Bigger, better Salt Palace

Not a one-event building.

The Salt Lake Convention & Visitors Bureau on Friday unveiled the expanded Salt Palace Convention Center, which will be completed on budget and in time to host its premier tenant, the Outdoor Retailer Summer and Winter Markets.

But county and tourism officials said the facility does more than secure Outdoor Retailer's semiannual gathering in Utah. Salt Lake County Mayor Peter Corroon said the expanded Salt Palace puts Salt Lake City and Utah in a new category of event hosts and elevates Utah even higher as a tourism and travel destination.

"The trade-show and convention industry is an over-$2 billion industry in Salt Lake County, so it's very, very important to our economy," Corroon said during a news conference prior to a news media tour of the expansion on Friday. "Without question, the expanded Salt Palace will be good for our economy as well, and the entire state of Utah.

"This is not a building for one event," he said. "It's a building for hopefully many, many events in the future."

Still, Scott Beck, the bureau's president and chief executive officer, acknowledged the importance of that one event and that one client — and not just because of its economic impact, which approaches $32 million annually.

"When we came together to build this for a client, it endorsed us in a way that — there's not enough advertising dollars to go and convince people that you're a valid, true player in the convention industry," Beck said. "But when you have an entity like Outdoor (Retailer) make the commitment ... When they endorsed us as a facility, what that does is put us at a table we wouldn't normally be in.

"Utah as a destination since the Olympics has drawn international acclaim as a world-class winter destination. To have this size of facility, with a client like OR, has already allowed us to do things we couldn't before."

When complete, the Salt Palace will have 515,000 square feet of exhibit space and 164,000 square feet of meeting rooms, including a 45,000-square-foot ballroom and 66 meeting rooms. The expansion project cost $58 million and was funded after heated negotiations involving lawmakers, communities and business leaders at the city, county and state levels. All told, the actual construction time will span just 19 months, with a two-month break for the 2005 Outdoor Retailer Summer Market.

"Twelve months ago, we stood here, and we had tents on this (concrete) slab," said Allyson Jackson, Salt Palace general manager, nodding toward a vast covered exhibition space. "The ground had not been broken on meeting rooms (on the South Temple side of the facility). Today, we are approaching the finish line."