Minding Your Business; 319; Convention Bureau

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Mining your business A look at the people, places, events and issues that impact the business and economy of Southwest New Mexico with your host, Charles Comer Hello and welcome to Mining Your Business, a show where we explore business, politics and issues that impact our region. This week on Mining Your Business, it's a group that often gets confused with the Chamber of Commerce. And while they sometimes work together to achieve common goals, they have notably different missions. Here to tell us more about the Lost Cruces Convention in Visitors Bureau, is their Media and Publications Manager Chris Faber. Chris, thanks so much for being on the show. Thank you for having me, Charles. As is tradition, let's start off by finding out a little bit about you, Chris Faber. Tell us a little bit about yourself, where you grew up, where you went to school, how you ended up with the visitors, with the convention and visitors bureau. Let's try not to get those flip-flops. There's no share, no problem. Originally from New York, but raised in Albuquerque. I moved to Lost Cruces right before I started high school,

so I attended Mayfield, graduated in 1995, and then enrolled in the journalism program in Mexico State University, where I got my bachelor's degree in photojournalism. From there, I went to work at the Deming Headlight, where I was sort of an all-purpose reporter, working in doing photography as well. I wanted a little bit of a change of pace, so from there, I went over and worked at the Sun News, worked in their advertising department, see how, to both sides of the newspaper work. And then from there, I got an opportunity to work at the convention in Visitors Bureau, and that was about six years ago. So you worked with a small-time paper. You worked with the Sun News. Which did you like better? I know both hold their own challenges, and you work the money side and you work the news side just out of curiosity. Which did you like better? You know, I actually think I liked working in the advertising side better. I liked working closer with the business community. It was just working as a reporter. You sometimes see a lot of negative stuff all the time,

and that gets a little draining on you. So I liked working with the advertising. You got to see a different, you got to help businesses grow and expand and find new ways for them to improve their business. So I actually enjoyed doing that a lot more. I have to say, I like this job a lot better than my one-man ban reporter. I had a KBIM TV in Roswell. That was top bullet holes and body bags. That's what I say it all pretty much came down to. What made me want to get out of commercial station news. But let's hit the topic, and I alluded a little bit to this in the intro of the show. I get it confused all the time. As a matter of fact, when I'm going to visit a town, I quite often go to I'll do a plug into a search engine and find the Chamber of Commerce. And then realize, no, actually, if I'm going to visit there, I want to go to the convention and visitors bureau. Usually, there's a link, fortunately, on most Chamber of Commerce websites. And if not, it's pretty easy to get a link from a search engine.

But tell us the difference between the Las Cruces, Convention of Visitors Bureau, and the greater Las Cruces Chamber of Commerce. What's the diff? And that's a common thing that people get the two confused. Because especially in a state like New Mexico with a lot of smaller cities, you have the Chamber of Commerce that serves in both capacities. They both work with visitors and they both work as a Chamber. So basically, a Chamber of Commerce works with local business and local residents. And when new people move to town, it's sort of a way to help them introduce the new people to their member, their business community. The city, the convention and visitors bureau works exclusively with visitors. We work with trying to generate more overnight visitors to the city. And when they come, we provide them with all the information they need to stay here as a tourist. If they're looking to relocate at some later date, we provide them with the information they need on their initial visit. And then we refer them to the Chamber of Commerce to get more information about housing

and schools and hospitals and that type of thing, more fitting of someone relocating. But the basic thing is, we work with visitors, Chambers of Commerce work with local residents and the local business community. So that's a good way to try and keep them separate. How was the Lasgers Convention of Visitors Bureau funded? We are funded through the lodgers tax. And the lodgers tax is a tax collected on room nights here in Lasgers. So every time you stay in a room night, you pay the general gross receipts tax and then you're charged a lodgers tax as well. That money goes into a separate account and that's what funds, both the CBB from administrative side, like salaries and stuff like that, as well as all of our marketing efforts. So our entire budget comes from the lodgers tax. We don't get any money from the general fund. Tell me a little bit about the structure of the organization. It has several departments. Talks about each of them and what each of those departments aims to do. Well, of course we have our administrative department, which is made up of Ken Wampellier, who's our director.

He's been with the Bureau almost nine years now. I've heard his name for sure. Yeah. Anna Meyers, she's our office manager and sort of serves as our liaison between what we do at the CBB and complying with all the city regulations that we have to, you know, to city policies and procedures. And then there's two other major components. There's the visitor center and then there's the sales teams. Our visitor center is basically that it's a visitor center for people when they're visiting, they come in, pick up all their local information and we have some statewide information for them as well from other communities. And then we have the sales side of it, which is our efforts to go out and attract new business to Las Cruces. So we have three main sales areas. We have the sports sales, convention sales and tourism sales. And they're pretty self-explanatory. The sports sales, obviously going after sports markets, tournaments, sporting events, that type of thing, trying to bring them to Las Cruces. You know, either, you know, just to hold here or bring events here that people in the local community can go out and watch,

like, say, boxing events or basketball tournaments or things like that. Then the convention department, obviously bringing in conventions here right now, just more of a smaller nature because of the facilities that we currently have. But we, you know, there's conventions and meetings of all sizes. So there's small ones all the way up to, you know, the largest we can handle now. And then there's the tourism side, which goes out and tries to bring in group tours as well as just your regular leisure traveler. You know, the years I worked at the Hilton, oh, probably at least once a month, a big group of Germans would roll up in a bus and the sheriff's department would come out and do a hold up on it. And they were nuts about it. Everyone would whip out their video cameras and pictures. And then the deputies were really nice. They'd pose for pictures with anyone who wanted to and stuff like that. So those bus tours, I'm telling you what, it's nice when they all come in a big, huge group and I'll stay in the same place.

And always a great crew. Now, Los Cruz has recently hosted the WAC tournament for basketball. How much of a hand did CVB have in that? Well, NMSU was sort of the main entity that brought the tournament here. And we worked with them to provide them with some support initially when they went and made their bid proposal. So, you know, initially we provided, like I said, the information for their bid proposals and some gift baskets for the board members and things of that variety. And then as the tournament planning was going on at Karnathin, who's our sports sales manager, he was on a committee that sort of assisted with various aspects like some of the WAC banners you saw hanging up. We put those up banners and hotels, information on our websites, just a variety of little things. We just kind of whatever we could do to help out NMSU. And, you know, you mentioned Big Ed, that's one of my classmates. We graduated about a year apart and just a great guy.

I've been wondering for a while, I went to his wedding and all kinds of stuff. I haven't seen him for a while. I wondered what he's up to. I'm glad to hear he's got a good job and working with good folks. What did it mean to CVB to see the WAC come here? That's got to be a big one. Yeah, you know, I think a lot of people, maybe other communities that had teams that were participating, wondered if Las Cruces could handle the tournament because we are a smaller town. And I think this was an excellent opportunity for Las Cruces to showcase the city and what exactly we could do, you know, show that we could handle something of this size. And just sort of raise Las Cruces profile, try to get us on the map a little bit more, especially in the sports markets. So I think it was tremendous for the community. Again, you know, it showed other cities exactly what Las Cruces had to offer. Got some good TV coverage out of it, of course, on ESPN. So, oh, I know. I think it was a great opportunity for the community. Now, the recent renovation and expansion of the Pan American Center, what do you think that'll mean for attracting sporting and special events

for that matter here to the city of the crosses? You know, I think there's some tremendous potential there. And I also think, too, I'm not exactly sure what it was called. But I know that at the last legislature, they did away with a certain tax. That was a big hurdle for, I know, the Pan Am trying to get concerts here. Okay. So a lot of them would choose to go to El Paso because there was, it might just be the gross receipts tax. They weren't being charged that in El Paso. All right. So that was a big hurdle. That that's taken care of. That's going to be an even bigger factor in getting more, you know, events here. So, yeah, the renovations are also going to be tremendous. So I look for good things from the Pan Am. Will Loftall, who's the director there, actually sits on the advisory board for the Convention and Visitors Bureau. So we work real closely with them whenever we can. Oh, okay. And I know Barbara Hubbard has left an amazing legacy of concert promotion bringing, you know, certainly some of the biggest acts in the world. You know, we've had what, you know, the Eagles, the Eagles, you know, just monster concerts going on here.

So definitely sounds like a hopeful situation. Now, here's the big one. Has the lack of a convention center all these years held CVB back and how so? Hasn't really held the CVB back. I think we could have done some more things had we had a convention center. But I think having a convention center now is going to sort of propel us forward at a lot quicker rate. You know, right now we're sort of handicapped by the size of groups that we can host. Simply because, you know, the way conventions work, you need to have space for them to have their function and then have space for them to prepare meals. A lot of facilities we have now can do that, but they just can't do it with real large groups. So having this facility will, you know, allows to have more groups, larger size groups and be able to accommodate them properly. So, you know, has it held us back, I guess perhaps in some ways, but, you know, I think that the facilities that we have now have done a real good job trying to,

you know, accommodate the groups that are interested in lost groups. And I think the convention center is only going to help sort of, you know, expand on a pretty popular market already. So, now, what is the capacity of lost groups as far as a single convention coming in? Well, I think it varies. I mean, you have, you know, you have the ballrooms at three of the main properties, the hotel in Conto, the Ramada, and of course, the best western. And there's some other smaller meeting space around town, but it ranges a few hundred people just depending on how you're going to be setting up your function. So, you know, right now, I would say somewhere in the neighborhood of, you know, three to five hundred people max is probably what people can do comfortably, not exact on those figures, but somewhere in that neighborhood. And this convention center should allow us to do quite a bit more than that. What does it mean now that things really have finally, finally started? I know back in my bartoning days, I started out at Eddie's Bar and Grill, and oh, it was probably 86, and a presentation to the Las Cruces Association Realtors.

And it was, I think, the CVB or Chamber of Commerce who did it. And so, you know, all the way back since 86, there has been very, very serious talk about bringing a convention center here to Las Cruces. And now, you know, granted, the show is delayed. We tape a month or so before the show is actually aired. But just recently, there's been the land deal. So, things are really, really finally happening. Plans are finally getting solidified. I know it took almost a couple of years to decide on a location, to really lock down what's going to be the most advantageous location. And what does it mean for your organization now that that is finally in the works? And it looks like we're actually going to get a convention center. Well, it's tremendous for the CVB as well as the city of Las Cruces and to a large extent,

Mexico State University. But, you know, for several years now, we've anticipated a convention center being here. And so, we sort of put feelers out in that market to let people know that, you know, we can't maybe we can accommodate your group right now, but at a few years down the road, we should be able to, so keep us in mind. So, we've laid some real light groundwork in a lot of those markets, so that when we do get to this point where it looks like it's pretty much a go, we can go to these groups and say, okay, now, you know, we have a facility that's coming online. So, now we can start talking with them a little bit more seriously about bringing their groups here. So, it's a really big deal for us. You know, it's going to mean more business for, you know, obviously larger conventions, but it'll mean more business for the other properties too, because those smaller groups are still going to come here, and they're still going to want to meet in smaller venues. This will just allow us to add a whole other market segment to the convention market here in Las Cruces. So, you know, the potential is unlimited really in terms of what we can go out there and do. Now, how frustrating has, has it been?

Because, you know, I know that a lot of groups, when they're looking around for where to have their convention and annual convention, especially if they like to hop it around from town to town, I know a lot of people like to come to the Southwest, especially if it's a fall or a winter time function, they certainly are thinking, you know, much farther down in the Southern United States, and when people think of good weather in the winter, of course they think of San Diego in the Southwest, here along the borderland in southern New Mexico and West Texas. How frustrating is that to say, you know, we want you to come around for a couple of years, you know, in a couple of years, but we can't take in now. Well, there is a bit of frustration there, but fortunately the way convention groups work is they book several years out anyway. Okay. So, you might be talking to a group today that could be booking groups as far as 2010, 2011. So, even though you don't have a facility online right now, by the time their group,

you know, while the time those open dates down the road are available, your facility may very well be here. So, yeah, there is some frustration about not having a facility, because everybody wants, you know, space to do more and have a bigger facility. But, you know, just the way the market operates, there's still, it doesn't really crush a lot of your potential, like I said, a lot of it books so far out that you can still talk to those people, and you can still make some, you know, rough plans, so to speak, about what you can do just by the way that that market works. But, you know, like I said, having that facility will be tremendous, and then a good deal of frustration will be sort of lifted once, you know, they finally put a shovel in the ground, and there's sort of a set data as to when we can expect, you know, them to open the doors. Okay. And, you know, I know the roughest set of days I ever spent in bankwoods, and there were many at Eddie's Bar and Grill, a well-run facility. Don't get me wrong. But, when we tried to host Sonic Convention, and Sonic Convention by that time was just way too big for any facility here, and there wasn't enough room for the people.

There was insufficient infrastructure. You know, obviously the best Western has undergone a lot of improvements over the last years. Peggy Smith is still running the place, and can't say enough does a great, great job. And a much nicer place than when I worked there back in the mid-80s. But that certainly was tough, try, you know, just trying to shoehorn those people in, and it just made it hotter, and more frustrating from them. Until Sonic Convention, who knows? I'm not sure if they do it here anymore, but they took it out of town and went to another place, a place with a bigger facility. And I know that was, just that function was upwards of 700 people that the next year we had to turn away. Now, what do you think the Convention Center will do for the hospitality restaurant and tourism management program at NMSU? Because from what I understand, a large amount of the staff

for the Convention Center are going to be those students and doing internships. What do you think that means for NMSU in that program? Well, I think it means a lot, you know. I mean, more than likely there will be a management company that runs the Convention Center, and they'll sort of, you know, they'll have their staff that runs different things, but it will be a great opportunity for the HRTM program to get some real, real on the job training. You know, they can do a lot of that to some extent here at some of the hotels, but there is no Convention Center obviously to do some of the other side of what their program offers. So it's the perfect training ground, and I'm pretty sure that NMSU is still looking at putting a hotel down there as well. So there's going to be some real good opportunities for these students to learn on both the hotel side as well as the convention side. So I think it's going to be a big bonus for that program. Now, CVB has not yet come up with a solid game plan concerning the possibility of the space industry setting up shop in Southern New Mexico, and we talked about that a little bit earlier when we

met a few days ago. How come they haven't come up with a solid plan? They're keeping it in mind that this is a possibility, but why not solid plans? We want to do ABC. Well, I think it's a little early on in the process to really start making those decisions. I mean, there's a lot of groundwork that has to be sort of finalized before the CVB can look at it from a tourist industry and say, okay, what's going to be available for the tourists? Because the last thing you want to do is promote something that when someone shows up to see they're going to be disappointed. So, you know, we want to make sure that when we say, okay, when we talk about the space industry and Las Cruces that there is actually A, B, and C things to go see and do, and I know a lot of the people that are coming here, Star Chaser, Rocket Racing League, they have some big plans. And when those plans are actually finalized, it's going to be a great venue for people to come, you know, sort of look at the next phase of space travel, air travel, you know, tourism in general. So, it's not that we're, you know, reluctant to work with them, we're just kind of waiting to see what their plans

are going to be, so we can figure out the best ways to work with them and, you know, what's going to be the best way to sort of promote that industry in general. I know Star Chaser plans to build an entire resort when things come to full fruition there. And just went to a ribbon cutting for them for their rocket roadshow. So, who knows what's going to happen with them, but it sounds like great things. In the 30 seconds we got left, any big projects that CVB is currently working on? You know, I was thinking about that on the way over here and Mimi Laff a little bit, because probably the biggest project we have going on right now is we've got some new staff. We've had some new people in some new key positions, the tourism sales position, Adele Cox is our new tourism sales manager. She just came over to us from the Sunset Barn girl up at Sonoma Ranch. And then John Bula, who's our new convention sales manager, he's been there less than a year. And of course, Edgelman with us for a couple years. So, you know, there's a lot of exciting things happening. We're just kind of laying the ground

worth a lot of these departments and just trying to go in some new direction. So, sort of the whole CVB has a lot going on really. Chris, thanks so much for coming on the show. I really appreciate the information you did a great job. Sure, thank you. Thanks. It's time again for our weekly piece here on Mining Your Business to showcase some of the hard working entrepreneurs and business people in our area. We call it the Greater Las Cruces Chamber of Commerce Local Business Feature. About five years ago, I finished up my master's degree of Vicki and I have been friends for a long time. I worked for her husband before. And she's been making quilts. She makes great quilts and I wanted one. So, I wanted her to make me one. And she refused.

But she said she'd teach me how. She taught me how to make a quilt and I was put. And an opportunity opened up with my job. I'm an engineer to move here to New Mexico. So, I left Phoenix. And I was here about three years and noticed that there's no quilt shops in El Paso. And there was really only one quilt shop quilt shop here in Las Cruces. So, I called Vicki and we started talking about it. And actually, I was quite surprised that she was so open to moving here to Las Cruces to go into business with me. So, we neither one of us had ever done anything like that before. We went back to Phoenix, went to every quilt store that we possibly could, wrote up a business plan and went into business. Right now, we have one employee, Jennifer. Last year was a struggle, but this year it's been so cool. Everything's just, it seems to be just flying off the shelf.

People are starting to know that we're here. We quilt, quilts for folks. So, they bring in their quilts. Vicki is an artist. She does beautiful work and people bring her to the quilts and she gets them done on her long long. The machine is going as fast as I'm moving the machine. We sell fabric, of course. That's our biggest thing. I guess the next thing that would be of real big interest to our customers and to us is our books. Quilters are into education. And we love providing that for them. So, we teach classes. We've teamed with the ladies at Bernina. They bring in sewing machines and they put them in our classroom for us. We do sell some sewing machines. They're more for beginners and for those that are just barely starting into quilting. And we sell quilt racks. We sell batting. We sell very high-end Egyptian cotton thread. We sell notions. And we have a ton of patterns.

It's something that's a great passion. And so, even though the work is hard, just to be able to be in contact with people that love doing the same thing we love doing is a real reward in itself. That just about does it for this week. If you have a question or comment about the show, you can call them in your business hotline at 646-7350 or email me at Charles Comer at Yahoo.com. Again, I'd like to thank my guest Media and Publications Manager for the Las Cruces Convention and Visitors Bureau Chris Faber for coming on the show. And thank you so much for watching. I'm Charles Comer. Here's hoping you have a great one. Music Minding your business is provided by support from CEO Levitino of Emoryk Realtors,

proud to be associated with the quality programs and community service projects of PBS and KRWG TV. By Camino Real Builders, a committed partner with KRWG Broadcasting, providing educational, informative, and entertaining programs to our region. And by the New Mexico Humanities Council, working with local groups to bring programs about culture and the human experience to all communities in New Mexico. And having fun doing it. I mean, you're the one that's in charge now. This is your painting at this point. I've showed you the basics on how to kind of get it going

and you're going to have to spend time finishing it up so that you'll be happy with it. And who knows, maybe you'll have this one sold before the days over. Some surfing personal come along and just fall in love with it. I would recommend that you detail these a little bit. Highlight a little more, three dimensionalize them a little bit because they're not quite as formed as they could be and that just takes a little time. It's one of those things where even if it's impressionism, you have to be just a little bit more open-minded about forming them so that they'll look a little bit more finished. And that's really all there is to it. Just a simple matter of you just going in there and finishing things. I probably want to darken this corner just a little bit with some mobish colors. Just to keep it from being too of an eye catcher. Just darkening your corners is a good thing. And I like these softer mob tones in the corner because it kind of helps to soften. But anyway, we're going to have to stop now. We're going to start a brand new painting next week. So finish this up. Send me a picture of it. Let me know what you, you know, how it turned out. I'd like to see that. Don't forget, you can put a few flags flying up here. A little smidge of color.

Just things like that. So I want to thank you for joining us today. God bless you. Stay inspired. Keep painting. And I'll see you again real soon right here. I promise on another yarn else school. I'll find out. Funding for this program is provided by North Modesto Industrial Park, Modesto, California. To be continued...