On the Waterfront

Beautiful settings make for great meetings.

By Larry Bleiberg

Life, scientists say, began in water. Perhaps that’s why even now we’re drawn to it. There’s something undeniably magical about sitting by the ocean or a lake. “It’s very soothing. When you’re literally at the water’s edge, you breathe easier,” says Dave Scott, director of sales and marketing at Marina Del Rey Hotel, which overlooks the Pacific near Los Angeles. “It’s very, very peaceful.”

As meeting planners have discovered, if you put a group in a waterfront setting, attendees are happy. Tensions start to melt away and ideas flow. Gazing at the horizon helps open the mind.

Hotels and resorts line the coast from Maine to Miami and San Diego to Seattle, and ring the Great Lakes. In addition, cruise ships offer a novel (and cost-efficient) opportunity to literally take a meeting to sea. The Gulf of Mexico also has scores of meeting options. And although some are suffering now due to fear of oil contamination from the Deepwater Horizon leak, venues are eager for business and willing to cut deals — including dropping cancellation penalties.

Some sites, like the Marina del Rey Hotel, are near major transport hubs. Although only 20 minutes from Los Angeles International Airport, the setting feels far from L.A.’s snarled freeways. As with most waterfront settings, the hotel puts guests close to nature, including pelicans, gulls, sea lions and occasionally whales. The inn has traditional meeting space and some surprising venues. A poolside gazebo, for example, can accommodate a small gathering, or a working lunch. “You’re 10 feet from the water’s edge,” says Scott. “If you’re going to have a meeting here, you’re going to see the ocean.”

Even waterfront cities can offer an escape. Christy Stacey, CMP, says she was amazed when she saw dolphins frolicking in the St. Johns River during a meeting in Jacksonville, Fla., co-sponsored by her employer, the Florida Alcohol and Drug Abuse Association. “Even though we’re based in Florida, the water’s still a draw,” she says. But if gathering by the water is enticing, then getting out on it is equally appealing.

Hornblower Cruises and Events offers meetings on yachts in the San Diego, Orange County, Los Angeles and San Francisco areas. While a boat slowly cruises sheltered waters, attendees can get down to work. Anytime you meet on a boat, you can expect RSVPs to be higher, says Mia Falkenstein of Hornblower. And she says such cruises literally get attendees thinking outside the box. “People seem to think and learn better when they’re in a relaxed and open environment.” For example, she says Mattel Inc. sometimes charters a boat for design sessions to dream up new Barbies.

Further up the coast, Argosy Lines operates Tillicum Village, a Native American attraction on an island near Seattle. Groups can meet aboard ship or on the island. The visit can be combined with a salmon bake or an Indian cultural show. “Groups can choose their own cruising route,” says Maureen Black, the line’s marketing director. “If people want narration we can do that, or we can sit back and be quiet.”

Perhaps the most grand waterfront setting is on the classic cruise ship, the Queen Mary. Docked now, it serves as a floating hotel and tourist attraction in Long Beach, Calif., and has 80,000 square feet of meeting space. Justine Bellock of the University of California, Long Beach, held a national educators conference with 200 attendees aboard the vessel. “Once we got aboard ship, there was no reason to leave,” she says. “We had every amenity available to us.” The ship is a floating museum, not only of history (it transported troops during World War II and counted Winston Churchill among its guests), but also of art. The Queen Mary is one of the best preserved examples of art deco design.

On the other side of the country, the appeal’s similar at Wentworth-by-the-Sea, a grand hotel on the New Hampshire coast. Just a few miles from historic Portsmouth, the ship-shaped hotel includes a solarium with a water view. “The whole length of the meeting space, you look out to the ocean and yachts,” says sales director Diane Dow. “It’s a different atmosphere, a different feeling. You can get a lot accomplished.” The hotel can also arrange for water-based team-building classes on kayaks, and lobster bakes on the pool deck, with easy access to shelter. (The hotel stopped holding bakes on the shoreline in 1944, when a meeting of the National Governors’ Conference was hit by a sudden storm, leaving the nation’s leaders soaked.)

Other waterfront venues have revitalized once tired industrial areas. One of the first was Baltimore, where the Rouse Co. created a festival marketplace on the once derelict Inner Harbor. The Harborplace development spawned a science center, aquarium, hotels and the nearby Camden Yards baseball park. Similar developments have occurred in Tacoma, Wash.; Milwaukee, Wis.; and Duluth, Minn., all now home to vibrant new tourism and meeting venues.

In Tacoma, groups are drawn to the Museum of Glass. The building sits on the city’s waterfront, adjacent to a marina, and offers indoor meeting space and three outdoor plazas. “In the last 10 years there has been a turnaround. It’s a transformed waterway,” says the museum’s Julie Pisto.

It’s much the same in Milwaukee, where a stunning museum addition by superstar architect Santiago Calatrava created the city’s signature Quadracci Pavilion at the Milwaukee Art Museum. It too offers a lovely venue, right on Lake Michigan. Meetings are often held in the building’s conference rooms, while galas and receptions in the main Windhover Hall wow guests with views. Receptions also can be held on the lakeside patio. Unlike other waterfront settings, which play up nature, this one has an urban vibe. “It automatically gives an event an upscale feel,” says Anne Radtke, sales and events manager. “You’re right in the center of the action and you have a view not everyone has.”

Further north, the new Duluth Entertainment Convention Center has played a key role in the redevelopment of the Minnesota city, which sits on the shores of Lake Superior. It can handle big meetings, and is just a short walk from shops and waterside restaurants. All overlook the world’s largest freshwater lake by surface area. “It’s vast and it can be very calming. It can also be very fierce, and a lot of people are drawn to that,” says Julie Johnson, of Visit Duluth. “We have meetings that come here for that view.”

Some groups have even taken to the rails for an unexpected waterside perspective. The Lake Superior Railroad Museum runs an excursion train 28 miles north of the city to the town of Twin Harbors. Along the way, it skirts Superior’s shore, and passes by waterfalls. Groups can meet in private cars, or have receptions along the route. “We use the train as social mixer,” says David Schauer, publications chairman of the Missabe Railroad Historical Society, which holds meetings in Duluth. “It’s very relaxing and inviting for conversation, plus you can get up and move around.”

The Minnesota Council of Teachers of Mathematics are also big Duluth fans. The group of more than 1,000 has come to the city for 11 consecutive years. “Part of it is price, but a piece of it is the atmosphere,” says executive director Tom Muchlinski. “When people are coming out of sessions and looking out at the water, many times there’s just a huge ore boat coming into the harbor and that just stops everyone. It really is one of my favorite cities.”

Read more on waterfront meetings:

Case Study: A Sorority at Sea

Thinking of a cruise for your next event? by Joe Condrill