By Emily Eades

The Orange County Convention Center (OCCC) announced the promotion of Eric Blanc, Sr., CMP to Deputy Director. In his new role, Blanc will oversee the OCCC’s Sales, Marketing, Event Management, and Exhibitor Services divisions.

Blanc became a part of the OCCC family in 2019 when he was hired as the Assistant Director of Sales. In February 2020, he was promoted to Senior Director of Sales.

Prior to joining the OCCC’s Sales Division, Blanc was the Director of Sales, Marketing and Convention Services for the Tampa Convention Center, where he spent 15 years of his career. Blanc’s background spans across various top organizations in the industry, including The Freeman Companies and GES Expositions, where he was a National Sales Manager for both companies.

“I am honored to take on the role of Deputy Director would be an understatement,” Blanc said. “I am eager to lead our team forward, maintaining a highly visible presence in the convention industry and within Orange County to secure continued convention group bookings well into the future.”

Blanc graduated from Florida State University with a Bachelor of Science degree in Business – Marketing and holds a certificate from the IAVM’s Venue Management School.

Emily Eades is Public Relations/Information Officer | Marketing & Communications for the Orange County Convention Center.

By Celebrity Access

Ticketmaster announced the launch of new technology that will provide event organizers with a new way to integrate collectible NFTs into the fan experience.

According to Ticketmaster, event organizers who sell tickets to live events through Ticketmaster will now have the ability to issue collectible NFTs before, during, and after live events.

The new system has already caught on and Ticketmaster reports ‘minting’ more than 5 million NFTs for event organizers on the Flow blockchain.

The NFTs can be shared online or activated to access loyalty rewards around an artist or event through digital keepsakes, including VIP engagement opportunities and more.

The technology is powered by the Flow Blockchain, which has been designed as a commercial product and has already delivered programs experiences like NFL ALL DAY, NBA Top Shot and UFC Strike.

As well, the Flow Blockchain consumes less energy than traditional blockchain technology and according to independent auditor Deloitte, NFTs minted through Flow consume less power than a post on a social media site.

Ticketmaster is no stranger to the Flow technology and has already used the platform to distribute more than 70,000 one-of-one virtual commemorative ticket NFTs at Super Bowl LVI with each attendee’s unique seat location on the NFT itself. For the 2022 season, the NFL will offer Flow-minted NFTs to every attendee at more than 100 games, including at least 3 home games for each team.

“Event organizers who choose to offer fans an NFT with their ticket have a real opportunity to make this new technology relevant and relatable at scale,” said Brendan Lynch, Ticketmaster EVP of Enterprise & Revenue. “This is why we are partnering with Flow, because their blockchain is custom-built for fan engagement and frictionless consumer experiences.”

“Our partnership with Ticketmaster will enable millions of live event fans to immortalize, share and enhance their IRL experiences through digital collectibles,” added Mickey Maher, SVP Partnerships of Dapper Labs. “Ticketmaster has quickly become a leader in this space, so we’re excited to support their work in empowering event organizers to deliver even greater value to fans through the benefits of blockchain.”

By R.V. Baugus

The Events Industry Council (EIC), the global voice of the business events industry, has announced the recipients of its annual Global Awards, which celebrate and honor exemplary achievements and focus on leadership at all levels and areas of focus within the global business events industry.

Among this year’s EIC Hall of Leaders inductees is Bob McClintock, Executive Vice President Convention Centers for ASM Global. McClintock joins 143 previous recipients, each of whom has had a significant legacy impact on the
global business events sector. The recipients will be honored on October 10 at the Global Awards Celebration at ARIA Resort & Casino, Las Vegas.

“I confess this is a bit surreal – when one looks at the list of previous honorees it is impossible not to be humbled to be on the same list as a Tom Mobley, Frank Poe, John Christison, Peggy Daidakis and Cliff Wallace, McClintock said in sharing the names of some of the industry’s biggest difference-makers. “And these are just some of the names from our world! It is not false modesty to quote Big Bird – ‘one of these things is not like the others!'”

McClintock was nominated by IAVM Director of Education Greg Wolfe, who received the good news from EIC Chief Executive Officer Amy Calvert that McClintock indeed was worthy of the honor.

“It brings me great joy to announce that Mr. Bob McClintock, Executive Vice President, ASM Global was selected to be inducted into EIC’s Hall of Leaders,” Calvert said. “The Events Industry Council is thrilled to present Mr. McClintock with this special honor – a true testament to his lifetime achievements and the meaningful work endeavored to support and to lift up this industry and its workforce. Mr. McClintock will be rightly placed among a distinctive group of individuals distinguished by leadership, legacy impact, innovation, perseverance, and vision.”

McClintock has more than three decades in the public assembly venue world, starting in 1990 through 2011 as Senior Vice President with SMG. He has been in his current position since October 2019.

“I have reflected on this over the past few days and have realized the incredibly good fortune I have had to be surrounded by some of the most talented, dedicated, and hard-working people I could have ever imagined,” McClintock said. “I made a conscious decision over my career to stay with SMG (now ASM Global) because I know that they made me better at my job – and allowed me to enjoy every minute. Whether it was mentors like Matt Brown and Thom Connors, peers like John Adams and David Causton, or my partner in crime for over 20 years, Gregg Caren, I was blessed to be able to learn, be motivated, and challenged by them every day.

“But most important has been those who are the actual engine that powers our industry. Maz, Rickey, Bumpsie, etc. (that is a Philly thing) are the ones we lean on day in and day out. I was reminded this week how much the pandemic hit them the hardest and how many of them haven’t come back. I think that this is the mission that we all have to embrace now – to rebuild our industry stronger and more resilient so that we can again offer the careers that those men and women can rely on.”

Registration for the awards October 10 is now open.

From all of your friends at IAVM and in the industry, congratulations on a well-deserved honor!

By R.V. Baugus

Mark Herrera, IAVM’s Director of Safety and Security, has trained more than 400 venues and organizations in various facets including Situational Awareness (Mitigating Risk Through Guest Services), De-Escalation Training for Frontline Teams, Active Threat/Active Shooter Preparedness, and Best Practices for Building Your Security Culture.

These groups are the beneficiary of training from one of the best anywhere on the topics above. If your venue is not one of those groups, what are you waiting for? A disaster of epic safety and security proportions? The last thing any venue wants is to be unprepared for any eventuality that could happen. By having Mark Herrera come to your venue and train your staff, you are given the vital tools necessary if and when bad actors (and for you performing arts folks we don’t mean bad actors performing on your stage) seek to disrupt, destroy, and even kill.

“The International Association of Venue Managers has provided over 418 Live Security Training to all venue types and other facilities to develop a security-focused culture, empowering employees to feel confident in carrying out their day-to-day responsibility with a safety and security mindset,” Herrera said. “The goal of the live training is to inoculate front-line teams and leadership to the challenges plaguing our industry today and to better equip teams on forecasting critical incidents with mitigation efforts to better prepare, plan, respond, and recover.”

Kerry Painter, CVE, CMP, CEM, Director/General Manager of the Raleigh Convention and Performing Arts Complex at City of Raleigh Municipal Government as well as IAVM 1st Vice Chair, recently welcomed Herrera to her venue for full-scale training and was complimentary of the value she and her team received.

“As we continue to welcome crowds back into our public spaces, it’s more important than ever to stay up-to-date with training that will help ensure the safety and security of our guests, performers, and staff,” Painter said. “We were honored to host this internationally recognized training which brought together those in charge of services, spaces, and activities both public and private. Whether a church service, a community gathering, or a large sporting event, we all have one thing in common: the desire for all of our guests to go home safe and happy.

“Not only is this security training vitally important for our traditional industry venues, but I am also honored to be able to share with other local venues and community partners such as colleges, churches, museums, and hotels who might not be able to afford this elite-level training otherwise. “

Herrera’s schedule also took him recently to Houston to train the Building Owners and Managers Association to another training program that resonated with the audience.

“Houston Building Owners and Managers Association hosted Mark Herrera as the guest speaker at our August Luncheon,” said Bradley Elliott, MBA, CAE, CEO of Houston BOMA (Building Owners and Managers Association). “Mark taught our members how to assess safety threats in building infrastructure, guest behavior, and large-scale events. The techniques he shared for utilizing guest services to enhance security and mitigate risk are particularly helpful, as our industry continues to increase its focus on hospitality. Property managers and building staff walked away from the luncheon feeling empowered and confident in their ability to provide safety and security for their tenants and properties.”

In addition to being recognized as one of the 25 most influential leaders in the meetings and event industry, Herrera also represents the Department of Homeland Security Office of Infrastructure Protection as the current Chair for the Public Assembly Facility Sub-Sector Council. He is a seasoned law enforcement officer and trainer with 20 years of experience in different roles including patrol officer, detective for the Gang and Narcotics Unit, Entry Team
Leader, and Tactical Seargent for a special operations unit known as S.W.A.T.

“From the moment Mr. Herrera took the stage he immediately engaged the audience with his presence and humor,” said Eric Neill, Director of Theatre Operations for the Boch Center for the Performing Arts in Boston and President & CEO of Guardian Security & Protection. “Mark is clearly not just on stage reading from a PowerPoint program. He draws from his experience of when he was in law enforcement and brings his knowledge of lessons learned from prior incidents in our event space and passes that information on in an engrossing way.”

Neill adds that Herrera’s involvement with the Department of Homeland Security resonated when Herrera trained before a Boston audience that was a community-wide crowd.

“His involvement with the DHS gives him real time knowledge of current threats and other important information which he disseminates to his up to 25 groups he chairs in IAVM and in his training programs,” Neill said. “His passion to make those in the audience better prepared is extremely evident from beginning to end.

“The situational awareness part of the training focuses from all aspects of outside the venue to the inside. He included the external threats that can sometimes be overlooked such as traffic patterns, parking garages, and other local structures that could pose an opportunity for a bad actor to cause harm to your patrons and stressing the importance of getting your patrons off the sidewalk and into the building. As protectors of our buildings, we often can focus on just outside our front doors to inside and not going a little bit further out to see the concentric circle of protection to potentially see a threat. Again, a great reason to invite the community so we have one big circle to help each other out with.”

For Herrera, the training comes as a labor of love and covers a number of safety and security elements.

“IAVM’s Live Training has been deemed as the preeminent source of community-wide security training in the areas of Building Elite Guest Service and Security Cultures through a team engagement tool developed to foster leadership buy-in and identify training & technology gaps,” Herrera said. “Training also includes Active Threat/Shooter Preparedness, Risk Mitigation Through Guest Service Interjection, Behavioral Indication Training, and De-escalation Strategies & Techniques. Training has been heavily supported by the entire event industry inclusive of our Federal partners with the Department of Homeland Security.”

To visit with Herrera about coming to your venue to provide live training, contact him at mark.herrera@iavm.org to get on his busy training schedule.

By Mariela McIlwraith, CMP, CMM, MBA

In 2017, business events supported 26 million jobs, reached 1.5 billion people, and contributed $1.5 trillion USD of GDP. Share your event info to help the Industry Events Council measure our direct, indirect and catalytic impacts. 1 CE available for CMP certification/recertification #eventprofs

So that we can track completion rates, we have created a personalized survey link for your organization and would encourage you to share this link in your communications:

To take the survey, click here.

Mariela McIlwraith, CMP Fellow, CMM, MBA, is Chief Sustainability Officer for EIC Centre for Sustainability and Social Impact.