The general manager of Anvil Centre is pleased as punch with the status of conferences at the local facility.
The City of New Westminster opened the $44-million conference and community facility at 777 Columbia St. in September 2014. Along with providing a theatre, city museum, Canadian Lacrosse Hall of Fame and arts spaces, the facility also provides space for conferences.
“I am so happy with our bookings. We are just inundated with calls. It’s been great,” said Vali Marling, the centre’s general manager. “We are much busier than we had anticipated, which is wonderful.”
Marling attributes the centre’s success to a number of things, including its central location in Metro Vancouver, proximity to SkyTrain and buses and onsite parking.
“It’s an absolutely stunning building. It’s beautiful so clients want to come to a beautiful building, particularly if they are doing some type of reception with their business partners or clients,” she added. “We also have a really experienced staff here, so they bring a lot of experience from many different event venues. A lot of the event clients follow people from facility to facility. It’s combined to work very, very well.”
Anvil Centre has been a hot topic at city council during the 2015 budget deliberations, with councillors asking questions about the facility’s revenues, expenses and business plan.
Marling is in the midst of compiling information for a report for council and senior staff.
“Our mandate is to fill the building, ensure that we are not costing money,” she said, “but the bigger mandate is to generate economic impact on the community through hotel room nights, restaurants, shopping, everything down to purchasing gas.”
Anvil Centre seeks clients that will not only use the conference space in Anvil Centre, but other locations in the building, such as the theatre.
While Anvil Centre often looks quiet to passersby, Marling said gatherings are often taking place that may not be visible to those outside the facility.
“It could be the fact the clients are in the ballroom. For a conference, the intent is that people will arrive, they will go into the ballroom and the walls are closed. They stay there because it’s a training session, it’s an AGM. Conferences are not events where people are getting up and moving around and going out into the foyers. It depends on the type of event as well.
Along with large and small conferences, Anvil Centre is also set to host some weddings this year.
“We did a wedding on New Year’s Eve and we have several weddings booked for this year,” Marling said. “We have some that are reception only, some where the service is on site and then they have their reception here.
Anvil Centre is a member or the Vancouver chapter of the International Special Events Society, which is holding an event at the facility on March 25.
“We are able to present the space, to frankly show off the building,” Marling said of the gathering for event planners. “It’s perfect. It’s a very targeted market for us. These are the people that organize the events, they are the ones that look for locations. This provides us with an opportunity to show off the space, to show off our catering, do tours in the building and let people know about the community as well.”
