Some of the world’s leading professional conference organisers (PCOs) were given a special tour of the Sydney Convention and Exhibition Centre recently, to highlight the facilities and service levels, as well as the destination.

The group of 18 European and UK organisers were visiting Sydney for a recent board of directors meeting and educational seminar of INCON, the worldwide partnership of PCOs and event producers.

The PCOs inspected the centre’s multi-million dollar refurbishment and experienced a live demonstration of its in-house audio-visual skills, before enjoying a gourmet dinner in the centre’s Bayside Terrace, overlooking the Harbour and Sydney’s city skyline.

“The Bayside Terrace location is as good as you can get in Sydney, it really is superb,” said INCON executive member and Tour Hosts managing director Ros McLeod. “Our visitors enjoyed the warm hospitality of the centre’s team, an extremely impressive live AV presentation and a magnificent dinner.

“It made me very proud of what we achieve in Sydney and my peers from around the world were very impressed.”

One of the participants, Inge Hanser from CPO Hanser Germany and co-chair of INCON, described the tour as outstanding. “We all very much enjoyed the centre’s unique and very creative way of making this site inspection unforgettable,” she said. “We had a lovely evening. The Sydney Convention and Exhibition Centre is certainly one of the world’s most impressive venues.”

Centre chief executive Ton van Amerongen was thrilled to be able to demonstrate its abilities to such an influential group of PCOs.

“We wanted to show them that the Centre is not only a professional venue, it’s extremely motivational, which makes for a great meeting,” he said. “We enjoy a beautiful harbour setting, we’re surrounded by a world-class conference village, Darling Harbour and we embrace all the energy and vitality which makes Sydney Australia’s leading meetings destination.”