The Refinishing Touch participates in Intercontinental Hotels Group Leadership Conference

Here at The Refinishing Touch we’ve had a busy tradeshow season that gave us the opportunity to meet peers, prospects and customers across the USA.  It’s been great, as it meant we got to engage in some very important discussions about the future of our industry at a range of conference, seminars and exhibitions.

So in this spirit of contributing and engaging, last week we attended the Intercontinental Hotels Group Americas Investors & Leadership Conference in Las Vegas, and once again we were wowed by the overall scene and learning experience.

A warming welcoming party to kick-off the networking and a surprise performance by Natasha Bedingfield was the opener for a very worthwhile and business-focused event.  After all, there’s a great deal for us to discuss and resolve.  While many of our own conversations were about the financial, environmental and landfill prevention that are the cornerstones of refinishing, refurbishment and armoire conversions, we found that much like many of this season’s events, decision makers were concerned again and again with two key issues: how to keep costs low while being able to keep their property up-to-date for visitors.

The fact that the hospitality industry is still under pressure is no surprise: even Jim Abrahamson, the president of IHG America, made sure to keep expectations in line by stating in his keynote that the industry hasn’t recovered completely yet, despite positive numbers at IHG’s seven hotels chains – particularly over 130 million stays across 650,000 rooms in over 100 countries. IHG made sure the conference was not just presentations about numbers, but instructional as well. With workshops taking place throughout an entire day, attendees had plenty of opportunity to learn and network with others. And as t

his was the Americas event, it was great to see all elements of the North and South America attend and contribute, including Mexico and Canada.

With the wonderful amount of networking and learning opportunities presented to us at the IHG conference, and all the other shows we’ve attended, we’re gracious for the great opportunity to learn and connect with some our trusted clients.