PCMA Convening Leaders 2019 took place in Pittsburgh, PA from January 6-9. We had the opportunity to attend and represent our DMC services in the Pittsburgh and Philadelphia markets. Pittsburgh did a wonderful job of welcoming attendees to their city and showing why they are considered an East Coast city with a Midwest mentality.
The opening reception on Sunday evening was a club theme that featured great nods to the host city. Stations had steel and bridge facades while the center bar showed off great shots of the city’s bridges. A DJ and saxophonist entertained the crowd until there was a guest performance by some of the actors from Hamilton. Food was served in inventive ways including drones serving drinks, moving hors d’oeuvre stations and live donut making.
On Monday morning the education of the conference kicked off with Seth Godin, a great speaker for the main stage. Seth’s speech focused around marketing to the people that are specific to your cause, not mass marketing to everyone. Additional main stage speakers throughout the conference included; Billie Jean King, who ended her Q&A session by serving signed tennis balls out to the eager crowd, and Gena Davis who spoke about the misrepresentation of women in almost every version of main stream media today. All the speakers instilled energy into the crowd that made you want to act on their words and make a difference in your community.
Breakout sessions were packed with attendees and offered just as great of insights as the main stage speakers. Each speaker was as engaging as the one before and all left attendees with excellent takeaways.
If not in sessions you could roam the main hall and check-out booths from major CVBs around the country. San Francico’s booth was handing out their famous Irish Coffees, Columbus had a vending machine awarding guests prizes, PCMA had a claw machine with swag and VisitPittsburgh had a celebrity appearance by Joe Manganiello.
The closing night networking event took place at Heinz Field and featured a DJ, jazz band, Steelcity Drumline and fireworks to end the evening. It was a great showcase of one of Pittsburgh’s most popular venues and gave attendees a taste of what the Steelcity had to offer.
Hopefully associations that attended think of Pittsburgh the next time they are picking a host city for their conference!