Products and Services
IMEX Chairman Ray Bloom Named 'Industry Visionary'
By Matt Alderton
November 10, 2011
The International Council of Tourism Partners (ICTP) is celebrating the inaugural IMEX America trade show — taking place Oct. 11-13 in Las Vegas — by honoring its founder and creator, IMEX Group Chairman Ray Bloom, it announced this week. Bloom is the first person to be named to ICTP's new "Industry Visionaries" hall of fame.
Prior to launching the original IMEX trade show in Frankfurt in 2003, Bloom created the European Incentive, Business Travel and Meetings (EIBTM) exhibition in 1990.
"He's charming, but he's crazy," ICTP President Geoffrey Lipman recalls thinking when Bloom told him about his plans to create "the biggest MICE event ever" more than 20 years ago.
Today, Bloom is fulfilling his great vision for the third time with the launch of IMEX America, and in the process is playing an important role in advancing the travel industry on the world stage, according to ICTP, which said Bloom's exhibitions embody ICTP's driving principles: the search for quality, and recognition of the importance of green events. The IMEX exhibitions also demonstrate the key contribution of the business travel sector to the broader visitor economy, it said — a fact that is often lost in the word "tourism" and is frequently unrecognized by policymakers.
"We are proud to make Ray Bloom the first name on ICTP's 'Industry Visionaries' roll," Lipman said. "We salute him as a visionary, a creator, and above all, as someone who has remained a fundamentally decent person despite his great success."
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