A SOCIAL dining company which connects hosts across the world with travellers keen on enjoying homemade flavours of the destination in a local home has begun its courtship of the corporate events market, encouraged by a 20 per cent monthly increase in corporate event bookings.
Since coming into operations in 2014, VizEat now has a network of 17,000 hosts in more than 100 countries including Italy, the US, India, China, South Korea and Taiwan.
While the VizEat website now caters to leisure travellers seeking and booking social dining experiences, cooking classes or market tours, the company will soon debut an online support for corporate events.
Jean-Michel Petit, co-founder of VizEat, told TTGmice e-Weekly: “In the coming weeks we will have a separate section on the website where corporate event planners can connect with our team and describe the type of event they are looking to organise. Based on the information provided, we will then select the hosts and set up a co-branded website with the organiser.”
VizEat’s track record in putting together major events built around the social dining concept includes the Airbnb Open in Paris last November – said to be the world’s biggest event of its kind – where more than 1,000 Airbnb members from all over the world dined that evening in local VizEat hosts’ homes in the French capital.
The company will run OuiShare Fest for 1,000 participants this month, and a dining event for a major insurance company as part of an annual meeting in June, with more than 2,000 delegates expected to attend.
While the bulk of corporate bookings comes from Europe, Petit said the company is determined to expand its reach into Asian source markets and had participated in IMEX Frankfurt last month to build awareness of its specialisation.
“We are also planning to (establish) strong curated host communities in Singapore, Hong Kong and Seoul by 4Q2016 (because these destinations are most active in securing corporate events) and expand quickly across more key Asian cities by 1Q2017,” Petit said, adding that VizEat will work with the local tourism bureau to promote the experience to corporate clients.
