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Millennium & Copthorne comes to Sheffield
 The 158-bedroom Copthorne Hotel Sheffield is due to open its doors in November this year. The hotel, situated next to Sheffield United Football Club, enhances Copthorne’s existing UK portfolio of 14 properties, and adds to the group’s success of having hotels at well-known football grounds. The hotel will offer on-site parking, restaurant, lounge bar and bistro, plus a 65 station gym and conference and banqueting rooms. Guests will also be able to enjoy the convenience of in-room high speed internet access – ideal for the business traveller – and interactive TV and entertainment systems. Link: www.millenniumhotels.co.uk/copthornesheffield
MIA appoints new council members
 The Meetings Industry Association (MIA) Council chairman Nick Milne has appointed five new co-opted council members – all of whom have been seconded – to boost the team and move the association forward. Ed Bolling, functions and meetings manager at Chartered Accountants’ Hall in London, is taking on new member development, and Julie Zacaroli, general manager for conferences and events at the University of Birmingham, will be responsible for events planning.
The other new members are David Vaughton, conferencing divisional director at Woodland Grange Training and Conference Centre in Leamington Spa, and Gary Payne, director of One Great George Street in London, who will be joining the Standards and Principles Committee. Mike Glaire, managing director of Edinburgh Training Centre, will be responsible for membership development in Scotland.
The new members of council have joined at a very exciting time for the MIA, as its AIM scheme has recently been endorsed by VisitBritain and is the only UK standard for the meetings industry. VisitBritain is encouraging all meetings venues in England to become accredited under the AIM scheme when it becomes available to non-MIA members in January 2009. Link: www.mia-uk.org
NHS Alliance at BIC
 After a busy month of conferences and exhibitions that has already seen the GP’s Forum at the Bournemouth International Centre (BIC), the NHS Alliance is back in Bournemouth this week for its annual conference. About 700 delegates are expected to flock to the BIC for the two-day conference. The event is expected to bring £400,000 to the local economy through business tourism expenditure.
The NHS Alliance is the only organisation which brings together primary care trusts with practices, clinicians with managers and board members, and NHS Primary Care with its patients. It is completely independent of the Government, though it works with all bodies associated with the NHS. Pat Goodall from the NHS Alliance said: ‘It’s great to be back in Bournemouth at the BIC. The BIC is a prestigious custom-built conference centre, in an ideal location that is easily accessible, and is surrounded by excellent accommodation and restaurants.’ Link: www.bic.co.uk
Bristol welcomes Tourism Management Conference
 Last week the Tourism Management Institute took its annual convention to Bristol. The conference, entitled ‘Destination Management, Cutting Edge Skills for Changing Markets’, attracted destination managers and tourism marketing professionals from all over the UK, and focused firmly upon developing the skills travel destinations require to successfully serve the changing marketplace.
Designed to meet the specific needs of tourism professionals, the event combined a variety of practical sessions and expert advice with leading keynote plenaries and lively debates, including a special fringe event sponsored by the South West Regional Development Agency which discussed the benefits to the tourism economy of the 2012 Olympics. A programme of study tours also featured in the programme. Link: www.visitbristol.co.uk
New courses for Go Ape
 The award-winning Go Ape High Wire Forest Adventure is set to open more courses in March 2009: the first ever course in Wales at Margam Country Park, another at Rivington, near Bolton in Lancashire, and one at Wyre Forest near Kidderminster, Worcestershire. Based on a similar design to the 17 courses already established, the new Go Ape courses will offer people of all ages the opportunity to live life more adventurously.
Go Ape courses are available for corporate and business hire, and provide a brilliant environment in which to carry out team-building and motivational activities among the treetops, where an assortment of obstacles and Tarzan swings lead to an exhilarating experience high above the forest floor. This unique outdoor activity provides approximately three hours of adrenalin-fuelled fun and adventure for everyone from families to corporate guests. Link: www.goape.co.uk
Fit for purpose!
 Could Woodland Grange's director of conferencing David Vaughton be the fittest venue boss in the business? During the first weekend of October he completed the Great North Run – the world's biggest ever event of its type – with more than 50,000 fellow masochists. Months of carefully planned training enabled David, 45, to complete the 13.1 mile course in two hours and two minutes – coming in officially 14,454th place out of 52,000. In doing so, he raised funds for Save the Children, thanks in part to many supporters from the conference sector.
It'd be nice to report that he has made a quick recovery, but he reckoned that for the next few days his body was in shut-down mode, with flu, insomnia and even blood poisoning taking their toll. In case you're wondering about the fitness bit – none of it stopped him being back in the office! Link: www.wgrange.com
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