Reuters Business Traveller

Los Angeles – Overview

Sprawling Los Angeles is not the easiest city in which to be a business visitor — mainly because it takes so long to get from one place to another: L.A.’s footprint is more than 10 times that of Manhattan. But, with a hire car and  a GPS navigation system you can make the most of this loud, brash and glitzy conurbation.

A multicultural hub, 140 countries and 224 languages are represented in L.A.’s 3.8-million population (which balloons to 14.8 million if you take in the wider urban area), and only 5 percent of them work in the movie or TV industry. Nearly one-fifth of the city’s business is in trade, transportation and utilities, while 11 percent is devoted to manufacturing.

The glass-sheathed central (downtown) area contains most banking, law and financial services companies, along with fashion, jewellery and real-estate concerns. Commercial areas are also found in the city’s western districts which include Beverly Hills, Bel Air, Century City and Westwood. A good rule of thumb: your meeting will almost definitely be somewhere near the city’s main artery — the Interstate 10 — which runs east-west from Santa Monica on the coast through L.A.’s downtown.

There are a few things you simply must make time for in Los Angeles. A beachside lunch in Santa Monica (or even surfing on Malibu), shopping on Beverly Hills’ Rodeo Drive, a visit to the Getty Center (built into a hillside of the Santa Monica Mountains), a clichéd sashay down the Hollywood Walk of Fame, and a night-time stroll down bar- and lounge-flanked Sunset Boulevard.

Los Angeles may be a city best suited to long-stay residents rather than the weekender, but the latter will find an endlessly fascinating city, full of surprisingly open people always open to new ideas.

-Money: US Dollars (US$)

Hotels do not, as a rule, exchange currency and only a few major banks offer the service so it is advisable to arrive with dollars, or exchange foreign currency at the airport upon arrival. Try not to land yourself with $100 notes because taxi drivers won’t change them. Credit cards are widely used.