates roam about the convention center from 20-minute appointment to 20-minute appointment, buying wholesale and in bulk the things that they intend to package and sell to international travelers.

“For us, Pow Wow is the most important travel trade show that exists because you actually finalize agreements,” said Noel Irwin-Hentschel, chief executive of AmericanTours International. The Los Angeles company, which arranged $150 million worth of tours last year, has seen an increase in business every year from Pow Wow, Irwin-Hentschel said.

Because these delegates are here to find ways to show future clients a good time, they will be busy playing tourist themselves.

The convention bureau has set up a variety of tours for delegates and a record number of seats for a Pow Wow--more than 3,000--have been booked.

The tours highlight not only the usual tourist destinations, but also some of Los Angeles’ less-seen sights that might not occur to most travel agents. Tours focusing on ethnic neighborhoods and interests have been very popular, including visits to East Los Angeles and South-Central Los Angeles. A late-night jazz tour of Leimert Park is one of the most sought-after outings of the convention.

The city’s hot spots have been working hard to put on that extra coat of glitz. Thousands of blue banners bearing the convention’s slogan, “L.A. on Location,” have gone up around the city to welcome visitors. Several hundred volunteers are pitching in to help.

Self-Help Graphics, a nonprofit gallery and workshop in East Los Angeles, has been doing a little “spring cleaning” to get ready for delegates, who will be touring the facility and watching artists at work, said Tomas Benitez, assistant to the director.

“People’s perception of Los Angeles remains Hollywood and Disneyland, and their children think of Universal Studios and the beach,” Benitez said. The convention’s organizers “have thought to show Los Angeles in its melliferous diversity.”

The Beverly Center is shuttling shoppers from convention to shopping center in classic convertiblesrented for the event, and will be one of the stops on a special tour showcasing Los Angeles’ fashion and design industries.

Pow Wow visitors will be the first to pass through a remodeled gateway to Universal Studios Hollywood during a special party Sunday night.

Many galleries and retailers in West Hollywood plan to stay open late during the convention and will offer special discounts to delegates.

Beverly Hills will shut down part of Rodeo Drive for a big party during the convention, and 5th Street downtown in front of the Central Library will be the site of a huge closing celebration.

“Organizations throughout the city and county have pulled together to create unique events even by L.A. standards, which is quite a feat,” said Michael C.R. Collins, executive vice president of the convention bureau. “If L.A. can’t throw a great party, no one can.”

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Have You Hugged a Tourist Today?

Tourism is extremely important to the economic well-being of Southern California, employing more people than nearly every other industry. Employment in the five-county area of Los Angeles, Orange, Riverside, San Bernardino and Ventura counties, in hundreds of thousandths:

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Rank Industry Total employment 1 Business & professional 607.4 management services 2 Tourism 442.4 3 Health services 432.5 4 Direct international trade 368.8 5 Wholesale trade (excl. apparel) 364.6 6 Technology 276.1 7 Motion picture/TV 224.2 8 Financial services 164.6 9 Apparel/textiles 162.7 10 Agriculture/food 113.1

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Sources: California Employment Development Dept. and U.S. Census Bureau