SMG Awarded Contract To Manage
Hampton Roads Convention Center

January 6, 2006

The City of Hampton today announced a three-and-a-half-year agreement with SMG to manage the city's Hampton Roads Convention Center.

Headquartered in Philadelphia, SMG provides facility services to over 180 venues, including 57 convention centers, in 41 states, Puerto Rico, Canada and Europe. SMG controls over 1.4 million entertainment seats worldwide and manages more than 10 million feet of exhibition space.

The 344,000-square-foot convention center, which officially opened on April 28, 2005, is one of the premier new facilities on the Atlantic Coast. Designed by HOK Architects, it features 35 meeting spaces, a 28,000-square-foot grand ballroom with seating for up to 2,000 and a 108,000-square-foot exhibit hall.

The Hampton Roads Convention Center is supported by over 2,500 hotel rooms in close proximity, including the new John Q. Hammons-owned Embassy Suites hotel which is connected to the center.

Under the contract, SMG will be responsible for management services, groundskeeping, custodial and maintenance services, security, booking, local sales and marketing, event services, ticketing-related services, and a variety of administrative functions. For these services, SMG will receive $125,000 annually for its management contract, with operating expenses continuing to come from the convention center budget, as they have been since the center opening.

All existing booking and food-and-beverage policies will remain in place.

Hampton City Manager Jesse Wallace said, "The City welcomes SMG as contracted private management for the Hampton Roads Convention Center. SMG was selected by the City after a competitive process involving some of the best public facility management companies available. We look forward to working with SMG to assist the City in successfully accomplishing the goals and objectives we have set for the convention center."

Since its opening, the convention center has generated interest from meeting planners regionally and nationally, resulting in room sales and convention bookings exceeding projections.

The Hampton Convention & Visitor Bureau will continue to focus its marketing and sales efforts on bringing meetings and conventions to Hampton, with the purpose of creating economic spill-over for Hampton hotels, shops, restaurants and attractions. Convention business has been booked at the center through 2011, bringing an anticipated $63.8 million in economic impact to the region's economy. The national market presence of SMG will also increase Hampton's national profile in regard to attracting consumer shows.

The Hampton Convention & Visitor Bureau will continue to market and sell the center, and handle city-wide and long-term bookings (18 months and out) as it has since the project's inception in 2002. SMG will handle the majority of short-term bookings, 18 months and in. Embassy Suites will continue to book 6 months and in, for events on the second floor of the Convention Center, and will manage all catering.

"We are very excited to begin our relationship with the city of Hampton," said SMG President Wes Westley. "The Hampton Roads Convention Center is a beautiful facility and we are confident of its success in the years to come."

Partially bordered by the Hampton Roads harbor and Chesapeake Bay, Hampton is located in the center of the Hampton Roads metropolitan. It is the site of America's first continuous English-speaking settlement and is home to such visitor attractions as the Virginia Air & Space Center and Riverside IMAX^® Theater, the Cousteau Society, Hampton History Museum, harbor tours and cruises, Hampton University Museum, Fort Monroe, award-winning Hampton Coliseum, and The American Theatre, among others. Hampton was twice-named an All-America City, the nation's oldest and most prestigious civic recognition award.