Business View Magazine | September 2022

153 BUSINESS VIEW MAGAZINE VOLUME 9, ISSUE 9 COX BUS INESS CONVENT ION CENTER the road in Oklahoma City for 30 plus years, and this year was their first year in Tulsa. We plan to make that a long-standing relationship. We also work with a lot of locally based corporate clients for their national conventions and we are really working on growing the corporate and association markets for the city,” Teel states. Tulsa’s cultural and entertainment scene continues to flourish and, along with it, the film and TV industry is growing. To reflect such robust activity, the State of Oklahoma has increased its film incentive from $8 million to $30 million and there is hope for further funding to accommodate the burgeoning sector. Teel reports, “We were able to tap into some of that business during the pandemic. We utilized our biggest asset, which is our space, and some movie film sets were built here during the pandemic. Our 102,000 square foot exhibit hall was now a prime spot to fill for wardrobe, for set building, for set designs… and anything you can name that has to do with a film took place inside on increasing its already impressive lineup of conferences and conventions slated for 2022 and 2023. “We have a lot of flexible space. We are four walls, so anything that you can imagine inside of the four walls can definitely happen,” Teel describes. “We also have events that expand outside of our four walls, including a 19,000- seat arena (BOK Center) situated a block and a half away from us under the same management company, ASM Global. So, we have a lot of times where events will utilize the arena for general sessions or evening concerts, while the majority of their programming, whether it is their trade show or their breakouts, and meal functions will happen at the convention center.” A big draw for the city is sporting events, which include anything from the National Golden Gloves boxing event to gymnastics to volleyball to break dancing and cheer competitions. “We are also home to the FFA Convention; the Oklahoma State FFA Convention had been down