Data reveals the return of meetings and events in the technology segment, and smaller markets are realizing the most significant percentage of growth
ARLINGTON, Va. — March 8, 2023 — Knowland, the world’s leading provider of data-as-a-service insights on meetings and events for hospitality, announced today that the San Diego market led the U.S. meetings and events industry by volume for February. Second place went to Chicago, with Dallas in third. The leading industry driver for meetings was Technology and Healthcare across four of the top five markets. This data is a subset of Knowland’s pipeline generation platform designed to help hoteliers build and protect a hotel’s booking base.
Knowland’s data is designed to aid any hotel sales team looking to gain insight into hot accounts, in-depth competitive insight, and access to data that matters to increase sales and profitability, whether in the meetings and events space or sales in general.
• Year-over-Year Comparison – February 2023 increased 149.1 percent over February 2022. Additionally, February realized 8.2 percent growth over 2019.
• Top five markets (by volume) – San Diego was in the lead hosting Technology, followed by Healthcare and Pharma/Biotechnology. Chicago closed out the month with Healthcare groups at the top and Manufacturing and Technology coming in second and third. The following three markets, Dallas, Washington, DC, and Atlanta rounded out the top five markets. The chart below provides additional insight into the top drivers for these markets.
| SAN DIEGO, CA | CHICAGO, IL | DALLAS, TX | WASHINGTON, DC | ATLANTA, GA |
| Technology | HealthCare | HealthCare | Charity/Non-Profit/ Social Services |
Technology |
| Healthcare | Manufacturing | Technology | Travel | Manufacturing |
| Pharmaceutical/ Biotechnology | Technology | Manufacturing | Technology | HealthCare |
| Financial/Banking | Training/Education | Pharmaceutical/ Biotechnology | Training/Education | Transportation |
| Training/Education | Travel | Travel | HealthCare | Financial/Banking |
• Top Five Markets (by percentage growth) – Raleigh-Durham-Chapel Hill, N.C.; Oahu Island, Hawaii; Norfolk-Virginia Beach, Va.; Charleston, S.C.; and Riverside-San Bernadino, Calif. realized the largest percentage growth over February 2022.
Kristi White, chief product officer, Knowland, said: “Despite concerns about the technology sector – historically a big driver for corporate events, both technology and healthcare were strong contributors in February. Additionally, while the Top 25 markets dominate the volume metrics, smaller markets are realizing the largest percentage of growth. This means growth is hitting almost every section of the country.”
About the Data: Insights presented are a result of the analysis of meetings and events data acquired through Knowland data collection and aggregation methods, including field reporting and automated methods of customer and non-customer data collection in primary, secondary, and tertiary markets, as well as its large historical database.
