Northwest Arkansas
VisitBentonville.com; @VisitBentonville
Bentonville is filled with things to do outside of the conference, says Wes Oliver, director of sales for Visit Bentonville. “Relax at more than 100 restaurants, including several breweries and bars, explore Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, and enjoy more than 150 murals, sculptures, and neon public art throughout town. In addition to being the ‘Mountain Bike Capital of the World,’ with more than 400 miles of single-track trails, we have the only bikeable building, the Ledger, where you can bike or walk up and down six floors of outside ramps.”
The city’s “unconventional convention” approach remains popular, he says. “This is hosted in our downtown area, with multiple locations within a few blocks for your participants to enjoy a walkable indoor/outdoor meeting experience. This is an opportunity for a unique work/fun balance.”
In January, Walmart celebrated the beginning of a phased opening of its new 350-acre headquarters campus in Bentonville, according to ArkansasAdvocate.com, noting the multimillion-dollar investment features smart building technology and a design integrating the open campus into downtown Bentonville. The campus includes a welcome center, an outdoor amphitheater, a food hall with global cuisine, and retail shops run by local and national companies set to open to the public later this year.
On campus, a 153-room AC Hotel Bentonville, with 5,000 square feet of function space, is expected to open this summer. Located on the nearby Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art Campus, the 75,000 square foot Heartland Whole Health Institute is expected to open this year with an array of indoor and outdoor venues, including an event hall seating 350 for banquets, a 350-person-capacity flex room, and a 7,000-square-foot patio. Set on a 138-acre campus, Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art has more than a dozen indoor and outdoor event spaces, including the Great Hall, which seats 450 people theater style.
There are currently more than 2,200 guest rooms in Bentonville. Hotels with larger event spaces include the 105-room Four Points by Sheraton Bentonville, with 11,107 square feet of function space, and 140-room DoubleTree Suites by Hilton, with six meeting rooms in 8,162 square feet of event space. The 175-room Motto by Hilton Bentonville Downtown opened in 2024.
Offsite venues include The Momentary, with indoor and outdoor space to host up to 4,000 attendees; Ledger, with 28 conference rooms, a 59-person-capacity classroom, a 66-person-capacity multipurpose room, and a 6th-floor terrace; and Record, with 8,100 square feet of function space to host events of up to 600 people.
