By the end of 2020, like many other clubs in the USA and around the world, Skål International Miami membership was depleted to around 15-20 members.

Skål International Miami did host small events in October - November 2020, where we invited and received Board members of other travel organizations such as TIA, Site and Chambers of Commerce.

We made sure all participants adhered to all protocols required by the State of Florida and City of Miami. 3 Board members of TIA subsequently became members of Skål International Miami in 2021.

From January through March of 2021, Skål International Miami Board held monthly board Zoom meetings and as well a few in person board meetings.

We then came up with a plan to grow our membership focusing on high level industry travel executives. Our campaign included following up with previous members prior to 2020 contacting hotel general managers and directors of marketing, restaurant managers, and travel planning executives both on the individual and group side, as well as travel and hotel consultants.

Additionally, we decided to make sure that one of our board members participated in other travel related functions with other hospitality organizations, since our club didn’t have that many members anymore. Therefor we collaborated with SITE, Sustainable Network Event for Florida & the Caribbean and with the Swiss American Chamber of Commerce for the Florida region.

On January our board members participated with the SITE South Florida chapter, as we were invited by United Airlines to the Fort Lauderdale airport terminal. UAL showed us how they cleaned aircrafts under the Covid19 regulation.

On Feb 19, 2021, we also participate jointly with SITE Florida on Beach Cleanup Day on Key Biscayne. The reward was a reception hosted by the Hotel Ritz-Carlton Key Biscayne.

On March 9, Skål International Miami hosted a joint zoom State of the Cruise line Industry Panel Event together with the Swiss American Chamber of Commerce Florida (Karin Andersen, Skål International Miami president is from Switzerland, and a board member of the SACC Florida). We invited all Skål International members and travel partners to participate in that MSC webinar. The result was over 100 participants.

On March 4, Skål International Miami and Skål International Sydney held a joint zoom call discussing the state of the travel industry in both Sydney, Australia and Miami, Florida. It was fun to chat with the past president Walter Nand and his Australian Skål International members and we had great memories of the World Congress 2019, hosted by the Miami chapter on the RCCL cruise ship Symphony of the Seas.

On April 13, Skål International Miami hosted a pool side reception at the Resort Hotel Z’Ocean on Miami Beach, and we had over 35 participants. In fact, after this event the General Manager and Director of Sales of the hotel both became Skål International members. For all our in-person reception, we have now guest speaker with current topics. The Executive Director form The Miami Design Preservation League joined us as a speaker for the April event.

For the subsequently on May 17, Skål International hosted jointly with chef Michael Ross an outdoor reception dinner at his backyard, with over 40 participants. Chef Mike explained to us how he promotes his service on YouTube and thousands of views have seen his supper club dinner functions.

On June 29, Skål International Miami hosted a reception at the Hotel Dream, Miami Beach. We are currently planning events for this fall such as our annual dinner on September 7, at Smith & Wollensky South Beach.

In promoting Skål International, we have found success in stressing the global access of Skål International worldwide membership, one of the only hospitality associations which shares their data base with their members! Also access to Skål International events and members when traveling to any Skål International chapter city and the high level of our current membership. Zoom business presentations will be coming up, where everyone can do a 2-3 minutes company promotion. Speakers and topics for each event have shown to be successful.

Our club has grown in the past months to over 50 members and our goal is to reach 66 or more in the next few months.