A student group from Trinity International School of Tourism Management, whose members are majoring in Convention, Event and Exhibition Management, presented a project for the establishment of a Convention & Visitor Bureau (Hersonissos CVB - HCVB) for the Municipality of Hersonissos, in the presence of the Mayor of Hersonissos, Mr. Spiros Danellis, the Municipal Council and Mr. Nikos Skoulas, Former Minister of Tourism and President of Trinity. The presentation was made at the Municipality Hall of Hersonissos.

In this project, students: assessed the role and importance that CVBs play for a conference destination; suggested a HCVB membership drawn from local tourism professionals; indicated the means for the funding of the HCVB; outlined the services that would be offered; identified potential means for its promotion at a national and international level and proposed logos and slogans for the HCVB.

Through this project, Trinity students articulated the need for the establishment of the HCVB, which would be a non-profit entity aimed at attracting conventions, events and visitors, which, in turn, would increase overnight stays at the destination and result in the enhancement and the development of the economy of the local community. Local businesses that are directly or indirectly related to the tourism industry, such as conference centers, hotels with conference facilities, congress organizers, travel agencies, restaurants, tour guides, interpreters, etc., would be given the opportunity to become members of the HCVB.

In addition, students stressed that, according to international practice, the cooperation and synergy between the private and the public sectors constitutes a sine-qua-non condition for a CVB’s successful operation and effectiveness. Such a venture cannot be accomplished without the support of local government bodies, such as the Municipality of Hersonissos, the Prefecture of Heraklion, the Tourism Directorate of the Island of Crete and other public stakeholders.

The project was highly praised by the entire Municipal Council. The Mayor, Mr. Spiros Danellis, has expressed his satisfaction with this project, stating that, ‘‘This remarkable presentation constitutes the first step to a close cooperation with TRINITY. We believe that the traditional model of tourism development which is based on mass tourism and has been applied to Hersonissos as well, reached its limits a long time ago, making us turn towards the development of thematic forms of tourism, while pursuing quality. Conference tourism in particular, is a form of thematic tourism which is of great interest to us, since it is associated with quality tourism as well as with sustainable tourism development that is essential to our destination. Besides, Hersonissos is endowed with the best conference infrastructure. We consider this imminent cooperation for the optimization of the students’ project to be exceptionally advantageous for the local society’’.

The students involved in this project were: Jordan Amon and Janine Keith (Canada), Elena Corlateanu (Moldavia), Elena Gheorghita and Georgiana Grama (Romania), Katelyn Ward (USA),  Madgalina Yarichkova (Bulgaria), Anna Christodoulou, Serafim Karouzakis, Dimitra Koulia, Niki Pirovolaki,  Kalliopi Tambakaki, and Nikos Vlassiadis (Greece). The project was supervised by Mrs. Filio Lazana, faculty member of  Trinity.