Thessaloniki Significantly Rises as a Business Destination

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Thessaloniki, northern Greece registered a significant rise as a business event destination, moving up 65 places, from the 163rd position to the 98th, according to the latest figures released by the International Congress and Convention Association (ICCA). The city hosted 26 conferences in 2016, instead of 16 in 2015, with a total of 6,109 participants the Thessaloniki Convention Bureau also announced.

Thessaloniki rose to the 53rd position among other European conference destinations, from the 93rd position in 2015. According to ICCA, Paris ranked first with 196 meetings in 2016; Vienna was second and Barcelona remained third. Berlin dropped from the first to the fourth place, while London remained fifth. Newcomers in the top 10 compared to last year are Amsterdam, Madrid, and Seoul.

Source: ICCA

Greece placed 25th in country rankings

Thessaloniki’s performance contributed to the overall position of the country in ICCA’s rankings. Greece is placed in the 25th position globally and on the 15th among other European countries, as it hosted 168 conferences in 2016. U.S.A. is number one with 934 meetings, Germany is second, while the United Kingdom remains third.

As one of the very few reports which compares destinations’ meetings-related performance on a global scale, the annual ICCA rankings are one of the most eagerly anticipated industry publications. ICCA captured 12,212 rotating international association meetings taking place in 2016, which is an all-time record for ICCA’s annual snapshot of immediate past year’s meetings data.