Corporate events are back in the Laurentians: the hotels joined by The Press are finally talking about a return to normal this year. With the pandemic specter still on people’s minds, however, business customers tend to book at the last minute. Overview.
Posted at 10:00 a.m.
At Grand Lodge Mont-Tremblant, the volume of events has now returned to approximately its pre-pandemic level. “People want to see each other. I think hybrid events will continue for a while, but if not, I think it’s doomed to disappear,” said Danièle Bouchard, director of sales and marketing.
While business customers have taken advance notice – about a year – to book their parties Christmas, however, they remain more cautious with regard to the organization of smaller meetings and events.
There are a lot of last minute. Nobody wants to plan too far in advance, not knowing what could happen in the fall, exactly, in terms of sanitary measures.
Danièle Bouchard, Sales and Marketing Director of Grand Lodge Mont-Tremblant
Little canvassing
At the Estérel Resort – clearly in the recovery phase – the message is the same.
“People get caught at the last minute, but we have a lot of requests, we get bombarded. We are not in canvassing mode. With the pandemic, our volume of events had fallen by much more than half, but in September, we will have returned to our normal business volumes”, summed up Marie-Claude Racine, director of communications and marketing, at the end of the August.
The establishment will be well placed to attract customers, since it took advantage of the pandemic to upgrade its 200 suites, a $7 million investment, in addition to having expanded its wine cellar and given a makeover to its conference rooms.
If the events organized during the summer were generally strategic meetings in groups of 10 or 20 people, the portrait should be different at the start of the school year. We should then see an influx of groups of 50 to 100 people.
PHOTO ROBERT SKINNER, THE PRESS
Marie-Claude Racine, Director of Communications and Marketing, Estérel Resort
This is because companies currently want to take advantage of the return of in-person events to create opportunities for their teams to get to know each other better, notes Marie-Claude Racine.
Companies want to create cohesion, forge links between their employees. So there are many, many requests for activities of team-building [consolidation d’équipe].
Marie-Claude Racine, Director of Communications and Marketing, Estérel Resort
At the Estérel Resort, the activities requested range from dinners to tastings or sommelier workshops in its wine cellar, to “escape” type games or dragon boating on the adjacent lake.
An advantaged region
The Laurentians region is also at an advantage when it comes to team building activities, believes Marie-Claude Racine.
“We’re very close to Montreal, but we have a big playground in nature,” she says.
And since the hotels are generally far from the major centers, the teams generally stay on site during their stay.
“In Montreal, employees would go for a walk in town, but here they stay together, they socialize, they bond. And that is important for businesses. »