About 200 people, most of them working in the hospitality industry, attended and got a tour of the new spaces by Young.
As the biggest and most recent attraction, the $786 million Convention Center expansion debuted March 4, and more than doubled the size of the sellable space in the existing center. The expansion, Ferguson has said, is intended to vault the city into the major leagues of convention towns by attracting the biggest groups here.
"I'm not a believer in 'build it and they will come,' " said Ferguson, who took over as president and CEO of the Convention and Visitors Bureau on New Year's Day. "I'm a believer in 'build it and give them a reason to come.' "
Ferguson made the statement in response to the question of what he considered the most important development in the city in the last 20 years: the opening of the original Convention Center in 1993, and the recent $786 million expansion of the building that debuted March 4.
At least five major conventions, with 800 or more attendees, have used the jumbo Convention Center already. Among them was the American Occupational Therapy Association, which was in town earlier this month.
The first groups housed in the expansion were the National Association of Student Personnel Administrators, with 4,500 attendees who registered 8,920 hotel room nights from March 12 to 16, and the Association of Peri-Operative Registered Nurses, which attracted 10,000 attendees who had a $27.8 million economic impact, from March 20 to 24.
To help house the conventioneers, the city added two new hotels - the Palomar and Le Méridien - to boost the city's room total to about 15,000, and to give Center City 44 hotels to market.
Contact staff writer Suzette Parmley at 215-854-2594 or sparmley@phillynews.com.
