The Scottish Exhibition + Conference Centre (SECC) has become a partner of the Professional Convention Management Association (PCMA) in a bid to further engage with the meetings and conference industry in the US and Canada.

Building close industry relationships across the Atlantic has been part of the venue’s strategy in attracting US meeting planners to Scotland for a number of years, with this latest move allowing the SECC access to over 6,000 senior professionals.

PCMA officially recognised the partnership during its annual Education Conference held in Montreal earlier this month, where the SECC attracted attention to the venue and to Glasgow as a business tourism destination.

SECC Director of Sales, Ben Goedegebuure, comments; “Overseas markets have always been a key target for us and partnering a renowned organisation like PCMA will help access key buyers in the US and Canada.

“Scotland has strong ties with both countries when it comes to ancestral and leisure tourism and we hope to build on these and attract more business visitors to the country in general and the city of Glasgow in particular.

“Together with the PCMA team we are working on a number of joint marketing initiatives over the coming months and can’t wait to work more closely with our colleagues across the Atlantic.”

Deborah Sexton, president and CEO of the Professional Convention Management Association (PCMA) said; “PCMA is happy to have officially formalised its relationship with SECC.  SECC has been extremely supportive of the development of PCMA global education initiatives.

“This partnership with SECC is sure to help with PCMA’s continued global reach and we’re delighted to be working with them in a more structured and collaborative way.  We feel this relationship will benefit PCMA members and our industry and we look forward to even more opportunities moving forward.”

Founded in 1957 PCMA represents meeting management executives from a variety of sectors and currently has over 6,100 members in 36 countries.