5 Reasons Meetings Profs Love F&B in Texas

• It’s well known that Texas is the place to go for BBQ, but Fort Worth may be the city to set your sights on. With 42 different locations to grab a stack of ribs, pulled pork or sausage links, you may leave with sticky fingers.
• Food and beverage experiences vary for the better in Dallas. Take your pick from rotating food trucks in Klyde Warren Park; downtown Dallas’ farmers market, where visitors can enjoy the city’s local street food and produce; or take a slightly buzzed stroll through the city’s Margarita Mile, which highlights Dallas’ best margaritas in town.
• Denton’s craft beer scene is a true rising star. With wineries, breweries and distilleries all over, including Bearded Monk, the city’s first craft beer-only shop, and the locally owned Denton County Brewing Company, there’s a wide range of ways to imbibe and go behind-the-scenes of what the city is brewing.
• Arlington likes to emphasize its eclectic array of F&B. Featured on Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives, Taste of Europe features favorites from Eastern Europe and Russia; visitors can also purchase European and Russian groceries from its market. And there are plenty of places to grab BBQ, a treat that’ll sate that sweet tooth or a relaxing place to enjoy a beverage.
• Many restaurants in Plano double as event venues, from Indian and Turkish restaurants to sports bars and pizza shops. And where there are event venues, there is room for meeting space and private parties. Few things beat a full stomach and great conversation with colleagues.

Untraditional Planning in Plano

Untraditional Planning in Plano

If you take your group roughly 30 minutes north of Dallas, you’ll soon find your way to Plano, a city encompassed in the 11-county Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex. With a population of roughly 285,000, the city is intimate, full of culture and opportunities to expose groups to meeting spaces and chances for team building that diverge from the norm.

This divergence from the norm—and an accidental convergence of two sports—is what brought about fowling (pronounced “foal-ing”). Born out of a football and bowling pin mishap in 2001 at an Indy 500 tailgate, the emerging hybrid sport has been making waves across the United States. Fowling Warehouse, which first opened in Hamtramck, Michigan, has made its way to Plano as Fowling Warehouse DFW, the company’s first location in the south. The 71,000-square-foot space features 40 fowling lanes and an 11,000-square-foot VIP lounge that comes with six private lanes.

The story of Heritage Farmstead Museum dates a bit further back than 2001. Built in 1891 in a region of Blackland Prairie soil, the museum now serves as a 4.5-acre historic site, designed to collect and preserve late 19^th– and early 20^th-century history and artifacts from the region, such as Victorian Era furniture, textiles and costumes and literature about the history of Plano, North Texas and Native Americans in the Texas region.

The museum offers dedicated spaces for meetings and team building, such as The Young House, a separate 1880s farmhouse that can seat up to 40 people; and the Pole Barn, which has indoor and outdoor space for up to 100 guests.

Fast-growing Frisco

Money Magazine named Frisco “The Fastest Growing City” two years in a row, advancing from a city of 25,000 to more than 200,000 over the course of 20 years. In 2021, many companies, including notable Fortune 500 companies, have either moved or expanded operations in Frisco, including T-Mobile, which consolidated its regional operations there; NFL’s Dallas Cowboys, which relocated its warehouse and distribution operations; Keurig Dr. Pepper, which relocated its R&D lab; and Complexity Gaming, which opened an eSports development center and training facility at The Star, headquarters of the Dallas Cowboys.

The Star isn’t just for physical and virtual sports, the property is 400,000 sq. ft. and features numerous event venues that can accommodate groups of up to 12,000, like the outdoor 29,000-square-foot Tostitos Championship Plaza and the 4,700-square-foot Training Table, which features lounge seating and a patio nearby the team’s outdoor practice fields.

When a city grows as quickly as Frisco, you need the meeting space and guest rooms to accommodate the incoming wave of new business, and the city is doing just that, with a couple of new projects which have recently opened and another set to open later this year. PGA of America moved its headquarters to Frisco in 2022, as part of the complex which now includes the $520-million Omni PGA Frisco Resort (mentioned above) and Monument Realty District, a retail and dining complex four minutes away from the hotel. The complex features 13 F&B options—seven at Omni PGA, six at Monument Realty and one at Fields Ranch Clubhouse near the complex’s 18-hole golf course—that cover the epicurean gamut for those seeking flavor.

Hall Park Hotel is set to open late 2023 and will be the first Autograph Collection hotel in Frisco. With  224 rooms and nearly 8,500 sq. ft. of meeting space, Hall Park Hotel will be an ideal spot for close-knit groups.

This new hotel will be just one part of a larger development in the area that is Hall Park, a 15-building, 162-acre mixed-use park, scheduled to open late 2023/early 2024. Included in this development is a 10,000-square-foot food hall, the 5.7-acre Kaleidoscope Park—green space will make up one-third of the entire park. The full master plan, which is anticipated to span 20 years, will be a 9.5-million-acre mixed-use space. Additionally, the park will have dedicated green space and walking and jogging trails.

Bigger than a Building Refresh

Craig Davis, president and CEO of Visit Dallas, called Kay Bailey Hutchison Convention Center Dallas Master Plan “a game-changer for meeting planners.” The 10-year plan is to tear down the existing building in 2024 and construct a new 2.5-million-square-foot space oriented perpendicular to the current entrance. The project will top the freeway with a park deck and open up 30 acres for a mixed-use entertainment district that links downtown to the Cedars neighborhood in parallel with multimodal station and transportation studies that will enhance accessibility for all types of transit, including bicyclists and pedestrians.

The modern, more environmentally friendly Convention Center District adds 500,000 sq. ft., 10% more exhibit space and three times the amount of ballroom space—170,000 sq. ft. in total—and is expected to nearly double annual attendance and associated revenue for Dallas. A rooftop terrace will be open to sweeping city views and the existing heliport will be rebuilt. The new configuration is designed to create economic opportunities for restaurants, hotels and retail to co-locate and take advantage of the increased traffic.

“It will excite convention-goers and revitalize southern Downtown Dallas, making it a place for locals to enjoy alongside our convention attendees,” said Davis. “The Convention Center District will be an authentic Dallas urban experience that will include restaurants, retail, lodging and entertainment options.”

Daivs told The Dallas Morning News that 24 groups had already booked events at the convention center as of January 30 for 2030 or later based on the plans.

Fort Worth Stampedes Forward

An hour away in Fort Worth, architects have been hired to handle the first phase of the expansion of Fort Worth Convention Center in the heart of downtown. The 1,000-person capacity building is marketed as “where Western heritage and hospitality meets modern culture and sophistication.” It is served by a free Molly the Trolley service and is 25 minutes from Dallas Fort Worth International Airport (DFW).

The Request for Statements of Qualifications describes a multi-phase, $400 million to $450 million strategic renovation that includes realignment of Commerce Street to create a site for a future hotel, and the rebuilding of the loading docks. The facility will remain operational while the new food area is built and improvements are made at the current annex site. Work will begin this year and finish in 2026.

“With all the momentum on the southeastern side of downtown with new residential property, new hotels and the Texas A&M campus expansion, we’re looking forward to welcoming larger events and more visitors than ever to Fort Worth,” said Mike Crum, director of Public Events for the City of Fort Worth.

This article appears in the digital-only July and July/August 2023 issue. You can subscribe to the magazine here.