Well, the real conversion is the distance from the earth's equator to the pole is 10,000 km, or 6,215.05 miles. Working out the conversion you end up with a meter to be bit over 39.37 inches in length.

I hope you are not the systems engineer that managed to plant the Mars Climate Orbiter back in 1999.

http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/msp98/news/mco990930.html