The Determinants of Convention Site Selection: An Experimental Analysis

This paper examines the determinants of convention site selection with experimental data. The meetings and conventions industry is becoming more competitive and gaining importance in a national economy. However, there are only a few studies available on this issue. Moreover, analytical tools used are limited to statistical variance analysis or simple linear regressions and they lacked theoretical backgrounds. This paper tries to fill this gap and examines the determinants of site selection and their relative importance in Korean meetings and conventions industry. We employ the random utility theory to investigate individual choice decisions and estimate the mixed logit model for the choices with different selection attributes. After careful examination of previous literature, fifteen candidate factors are finally chosen and the logit and the mixed logit models are estimated. Both methods show that meeting facilities, exhibition, access to site, reputation, local support and shopping are the most important factors.