It’s official. Las Vegas will host its first large scale convention and tradeshow in more than a year when World of Concrete takes over the newly expanded Las Vegas Convention Center June 8-10.
The Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority and Informa Markets announced the construction show’s dates Wednesday, along with the dates for 10 other trade shows the company plans to produce at the convention center between June and November.
Informa Markets is Las Vegas’ largest trade show organizer.
The announcement was hailed as a positive benchmark in Las Vegas’s recovery from the year-long COVID-19 pandemic, which decimated Southern Nevada gaming, tourism, and convention industries.
World of Concrete will be the first conference to utilize the convention center’s $989 million West Hall, a 1.4 million-square-foot expansion that was completed in January. The trade show will also use the convention center’s North Hall and outdoor space for construction displays.
World of Concrete attendees will also be the first group to utilize the Convention Center Loop, an underground tunnel system that will transport delegates throughout the entire campus in Tesla vehicles, free of charge.
It’s unclear how many attendees will attend the show, which drew more than 50,000 to its event in January 2019.
Nevada Gov. Steve Sisolak recently increased the capacity limits for large gatherings to 50%. The new directive requires meetings, trade shows, and entertainment venues to certify through the state’s Department of Business and Industry that they will follow the state’s health and safety requirements and protocols and adhere to the prevention principle, including social distancing and use of face coverings.
“We are deeply appreciative to Governor Sisolak, the State of Nevada’s Department of Business and Industry, Clark County and the Southern Nevada Health District for their leadership, oversight and hard work needed to allow conventions such as World of Concrete to safely reconvene,” LVCVA CEO Steve Hill said in a statement.
Informa Markets said in a statement it had a third-party company survey past attendees about returning to the World of Concrete show in June. Some 80% of the respondents said they were likely to attend in June and 97% viewed the decision as favorable to the industry.
Sisolak, in a statement, said Las Vegas has been “cautious, but very focused on reopening Las Vegas in the safest way possible. Las Vegas has been the top convention and meetings destination for many years. We pride ourselves on providing the best facilities, the best service, and now, the safest.”
COVID-19 sent the Las Vegas gaming and tourism market to record-settling lows in 2020. The year included a 78-day shut down of all gaming activities. Casino revenues fell to their lowest levels since 1996 and visitation was its lowest figure in more than 30 years.
Convention and meeting attendance was also annihilated by the pandemic, with the number of delegates collapsing to a little more than 1.7 million, a decline of 74% from the more than 6.6 million meeting attendees in 2019.
Over the last nine months of 2020, Las Vegas recorded zero in the number of convention delegates.
Large scale conferences, trade shows, and corporate meetings are a key market for the Strip’s midweek occupancy rates, which fell to 37% in 2020.
Howard Stutz is the executive editor of CDC Gaming. He can be reached at hstutz@cdcgaming.com. Follow @howardstutz on Twitter.
