Stay away from this disgusting organization!! I sent my VP on my behalf to one of their events. My VP was put in a room full of vendors to be tossed around like fresh meat in a lion pit! Countless cold calls from vendors post event, exhausting 3 days of hell at their event! This was a complete waste of our time.
They try to rope you in by saying your flights, hotels are free and that it is covered through budget for a handfull of executives, later to find out they cover EVERYONES flights and hotels..Why? Because Vendors pay THOUSANDS of dollars to be at one event!!!
I was told this was one of their "flagship summit's" and we were lied to by the GDS rep. We were told specific c-level executives were going to be in attendance, and specific fortune 500 companies, guess what NONE of them were at the event. This company puts pictures of executives on their websites who aren't even attending their summit.
They even had the balls to call us after the event to try to get us to another event of theirs! Their rep was blaring music in the background, people were using profanities in the background, and the rep had to nerve to mention an executive who would be on site, turns out that executive is a former colleague of mine who hadn't even spoken to GDS before!
After discussing this companies name in meetings within my Fortune-500 company I quickly learned that GDS has been scamming executives for 20 years! They find these vendors, lie to them about who will be in attendance, most likely the person they claim is in attendance hasn't even been spoken to by GDS, the vendors pay large cash amounts 35k, 45k, 65k, and more to come to these events hoping to do business with companies who really aren't in attendance, this is ILLEGAL!
A member of my team has a good relationship with a former GDS employee who left after 2 weeks with that company. She was appauled by the deceptive behavior, unprofessional reps, and the training which promotes this deceptive behavior! ONE WORD OF ADVICE TO ANY EXECUTIVE WHO GETS IN CONTACT WITH THIS COMPANY, STAY AWAY!!!!!
The reps are very pushy and as a vendor they try and push you into spending $30-60K on a conference. The attendees are sub-par and when you tell them that they try and tell you that the people attending are better...
A Waste of money and they lie to the vendors and the potential clients attending.
GDS Group Reviews
Stay away from this disgusting organization!! I sent my VP on my behalf to one of their events. My VP was put in a room full of vendors to be tossed around like fresh meat in a lion pit! Countless cold calls from vendors post event, exhausting 3 days of hell at their event! This was a complete waste of our time.
They try to rope you in by saying your flights, hotels are free and that it is covered through budget for a handfull of executives, later to find out they cover EVERYONES flights and hotels..Why? Because Vendors pay THOUSANDS of dollars to be at one event!!!
I was told this was one of their "flagship summit's" and we were lied to by the GDS rep. We were told specific c-level executives were going to be in attendance, and specific fortune 500 companies, guess what NONE of them were at the event. This company puts pictures of executives on their websites who aren't even attending their summit.
They even had the balls to call us after the event to try to get us to another event of theirs! Their rep was blaring music in the background, people were using profanities in the background, and the rep had to nerve to mention an executive who would be on site, turns out that executive is a former colleague of mine who hadn't even spoken to GDS before!
After discussing this companies name in meetings within my Fortune-500 company I quickly learned that GDS has been scamming executives for 20 years! They find these vendors, lie to them about who will be in attendance, most likely the person they claim is in attendance hasn't even been spoken to by GDS, the vendors pay large cash amounts 35k, 45k, 65k, and more to come to these events hoping to do business with companies who really aren't in attendance, this is ILLEGAL!
A member of my team has a good relationship with a former GDS employee who left after 2 weeks with that company. She was appauled by the deceptive behavior, unprofessional reps, and the training which promotes this deceptive behavior! ONE WORD OF ADVICE TO ANY EXECUTIVE WHO GETS IN CONTACT WITH THIS COMPANY, STAY AWAY!!!!!
Thanks
I really appreciate your advice, as it totally backs up the advice I am giving a friend.
Bad company
The reps are very pushy and as a vendor they try and push you into spending $30-60K on a conference. The attendees are sub-par and when you tell them that they try and tell you that the people attending are better...
A Waste of money and they lie to the vendors and the potential clients attending.
Same here!!!!
Ditto