Almost one in two business events in Queensland are taking place on the Gold Coast, according to the latest Queensland Business Events Survey.
The survey, which collated data for the year ending June 2019, revealed 49 per cent of all conferences, meetings and incentives in Queensland are held throughout the Gold Coast.
Overall, the city’s business events market share grew by 5 per cent, with total delegates numbers reaching 193,382 in the 12-month period.
Destination Gold Coast CEO Annaliese Battista said the business events sector injected an estimated $570 million into the Gold Coast economy in that time, up 6 per cent year-on-year.
“The Gold Coast’s ever-evolving tourism offering, maturing transport infrastructure and compelling appeal continues to stimulate market interest within Australia and abroad,” she said.
“The sector provides significant follow-on benefits to the tourism economy, so we are delighted to also see an increase in the number of delegates enjoying our facilities, attractions and experiences.
“Proactive strategies in our core markets yielded strong return on investment, particularly from incentive-based events which saw the number of groups arriving on the Gold Coast climb by almost 26 per cent.”
Coronavirus and bushfire impact
While renewed interest in the city from Asian markets including Japan are spurring incentive growth, the outbreak of coronavirus and the recent bushfire season is having an adverse impact on Gold Coast’s leisure and business events sectors, said Battista.
“Although Gold Coast was not directly impacted by the bushfires, international visitation has been affected so we are working with industry and stakeholders to get the message out that we remain open for business,” she said.
“We pivoted our efforts in the domestic market last year and we have already had great success in securing multi-year conferences in the immediate and forthcoming years.”
Destination Gold Coast has secured 43,220 delegates for upcoming conferences over the next six months, with forward bookings estimated to deliver $89 million in economic impact.
