During the economic downturn, we have explored several ways to help our clients. One was to add video conferencing capabilities. Another was to create a lower cost alternative to our meeting space.

We studied our meeting room usage, picked the room that gets used the least, and made a special offer to our guests. For a limited time, we lowered the cost of this room considerably. Our Board Room (named for it's surfboard decor) is our smallest room and holds up to 6 people. It was our hope that smaller meetings and smaller companies would benefit from a great meeting space at a more affordable price right now.

By using our smallest room, we also are not cannibalizing our entire business with this lower price. Our other rooms are still full-price and are staying busy, even during the economic downturn.

By the way, for the groups that had booked this room already at full-price, we lowered the price for them (even though technically we didn't have to...we had contracts with them). It just seemed like the right thing to do.

Why this is one of our favorite sparks:
We took a fairly unused resource and created a benefit for our customers. We realized that this offer won't make us rich. It may not even make us as much money as if we had left it alone, but it is important for us to create positive energy with our customers. It is also important for us to try new and different ideas in our business and not get too set in the way we do things.