Laissez Les Bons Temps Rouler! (Let The Good Times Roll!)

Have You Marked Your Calendar?

New Orleans is rolling out the purple carpet for us February 15-18, 2009 when PACE brings its show to town. Plans are under way for one of the liveliest most talked about shows in the industry.

Fat Tuesday is February 24, 2009 so do you know that during PACE 2009 we’ll be able to enjoy many of the Mardis Gras activities with none of the hassles? Check out the parades that will be taking place:

FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 13
Orleans / Jefferson
Oshun - Uptown, 6:00 p.m.
Atlas - Metairie, 6:30 p.m.
Cleopatra - West Bank, 6:30 p.m.
Excalibur - Metairie, 7:00 p.m.
Pygmalion - Uptown, 7:00 p.m. St. Tammany
Eve - Mandeville, 7:00 p.m.

SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 14
Orleans / Jefferson
Pontchartrain - Uptown, 1:00 p.m.
Shangri-La - Uptown, 2:00 p.m.
Caesar - Metairie, 6:00 p.m.
Sparta - Uptown, 6:00 p.m.
Pegasus - Uptown, 6:45 p.m. St. Tammany
Olympia - Covington, 6:00 p.m.

SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 15
Orleans / Jefferson
Alla - West Bank, Noon
Carrollton - Uptown, Noon
King Arthur - Uptown, 1:15 p.m.
Barkus - French Quarter, 2:00 p.m.
Rhea - Metairie, 3:45 p.m.
Centurions - Metairie, 5:30 p.m. St. Bernard
Nemesis - Chalmette 2:00 p.m. St. Tammany
Dionysus - Slidell, 1:00 p.m.

WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 18
Druids - Uptown, 6:00 p.m.
Thor - Metairie, 7:00 p.m.

For more information on Mardis Gras activities visit: http://www.mardigrasday.com/mardigras/

New Orleans is Going GREEN!

Call it green, call it sustainability, but being environmentally savvy is not a trend. It's an important business practice that's here to stay.

According to Meeting Strategies Worldwide (www.meetingstrategiesworldwide.com), green meetings are defined as a "meeting that incorporates environmental considerations throughout all stages of the meeting in order to minimize the negative impact on the environment."
Going green is good for the environment and it’s good for business. Producing a green meeting can actually save customers’ bottom lines.

That’s why New Orleans is one of many destinations working to become more environmentally friendly for meetings and conventions.

Each organization is unique in terms of how it defines corporate social responsibility. For years, corporate America has selected New Orleans as a meetings destination and taken advantage of the wealth of “voluntourism” community service opportunities available to expand team building efforts and strengthen corporate social responsibility programs. Now, New Orleans’ hospitality community is investing in green practices to help achieve client business objectives and green requirements.

A task force of our hospitality community was created with representatives from meeting and entertainment venues, restaurants, destination management companies, hotels, visitor attractions, transportation and trash disposal companies. This group was formed to:
- Identify new ways to create and deliver green meetings. - Engage the community in our findings to collectively become more socially responsible.- Encourage local businesses to integrate green initiatives into their daily operations.- Use a measurement tool to determine our continued successes.

The New Orleans Morial Convention Center is one of the largest convention centers in the nation with 1.1 million square feet of contiguous exhibit space. Imagine the environmentally-friendly practices that can be implemented in a building that is over one mile long and host to some of the nation’s largest conventions and exhibits.

So far, the New Orleans Morial Convention Center and its partner ARAMARK have many green programs underway:

Water Conservation- Low flow faucets in restrooms- Automatic faucets and toilets in restrooms- Irrigation systems equipped with rain sensors to prevent excessive use of water resources
Energy Conservation- Computerized Energy Management System in public areas and meeting space- Energy efficient lighting- Variable volume HVAC and pumping systems- Daylight sensors for exterior lighting- Manual control of escalators and other equipment when not needed- Manual reset on heating hot water- ARAMARK selects Engergy STAR equipment when purchasing new or replacement equipment.

Waste Reduction- A system in place for recycling cardboard- The largest contributor in New Orleans to area food banks- Bulk purchasing reducing packaging for materials brought into the building- Reusable liners for meeting room setups- Five-gallon water coolers instead of bottled water- Cloth napkins and table cloths instead of paper- Recyclable toner cartridges and other office supplies when possible.

Clean Air Practices- Environmentally friendly cleaners when possible- Annual maintenance on all air handler units and coils - Preventative maintenance regularly performed on boilers, diesel fire pumps and diesel generators.

Even New Orleans Mardi Gras celebration is going green. Kern Studios, the largest producer of Carnival floats, reduced the impact on the environment by using biodiesel in the tractors pulling floats along the parade routes in 2008.

These examples only scratch the surface. PACE will continue its green standards by sending fewer hard copy promotions and relying more on electronic distribution of information. We will also continue to use recycled paper and soy ink on our printed programs as well as “china” during refreshment breaks so that we don’t contribute to landfill waste.

Join us in helping us do our part to cut back waste – register on line and you’ll help save the environment while saving yourself money. Watch your email inbox for more information after Labor Day and visit www.pace2009.com for up to the minute PACE news.

A Good Time and Place for a Blog

Welcome back to those of you who were regular readers of the PACE Blog in recent years. PACE 2009 is several months away, but that doesn't mean that the staff are just sitting on their hands watching the flowers bloom. Well, maybe some of us are, what with it being Spring and all and the weather finally turning a bit warmer. :-) Of course, that's just during the work day. At night when we're home with our families, we're usually thinking about PACE and what we need to do to get ready for the show in New Orleans.



We're pretty excited about heading back to "Nawlins" in February. I've personally been back there twice since Katrina, most recently last month for another conference (over St. Patrick's Day weekend to boot!). The progress that they've made in the city is truly amazing. Population is returning, as are the tourists, and both small and large "victories" are occurring on a daily basis - whether it's the extension of business hours in a local restaurant or the reopening of a refurbished building.



New Orleans still features that traditional southern charm, and that was more evident than ever on my recent trip. Residents are genuinely happy to see the visitors and the economic activity that they bring with them. Many of them went out of their way to thank me for visiting their shop or restaurant, and those that felt like chatting were really excited for the progress. To me, this grass roots information was more valuable than any "official line" from some faceless agency.



The truth is that there are still many things in the area that need to be fixed, but as with any destination city like New Orleans, tourism brings money and money fixes stuff. I did my part while I was there (especially with the fine establishments on Bourbon Street), and plan to do more in the next few months.






Keep your eyes on this space for more from the PACE folks on the upcoming show. As always, if you have any questions, feel free to contact us via the web site at http://www.pace2009.com or by calling SSPC or PDCA directly.