25 years as a four-star hotel general manager, 12 years at the helm of York’s popular Marriott hotel taught John many valuable lessons. Not just how to run a highly successful hotel business, but how to stand out in the marketplace, spread your message effectively and recruit new custom. A voluntary tour guide in historic York, John is well-rehearsed in bringing ideas to life for newcomers. John was chairman of VisitYork for four years, founded LateMeetings.com in 2005, the first online booking portal for meetings and events, sold it to Expotel (now Capita) in 2010 and later established moregiving.co.uk, a corporate charity fundraising platform.

A Fellow of the Tourism Society, its Yorkshire chairman, career-long member of the Institute of Hospitality, former council member and vice chair of the Meetings Industry Association. John is chair of the research and market intelligence group at UK Events for which he conducts its quarterly business barometer and coordinates the compilation of the UK Events Report every three years that provides the sector and informs government about the value of the events industry, its volumes, information on the various sub-sectors and is a valuable and comprehensive industry data-set.