Four A's meet packs 'em in by offering real substance.

This article presents information on the American Association of Advertising Agencies Media Conference at Hilton in New Orleans, Louisiana in 1999. After just six years, the media conference is the association's largest and most profitable. Its success mirrors the rise of media's role in the marketing landscape. Media experts have gone from mid-level managers who toiled in relative obscurity to executives of their own branded businesses. They compete for consolidated global accounts worth hundreds of millions of dollars.