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LEFT TO RIGHT: Rolando Aedo, Senior Vice President, Marketing & Tourism; Alvin L. West, Chief Financial Officer & Sr. Vice President of Administration; Ita Moriarty, Senior Vice President, Convention Sales and William D. Talbert III, President & CEO.

Team Miami: GMCVB Sets High Bar for Rivals Worldwide

The Greater Miami Convention and Visitors Bureau: “Miami’s Brand Ambassadors” promote our region to the world.

By Jeff Zbar | Photography by Stephen Boxall

enured, talented and tenacious, the team at the Greater Miami Convention and Visitors Bureau has endured recessions and global tourism downturns to help transform the region into a symbol of tourism success.

The office of William “Bill” Talbert could serve as some unofficial museum of Miami tourism.

His credenza, shelves and walls are lined with mementos from Miami-Dade County’s memorable past. There are helmets from Orange Bowl football games, magazine clips about the destination, and trophies and plaques boasting success.

He even has an original of the provocative “Miami. See it like a native” poster. Thousands were to be driven to a landfill in 1978 when women’s groups protested the image of the topless woman in snorkeling gear. This one, at least, didn’t make it. Yet, it’s what’s unseen in this office that speaks to the successes of Talbert, the president and CEO, and his team at the Greater Miami Convention and Visitor’s Bureau. The county has added more than 15,000 hotel rooms over the past 15 years, and grown occupancy from 50.9 percent in the month after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, to 74 percent last October. The room rate 14 years ago was $94. Three months ago it was $161. The industry’s economic impact, at least from hoteliers’ perspectives, is up 128 percent, according to the bureau.

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Team Miami: GMCVB Sets High Bar for Rivals Worldwide

One of those partners is American Airlines. The carrier has turned Miami International into a major regional and international hub. As American has grown, so, too, has Greater Miami. Today, 51 percent of the region’s visitors are foreign nationals; they account for 70 percent of visitor spending. “We have a saying at American: What’s good for Miami is good for American,” said Marilyn DeVoe, a vice president with the carrier in Miami. “The more visitors that come to South Florida, the greater the growth of our hub and flights and, most importantly, the greater the economic impact on Miami-Dade.” Another partner is the Miami Downtown Development Authority. The GMCVB and DDA have helped remake downtown as a destination in its own right. And it’s worked, said Alyce Robertson, the DDA’s executive director, who has known Talbert for two decades. Together, along with PortMiami and American Airlines, they created the Where Worlds Meet initiative to promote Miami as a gateway destination and jointly sponsored banners congratulating the Miami Heat for the NBA team’s success and welcoming new cruise ships. “They’re open-minded about how to make your brand better,” said Robertson. “It is a long-term, ongoing, close-knit relationship.” Talbert is surrounded by executives with considerable longevity at the bureau. Ita Moriarty,

Another number: 58 months of consecutive hospitality jobs growth. “We’re a jobs program,” he deadpanned, adding honestly, “We’re numbers driven. We monitor our numbers very closely.” If numbers are a tourism booster’s life blood, the GMCVB and its partners are thriving. Talbert and his team are “brand managers for the word ‘Miami.’” The private, not-for-profit organization is contracted by Miami-Dade County, representing some 35 cities, and the city of Miami Beach, to promote the region as a tourist and convention destination. The GMCVB’s $25 million annual budget is underwritten by hotel and restaurant taxes collected by the county and Miami Beach. For more than 20 years, the team has steered the county’s marketing through various recessions and tourism crises. For a region that draws 96 percent of its visitors by plane, none was worse than 2001, the year of the September 11 attacks. With tourism at a standstill, the team huddled, redrew its marketing plan, and within weeks launched newspaper ads that avoided post-attack patriotism and instead aligned Miami with the emotions of shell-shocked Americans were feeling. “We totally redid our budget in seven days,” said Rolando Aedo, executive vice president and chief marketing officer, himself a 20-year GMCVB veteran. “That’s how nimble and creative we are.” When the economy crashed in 2008, the GMCVB again quickly responded. While travel trade was down globally, initiatives the GMCVB already had in place helped soften the blow. The bureau had created an international network of contract agents and representatives, now in 41 cities globally. Today, they include Russia, China, Qatar—which the bureau has been lobbying for direct flights—and Brazil. The bureau is successful because its people are entrepreneurial, said Aedo. They’ve created the monthly “Miami Spice” program to highlight different sectors of the community. They promote “heritage tourism” for historic districts like Overtown, Coconut Grove, Little Havana, the Design District and Wynwood. In partnership with Florida International University and Miami International Airport, their “Miami Begins with Me” program seeks to encourage improved customer service across the community. Their “Temptations presented by MasterCard” enlisted the card company as a vested partner. They explore marketing, sponsorship and even naming rights programs to generate revenue to reinvest in the marketplace in support of 1,100 member organizations throughout the county, including hotels, attractions and restaurants. “We’ve become very entrepreneurial to leverage the public dollars that we do receive to attract more private dollars,” said Aedo.

senior vice president of convention sales, arrived almost 28 years ago. Ginny Gutierrez, director of community relations, has 21 years there. Alvin L. West, senior vice president and CFO, arrived in 1992, and has presided over “23 clean audits” of the bureau’s books and an overhaul of its IT and database technology. West also helped create the “Black Hospitality Initiative,” which emerged from the African-American boycott of the 1990s. To date, the initiative has raised $2.5 million “to get young black talent into hospitality,” he said. “We’ve used BHI to move the needle to make sure the industry is diverse.” Talbert’s team has witnessed the region’s wholesale transformation. Top hoteliers have replaced mom-and-pop hotels along Collins Avenue. The Adrienne Arsht Center, New World Symphony and Pérez Art Museum Miami have helped infuse culture into the region. Art Basel, whose debut was stalled a year by the Sept. 11 attacks, now draws more private jets to Miami than the Super Bowl, said Talbert. Some 25 years later, Talbert and his team’s patience has prevailed, as he competes against Europe, Latin America and other U.S. markets. “No,” said Talbert, “they’re competing against us.” E

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LEFT TO RIGHT: Alvin L. West, William D. Talbert III, Ita Moriarty, and Rolando Aedo.

wenty-five years ago, when executives with the Greater Miami Convention and Visitor’s Bureau needed a new take on their marketing, they turned to a local ad man. Bruce Turkel, head of Turkel Advertising

in Coconut Grove, knew then—and knows now—what makes Miami thrive. Take your pick—café con leche at a Cuban bistro, lunch on the riverfront, an afternoon of gallery hopping in Midtown or Wynwood. Other options include visits to two national parks and dinner on Miami Beach, followed by the ballet, symphony, a Miami Heat game, or a South Beach club. “Then, the next day, you can wake up and do it all over again,” he said. Traditional tourism destination marketing, “sun and fun—ignored all those things.” Born and raised in Miami Beach, Turkel is a University of Florida graduate who worked in New York before returning home to launch his Coconut Grove ad shop 30 years ago. Upon his return, he saw a seasonal destination whose market was changing. In the 1960s, nine in 10 people drove to Greater Miami. Today,

that many people fly here, according to the bureau. They also fly to Jamaica and Cancun. But Miami is the tropical destination with a cosmopolitan panache. A recent campaign createdby Turkel, dubbed, “It’s So Miami,” offers images of a woman in a bathing suit in a local art gallery, or a man emerging from a McLaren sports car in search of a 50-cent cup of coffee. Turkel’s work captures the Miami ethos. Some credit his enthusiasm as much as his talent. Seth Werner, chairman/CEO of Harbour Real Estate Corporation, invited Turkel in 1993 to make a pitch for the First Mortgage Network ad account. What won the account for Turkel was the team’s energy and creativity, said Werner. More than 20 years later, Turkel has handled marketing for a host of Werner’s businesses. “His never-ending creative thought process and positive perspective coupled with a very high IQ and EQ, [Emotional Intelligence Quotient] is a very rare combination,” said Werner. Today, when he’s not selling Miami’s cachet, branding Bacardi Imports, handling Discovery Networks Latin America, or managing

a host of other tourism brands nationwide, Turkel is building his own brand. He’s written four books on marketing and branding, blogs on marketing and travel, and is a weekly guest on Fox Business News discussing the marketing implications of the day’s events.He speaks at corporate events nationwide, often teaching hundreds how to play harmonica—which he does in the local rhythm and blues band, Blackstar. Active in the community, Turkel sits on the board of trustees of the foster care agency Our Kids, Inc. of Miami-Dade and Monroe counties. Fellow trustee and running partner Adam M. Goldstein, president/COO of Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd., has watched as Turkel has guided all of Our Kids’ marketing work, from the logo and identity scheme to image building in the community. “I saw the creativity and inspiration for which he is well known in the business world,” said Goldstein. It’s no coincidence that a local personality like Turkel would market Miami. “The people at the GMCVB allow me to give back to my hometown in such a special way,” he said. E

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BRUCE TURKEL Building Brands, Bolstering Business

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