Bismarck, North Dakota
Thanks to its role as the state capital, Bismarck has the meeting and event facilities to serve large audiences, but because it’s not North Dakota’s largest city, it maintains a small-town feel that allows even small groups to feel like they’re the biggest game in town.
“We have the big-city amenities without the hustle and bustle,” said Sheri Grossman, CEO and executive director of the Bismarck-Mandan Convention and Visitors Bureau. “For a regional group that would normally go to a bigger place, when they come here, they find they’re a big deal here in town and people are always asking what they’re here for and wanting to find out more information about the group.”
Bismarck’s size also means that everything that planners need is concentrated in a small area, making meeting logistics much easier than in cities with comparable amenities. Nearly 3,500 hotel rooms lie within 10 to 15 minutes of both downtown and the Bismarck Municipal Airport, which is served by Allegiant, American Airlines, Delta Air Lines, Frontier Airlines and United Airlines.
In the heart of downtown, the Bismarck Event Center has 56,000 square feet of dividable exhibit space, a 10,000-seat area and a 452-seat theater. More than 800 sleeping rooms are situated within walking distance of the event center, including the 215-room Radisson Hotel Bismarck, with 12,000 square feet of its own meeting space, and the Best Western Plus Ramkota Hotel, with 25,000 square feet of meeting space.
To celebrate the 125th anniversary of North Dakota’s statehood in 2014, the North Dakota Heritage Center and State Museum underwent a $51.7 million renovation and expansion of the now 97,000-square-foot facility that has opened up new options for planners for both day meetings and event receptions. Thanks to two outdoor spaces, the Prairie Amphitheater and Badlands Plaza, the venue can accommodate up to 2,000 people, and smaller groups can take advantage of spaces such as the glass-walled Northern Lights Atrium during business hours and dinner with a mastodon in the Corridor of History after the museum closes.
Other options for unusual evening receptions just outside Bismarck are the 160-seat Lewis and Clark Riverboat and the 150-seat Commissary at Fort Abraham Lincoln, where groups can tour the Mandan-style Native American village before dinner.
www.discoverbismarckmandan.com
Fargo, North Dakota
Unless you’ve been to Fargo, it’s hard to put your finger on just how different it is from everything you’ve seen and heard about it. You can get one rendition of it from the movie and television show of the same name, another if you know it best as the second-largest Microsoft campus outside of Seattle and yet another if you know it as a major agricultural research and entrepreneurial hub due to its three universities.
“A lot of people assume we’re the state capital because we’re the largest city, but it’s actually Bismarck, and if that feel is what you’re looking for, you should go with Bismarck,” said Jill Halvorson, director of sales for the Fargo-Moorhead Convention and Visitors Bureau. “We’re more like Minneapolis but with only a quarter of a million people.”
That’s because Fargo has a wide variety of small, specialized offerings thanks to strong government support of locally owned small businesses, Halvorson often works with groups to take their events to out-of-the-box locations, such as a recent meeting Microsoft ran out of the 800-seat Fargo Theatre, followed by a downtown pub crawl. Small and medium-size groups can take advantage of options like the Prairie Den, a co-working space in the heart of downtown with several small meeting spaces for up to 50 people. Avalon West, an 18,000-square-foot event center with seven ballrooms, was remodeled this year. Outside the city center, farms like Crooked Lane and Rustic Oaks have also begun catering to corporate events.
Though many locals don’t feel like the new hit television show “Fargo” is the most accurate depiction of life in the city, it has brought a new name-brand recognition to the state that is bringing in much more meeting business, and the city is experiencing a building boom to support this surge. In 2015 alone, Fargo has seen a massive expansion of hotels with five new properties, including a 130-room Element by Westin and a 90-room Four Points by Sheraton, and nearly 20 new food and beverage offerings from both national brands and local entrepreneurs.
