At Ryan Companies, they view meeting together as an opportunity to enhance the company’s culture and live their values authentically. Courtesy of Colleen Kucera

To be successful in the industry, event planners and marketers need a very large toolbox, a diverse set of skills with which to employ those tools and the ability to switch gears quickly. That’s nothing new, but lately an additional standard has been added to the checklist —  authenticity — and planners and marketers seem to be talking and writing about it often these days.

Some in the industry theorize that the recent emphasis on authenticity is the result of living through the pandemic. Having lost something people took for granted, they emerged craving connection, but not just getting together … meaningful connection. Others theorize it is a generational shift, with political and social turmoil acting as a catalyst for young people to increasingly demand more accountability and transparency from those around them in all areas of their lives.

Regardless of the impetus, what does authenticity mean in its application for planning, creating and marketing events?

For David Fast and his team of event salespeople and event planners at Prairie Meadows Racetrack and Casino, it is the driving force from start to finish for every event.

Located in Altoona, IA, Prairie Meadows is unique in the universe of casinos because it is a nonprofit corporation; there is only one other in the United States. After salaries and expenses, the money it makes is funneled back to the residents of Iowa through community betterment programs — $2.2 billion over the course of the last 15 years — thereby lessening the financial burden to taxpayers and government alike.

Because Prairie Meadows isn’t answerable to stockholders, Fast and his team have more latitude to make sure that every event they stage meets or exceeds expectations.

“It’s very rewarding for those of us who work here, especially our event sales and marketing team.” Fast says. “Our values are respect, integrity, teamwork and excellence, and our mission is to be the best entertainment experience in the Midwest. That’s where our authenticity comes in, and we stay true to it.”

An event at Prairie Meadows begins with Fast and his sales team, then it’s handed off to an event coordinator who will collaborate with the client on the details, and then it proceeds to the event service team.

Fast has worked at other places where salespeople promise one level of performance, but with the pressure of rising costs combined with the need to deliver profits to shareholders, the client ended up getting a different, less satisfactory experience.

“A salesperson promises something, event coordinators lower those goals, and then when the client shows up for the event, they think, ‘This isn’t what I was led to believe I was getting.’  We don’t do that here. I don’t tolerate it. Neither does my food and beverage director, and neither do my conference operations directors. We’re very particular about making sure that the communication is consistent from one department to the next.”

Prairie Meadows is a corporate partner of Catch Des Moines and receives event sales leads from them. Originally established more than 100 years ago as the Greater Des Moines Convention & Visitors Bureau, it and the Des Moines Area Sports & Tourism Commission combined and rebranded in 2012 as Catch Des Moines.

Its purpose is to bring visitors to the region through event and leisure travel marketing, and as an accredited Destinations International organization, Greg Edwards, Catch Des Moines’ CEO, says authenticity is front and center. “We are the heart, the soul and the energy of our destination.”

Its overarching mission is to drive economic success and enhance the quality of life for Des Moines and 13 smaller surrounding municipalities by marketing the region as a visitor destination. It’s working. In 2022 -2023, the conventions and events Catch Des Moines’ bookings resulted in $2.8 billion in revenue for the area.

Since Catch Des Moines is primarily funded by a percentage of the local hotel/motel tax, those businesses are a primary constituency, but Edwards says that he tells anyone who asks, “Our constituents are essentially everyone.”

He believes his best salespeople are the people who live there, experiencing it day to day and can brag about Des Moines. Of course, Edwards also has a professional sales and marketing team who maintain a database of thousands of organizations that convene meetings, conventions, sporting and other events.

More often than not the groups are not familiar with Des Moines, he says, especially if they’re from either the East Coast or the West Coast. “Sometimes, they’re not even sure where Iowa is.”

“Once we get somebody who might be interested in talking about Des Moines as an event destination, we offer to fly them in, show them the community and the facilities. When they get here, they find out for themselves how real the people are. That’s just Midwest hospitality, but I think we have some of the best of that here in Des Moines.”

Investing in Your Employees

Ryan Companies, a national commercial construction, architecture, engineering and real estate management company, has established values of safety, integrity, respect, stewardship, family, excellence and fun. Colleen Kucera, senior vice-president, national marketing leader for Ryan Companies, is about to put those values into action. She is currently planning The Great Ryan Get Together for this coming October.

Roughly every five years Ryan Companies brings everyone in from all over the country, and although headquartered in Minneapolis, the company has chosen Dallas, the location of one of its 12 corporate offices, as the destination.

“We wanted to travel to one of our other regions, and finding a space where you can have 1400 to 1800 people stay in the same place where you’re going to have your meetings narrows down the pool of options pretty quickly,” Watson explains.

Travel costs for that many people from across the country plus accommodations is a huge expense, but Kucera says, “We really look at it as an investment in our employees. It’s an opportunity for us to offer some large-scale learning and development where we’re all together in the same place, but it’s also an opportunity to enhance our culture and live our values in a truly authentic way together.”

In addition to Ryan Companies’ very large meeting in October, Kucera also plans and executes their St. Patrick’s Day celebration held in Minneapolis every year. Some companies send cards to customers at Christmas and New Year’s, but her company sends out St. Patrick’s Day cards.

“St. Patrick’s Day is really our thing. It’s just such a great cultural event and it’s so much fun for everyone,” says Kucera, who, together with her team, also helps stage at least 50 or more ground breaking and ribbon-cutting ceremonies a year for the projects her company builds wherever construction is taking place.

Aligning With a Company’s Values

On the subject of authenticity and event planning, Greg Bogue, chief brand and experience officer of Maritz, the international events, sales and marketing company headquartered in St. Louis, MO, says, “When we consider authenticity, we think about the event experience and how it aligns with the organization and brand that’s putting on the event. We’re trying to create a connection between what they are as an authentic organization and the experiences they want created and staged.”

If anyone has had a chance to road test authenticity as a guiding principle, Bogue has. With more than 2,400 employees, an international supplier partner program and a global meetings network, last year Bogue’s worldwide team staged 6,113 events.

“It’s really about understanding the richness of the organization we’re working with and then ensuring that the experiences we design and stage are in alignment with their values and purpose,” Bogues says.

Every experience either reinforces or dilutes a client’s brand, he says, and he and his team seek to ensure that the experiences they plan and execute enrich the position of that brand. “We don’t want people leaving an event thinking, ‘Wow, that was weird.’”

The Maritz team walks clients through a series of exercises when necessary to help build consensus around the essence of what the event is about at its core and how it represents and connects to the client’s brand. Once an organizing principle and concept are established, Bogue says, “We use it as a North Star for their event. We follow the exact same process for our own events so that we don’t shortcut.”

From experience, he knows that organizations and event and meeting planners are under pressure to perform. “It’s a pressure-filled job, and it would be very easy for a planner to just say, ‘Oh, that’s a shiny object, I’ll do that.’ At Maritz we probably think a little bit more richly about all the elements and consider what kind of connections our clients want to make.”

Establishing Pillars to Abide by

Big Buzz Idea Group, a management, marketing, event and consulting service company for nonprofits and associations, has also been laser-focused on authenticity since Melissa Lagowski founded it.

Located in Chicago, Big Buzz is an outgrowth of her personal experience. After suffering burnout working for a small nonprofit where, as a staff of one, she was putting on 24 events, publishing 12 newsletters and overseeing eight committees a year, she took a break.

After she left, the nonprofit hired a professional event company to put on its annual fundraiser, and although the gross revenue from the event tripled, the amount the nonprofit netted was half of what it had received when Lagowski was running it.

Lagowski thought there had to be a better way. In response, she formed Big Buzz with a mission of “being an honest and transparent partner for nonprofits,” she explains, and the nonprofit she previously worked for was the first to sign on.

To make sure her company’s compass remains true, she established five pillars as the cornerstone: integrity, growth, gratitude, teamwork and profitability. “Those are the things we want for our clients, our staff members and for our company as a whole,” she says.

Lagowski adds that the five pillars she established have been beneficial not only for her clients but also for her company. She and her staff are able to vet prospective clients using the pillars to see if they align with Big Buzz as an organization to make sure it’s a good fit.

One of the entities Big Buzz works with is The Rotary Club of Chicago, part of Rotary International, a nonprofit corporation composed of local Rotary Clubs. Its purposes are to provide humanitarian service, encourage high ethical standards in all vocations and help build world peace and good will.

With more than 46,000 Rotary Clubs around the world, putting on Rotary’s annual convention is a daunting task. Rotary International’s Director of Meetings and Events, Shannon Watson, is the person to whom that responsibility falls.

“As a global service organization that brings 1.4 million people from all continents and cultures together to take action to create positive, lasting change in communities around the world, authenticity is at the heart of our meetings and events, including our annual international convention,” Watson says.

In May of this year, more than 14,000 attendees experienced five days of friendship, excitement and cultural connection during Rotary’s annual International Convention in Singapore. Watson and her staff will be taking the 2025 Convention to Calgary, Canada.

“Since Rotary’s first convention in 1910, Rotary’s conventions continue to be fueled by a spirit of collaboration, the desire to exchange knowledge and best practices as well as friendship,” she says, “all of which are in line with our core values.”

Rotary’s motto is Service Above Self, and members recite the “The Four-Way Test” at every meeting: “Is it the truth? Is it fair to all concerned? Will it build goodwill and better friendships? Will it be beneficial to all concerned?”

It doesn’t get more authentic than that. C&IT