Durham Convention Center Is Honored With ConventionSouth’s Annual Readers’ Choice Award

Doing a good job can be a reward in of itself, but being recognized is nice too! The Durham Convention Center has just received a 2014 Readers’ Choice Award from ConventionSouth Magazine.

Since the award's creation in 2001, this is the first time that Durham Convention Center has received the award. The Center will be featured as an award recipient in the December 2014 Awards Issue of ConventionSouth magazine.

The Durham Convention Center is among 175 convention and visitor bureaus, meeting facilities and hotels located across the South to receive this year’s Readers’ Choice Award. Throughout the year, meeting professionals nominated the meeting sites they believe provide exemplary service for group events. The nominated sites are then compiled onto an online ballot where meeting professionals and fans are asked to vote for the best of the best. More than 4,800 voters participated this year in the selection process - the highest vote count ever recorded. A complete list of award winners can be found online.

To hold a meeting or convention a the Durham Convention Center, learn more about what it can offer your meeting or group. Talk with professional sales staff at the Durham Convention & Visitors Bureau to discuss your needs.

Durham Convention Center Recognized as One of 101 Largest Expo Halls in the South

Durham, NC continues to be part of positive conversations about growth, prosperity, and development. This time, the editors of ConventionSouth magazine, a national multimedia resource for planning events that are held within the South, have the Durham Convention Center on their list of the “101 Largest Expo Halls in the South.”

Durham Convention & Visitors Bureau President and CEO Shelly Green remarked, "I can't recall when we made such a list in the past...primarily, because the Durham Convention Center (DCC) was marketed under the name of a hotel, essentially as their ball room. Hotel ball rooms, no matter how great they are, are not thought of in the same vein as standalone convention and meeting facilities by planners.  The City and County made a wise decision to separate the management, and therefore the marketing of this facility, as its own entity."

Green makes reference to the 2008 decision to have the Durham Convention Center be managed by a firm differently than the hotel. Global Spectrum manages more than 100 facilities like the DCC worldwide. "Bringing in a company like Global Spectrum to manage the Convention Center and investing in significant renovations were great moves by City and County Government," said Green who sees the facility and Durham's stake as a competitor on the meetings market rising significantly as additional hotel rooms come on line in 2014 and 2015.

"At more than 40,000 square feet and recently renovated, the Durham Convention Center receives high marks from planners and customers for its level of service," said Green. But facility size is just part of the equation. "We have one full service hotel in Downtown Durham, and that alone cannot provide the number of hotel rooms needed to sustain a facility of this size as a meeting venue.  Durham needs 1,200 rooms to serve the Convention Center and Downtown businesses, and to be competitive with peer cities," she added.

“Meeting Planners and event organizers who plan large conventions, trade shows and exhibitions, rallies, and congregations will find that the facilities that made ConventionSouth’s 2014 list of the ‘101 Largest Expo Halls in the South’ have some of the largest gathering spaces in the U.S. and certainly the South,” said ConventionSouth Editor Marlane Bundock. The September issue of magazine will share this list with meeting planners from across the country who book meeting sites in the South. 

Hosting an event in Durham is convenient, affordable and rewarding to attendees whether at the Durham Convention Center or a dozen other full service hotels and conference centers.  Within an hour's flight or day's drive of more than half the nation's population, Durham is perfectly situated for conventions of up to 1,000 attendees. Learn more online.

Urban Ministries of Durham’s 7th Annual Empty Bowls Fundraiser Takes Place March 7th

A full belly is something many who read this take for granted - if they even think about it at all.  For many, though, the sensation is at best a recent memory.  Durham's Urban Ministries works to fix that problem and others, and raises money and awareness each year with the Empty Bowls event which is an approachable way for people to be part of the solution, and for local restaurants to have a chance to compete and show off a bit.  That's a double bonus for attendees given the quality of Durham's chefs.

The annual battle for the “Best Soup in Durham” will take place Thursday, March 7th from 5:30 to 8:30 pm at the Durham Convention Center (301 West Morgan Street).  Urban Ministries of Durham (UMD) will hold its seventh annual Empty Bowls event presented by Olive & Olive, P.A. to raise much-needed funds to help UMD serve over 200,000 meals a year to those in need.

Attendees get to sample soups prepared by more than a dozen local restaurants and can vote for their favorite.  The light dinner of soup is a reminder that many people in Durham do not have enough to eat.  Local artists and artisans have donated their talents to create over 800 hand-crafted bowls for attendees to pick and take home.  There is also a panel of celebrity judges who vote and the evening will be serenaded by Moment’s Notice/St. Ambrose Jazz Mass Quartet.

More than 900 tickets were sold last year raising over $30,000 to benefit the people served by Urban Ministries of Durham’s Community Café.

There are three types of tickets to the event this year. The Hot Ticket includes soup and a bowl for $50.  It’s a hot ticket because you can have first choice of the bowls from 5:30 pm until 6:00 pm. There will only be 200 of these tickets available. The Regular Ticket includes soup and bowl for $35.  Bowls can be picked after 6:00 pm. Then there is the  Soup Only Ticket for $15.00
Children six and under can attend for free, and tickets can be bought online at online.

This year's roster of competing restaurants, and the soups they will be making, certainly makes it easy to justify the purchase price of a ticket.  They are:

• 604 at West Village: Tomato Polenta
• Bleu Olive Mediterranean Bistro: Chicken Avgolemono
• Bull City Burger and Brewery: Vegetarian White Chipotle Chili
• Durham Convention Center: Roasted Butternut Bisque with Pear and Sage
• The Mad Hatter’s Café and Bake Shop: Lime Chick and Roasted Corn
• Mediterranean Deli: Lentil Soup
• Papa Mojo’s Roadhouse: Catfish Stew
• Piedmont:  Cream of Kale Soup with Sourdough Croutons
• Pizzeria Toro: Lettuce Soup with Brown Butter Croutons and Clabber
• Saladelia Café:  Vegan Black Bean Chili
• Six Plates Wine Bar: Sweet Potato Bisque
• The Pit: Brunswick Stew
• Thrills From the Grill: Collard Green Soup
• Toast Paninoteca: Spicy Chickpea Puree with Lemony Swiss Chard
• Urban Ministries of Durham Community Café:  French Onion Soup
• Watts Grocery: White Bean and Pancetta

The soups will be judged by a panel of some of Durham's culinary luminaries, and other prominent members of the community, and attendees can vote, too.  At the end, both a fan favorite and a judge's favorite will be named.  The judges are: 

• Jay O'Berski:  Artistic director of The Little Green Pig Theatrical Concern and teaches acting at Duke.
• Sean Lilly Wilson:  Founder and Chief Executive Optimist of Fullsteam Brewery
• Tisha Powell:  Co-anchor for WTVD ABC11 Eyewitness News
• Mike Woodard:  State Senator
• Johanna Kramer:  Food blogger for johannakramer.com

Learn more about all of the great food events happening here all the time on the Durham Event Calendar, and more about dining in Durham online.

Durham, Where Great Developments Happen

More than a dozen facilities, restaurants and exhibits are slated to open in Durham before the year's end. This makes for an exciting follow up to a year that saw Durham grow by two breweries, two music venues, a multitude of restaurants, and improvements to the transportation sector including the addition of the Bull City Connector and the renovation of RDU’s Terminal 2.

2011 Visitor Related Projects

Durham Convention Center - The 44,000-square-foot facility is currently undergoing $6.1 in major renovations to offer planners and attendees with a state-of-the-art center beginning in Fall, 2011.

Carolina Theatre- $1.8 million renovations to the 85-year old theatre include new carpeting, plaster repairs and painting, new doors and windows, and the opening of six private boxes in Fletcher Hall. The theatre closed on June 13 and will reopen in October, 2011.

Amtrak - Durham county is slated for expanded service. A new commuter rail service is projected to operate 18 round trips daily to Wake County. The heaviest service would be in the morning and evening rush hour; round trip tickets will be $12.

The Leaf – Public structure, whose shape resembles a leaf, will have seven steel columns and a series of wooden fins that will hang from several steel ribs that connect the columns. The $30,000 structure will be located near the Liberty Arts Pavilion in Durham Central Park and will provide an artistic shaded seating area as well as a stage for performances.
 
History Beneath Our Feet - A new searchable resource created by the Museum of Durham History that helps users discover the origins of Durham's street and school names with a focus on the Downtown Durham Historic District and the Hayti/Fayetteville Street corridor. Through lively stories and images, the site engages visitors in the very human side of Durham's compelling history.

The Durham Convention & Visitors Bureau tracks new developments and maintains a database online as a public resource, click here to see more of them.