ICCA announced Flanders Meeting & Convention Center as the winner of this year's ICCA Best Marketing Award at the Closing Ceremony of the 56th ICCA Congress on 15 November in Prague, Czech Republic.

The “A room with a zoo” campaign, promotes the new convention center in Antwerp, Belgium, with a purpose and introduces conservation in the meeting industry.

Congratulations also go out to the other two finalists of the 2017 ICCA Best Marketing Award: International Convention Centre Sydney (ICC Sydney) and Shocklogic.

Best Marketing Award Chairman of the judging panel Patrick Delaney (SoolNua): “The campaigns presented by all three finalists truly demonstrated excellence in marketing and showed how ICCA members create innovative, effective and dynamic solutions to the challenges the meetings industry faces every day.”

“The winning campaign shows the power of how meetings and conferences have a positive social and economic impact, not only on the local society and economy, but also on the wider global community. The ability of their campaign to create a genuine authentic legacy that connects us all sets a great example for our industry.”

Flanders Meeting & Convention Center Antwerp (FMCCA) is a newly opened purpose-built convention centre built on the premises of the Antwerp ZOO. It launched a Marketing Campaign to create rapid brand awareness and brand reputation to attract more international congresses to the relatively unknown city of Antwerp.

The marketing campaign features a 3-way concept:

“Matadi”, a silverback gorilla as embodiment of the centre’s link to the Antwerp ZOO and icon for conservation in their Meeting Activities

Room with a zoo, the positioning tagline that highlights the centre’s biggest benefit including emotional value: its location on the premises of the Antwerp ZOO - among oldest scientific zoo’s in the world, offering great social program opportunities as well as green gardens that nature and make meetings more effective

Instant CSR through conservation, the promise of immediate conservation support, tapping into the Industry’s hunger for purpose and meaningful sustainability. Because of the kinship with the ZOO (owned by same Foundation) all revenue from meeting activities goes to the full conservation program of the Antwerp ZOO

Mrs. Anja Stas, Chief Commercial Officer of the FMCCA: “We are honored with this great recognition from our industry’s peers from all over the world. I dedicate this award to my whole team, because they made this all possible!”

As well as a detailed evaluation by an expert panel including past winners, the BMA finalists are judged by a live plenary audience of their competitors and colleagues, and as a result this session has become one of the most eagerly anticipated highlights of each year’s ICCA Congress.

The ICCA Best Marketing Award, established in 1997, recognises the excellence and outstanding achievements of organisations in their effort to market their destination or product. Entries can range from full scale campaigns and branding exercises to individual promotions and events. The ICCA Best Marketing Award is sponsored by The Meetings Show and is open to ICCA members only.

This year’s ICCA Congress was the biggest ICCA “Congress on congresses” ever with 1278 attendees from 80 countries.

About ICCA

The global community and knowledge hub for the international association meetings industry.

ICCA - the International Congress and Convention Association - represents the world's leading suppliers in handling, transporting and accommodating international meetings and events, and comprises over 1,000 member companies and organisations in almost 100 countries worldwide. Since its establishment over 50 years ago, ICCA specialises in the international association meetings sector, offering unrivalled data, communication channels, and business development opportunities.

ICCA members represent the top destinations worldwide, and the most experienced specialist suppliers. International meeting planners can rely on the ICCA network to find solutions for all their event objectives: venue selection; technical advice; assistance with delegate transportation; full convention planning or ad hoc services.