York Tourism Bureau was today preparing to monitor results from 40 of the city's venues which took part in its Conference Showcase.

The expectation is that the 110 conference organisers and buyers at yesterday's event at the city's racecourse - 50 per cent more than converged from all over the country to visit last year's inaugural showcase - will report record bookings.

Last year's showcase, staged in the Barbican, York, made a hefty contribution towards the £500,000-worth of conference bookings in the city that year.

There were confirmed project launches for Nestl UK, and bookings from Pizza Hut, the National Health Service and the Department of Work and Pensions.

Kate McMullen, the bureau's conference marketing manager, said the probability was that the bookings this year would exceed that. "The certainty is that it's quickly becoming an established event in the diary of buyers."

The Lord Mayor of York, Coun Janet Looker, opened the event then met some of the exhibitors.

They included representatives from 19 hotels and some of the city's more unusual conference venues, like the medieval town house, Barley Hall, and the Central Science Laboratory in Sand Hutton. Many of them were happy with the outcome.

Julia Bodmer, director of sales at the Royal York Hotel, said: "The showcase was a great opportunity to meet buyers from all over the country and a number of

them have shown genuine interest in the Royal York Hotel as a venue".

Updated: 11:30 Friday, October 22, 2004