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Open for business
By SHARON L. BOND
© St. Petersburg Times, PINELLAS PARK -- The former Sam's Club at 10601 U.S. 19 N now is the Pinellas Expo Center, a venue for trade shows and sports and music events. The expo center hopes to book trade shows that would not fill halls as large as the Tampa Convention Center, according to Barry Strafacci, the center's manager. "Our priority is trade shows," Strafacci said. "This project is the first of what we hope to be six, 10, 12 of these facilities developed just as expo facilities." The "we" he refers to is Global Spectrum of Philadelphia, which manages 28 public facilities such as the arenas for the Philadelphia Flyers and the Philadelphia 76ers. Locally it manages Harborview Center in Clearwater. Global is part of Comcast Corp. Pinellas Expo Center offers 105,000 square feet in which it can install 500 booths. Cost of the whole facility for a three-day exhibition with two move-in/out days is $21,000. For the same time, half the center can be rented for $12,000. Equipment, workers such as ushers and ticket takers, and services such as telephone, Internet access and catering are offered but carry extra charges. Carole Ketterhagen of the St. Petersburg/Clearwater Convention and Visitors Bureau said the expo center gives her another option to offer meeting planners. She said mid Pinellas, where companies continue to locate, did not have such a facility before Pinellas Expo. "We promote all our facilities, everything from Tropicana Field to Bayfront Center to the Coliseum (in St. Petersburg) to Ruth Eckerd Hall to the Casino at Gulfport to Harborview," Ketterhagen said. "It's very serious square footage, and the mid part of the county is growing. I think that is a good site for an expo hall. I don't see it competing with any other facility," Ketterhagen said. Sam's Club closed in late 1999 after it was unable to work out a lease deal with the owners. Sam's is a division of Wal-Mart.
 © 2006 • All Rights Reserved • Tampa Bay Times
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From the Times South Pinellas desks |
