MICE, although represents Meetings, Incentives, Conferences, Exhibitions and Events has become a fashionable work with the emphasis made by both Government tourism Authorities and Tourism Industry members and yet Sri Lanka has been lagging behind giants like Singapore, Malaysia and Thailand.  It is common acceptance that MICE tourists spend three times over leisure traveler and there is gamut of benefits from MICE tourism special the spin off benefits such as promotion of trade, investment and indirect employment.

This paper identifies the basic issues in developing the MICE industry in Sri Lanka, which includes recognizing the terminology ‘MICE’ and identifying different strategies for each component of MICE. In the light of that Sri Lanka needs to identify the Unique Selling Propositions (USPs) in MICE in each component prior to developing a product market strategy. The paper also describes strengths and weaknesses in each area and recommends the approach that needs to be taken jointly by the Government through tourism authorities, industry members, Sri Lanka Airlines, and other stakeholders of the MICE industry.

It is necessary that Sri Lanka differentiate herself from the competitors by using the USPs especially for meetings and Incentives while conference requires changing of present strategy altogether thus shifting responsibility equally between the Government and Industry.

Keywords—unique selling propositions, MICE incentives, tourism categories, tourism industry