How are hotels enticing MICE planners?

From carbon neutral meetings to virtual conference centres, and from holograms to bento deliveries, hotels come up with inventive ideas to attract MICE groups

Here are several highlights to pique your interest:

An eco-friendly approach

Conrad Seoul general manager Mark Meaney says that a carbon-neutral campaign targeting the MICE market will be a key focus this year, actively promoted to multinationals and large domestic companies.

“As this is a new promotion, there has not yet been a measurable contribution to the reservation rate,” he says. “But since many companies are now committed to carbon-neutral and environmental, social and corporate governance, we are very confident this will be an attractive selling point for global and domestic companies alike.”

Metaverse meets MICE

Regal Hotels Group, one of the largest hotel operators in Hong Kong, is also looking at sustainability, but with a tech twist.

Last month, it announced its ‘MetaGreen’ initiative, a project to develop an ESG (environmental, social, and governance) themed plot of ‘land’ in The Sandbox, a gaming virtual world.

MetaGreen, which is due to launch in October, aims to promote eco-friendly choices and foster a sustainable community to support a circular economy.

It will feature the MetaGreen Convention Center, The Sandbox's first MICE facility where ESG-related sustainability conferences will be hosted, which Regal says will “demonstrate the next generation of interactive corporate events in the metaverse”.

Hello holograms

With travel restrictions in Japan ongoing (although foreigners may be allowed in as early as June), it’s perhaps not surprising that hotels in Japan are investing in virtual services.

The Sheraton Grande Tokyo Bay Hotel, for example, is promoting audiovisual packages for virtual meetings and online events based around holograms.

A hotel spokesperson says: “The service aims to create an environment in which the speaker seems to be here, by relaying [the meeting at] the hotel with other locations online, using “Teams” or “Zoom” and projecting these images onto a transparent panel.”

Food, glorious food

The Sheraton Grande Tokyo Bay is also developing and promoting its catering and food delivery offering, with a bento box service for those attending meetings virtually. The menu items and cost can be customised according to the client's needs and the delivery fee is included.