news

August 2008

Welcome to the August issue of the newsletter.

It was the 9th of July and while settling into my Virgin Atlantic seat ready for the 24hr haul across the world to my home shores of NZ, I began reflecting on the past few days at Summer Eventia. After a fun train journey from Euston station where guests were practically force fed champagne by yours truly… ever the obliging host… we then kicked off that evening with a casual dinner in the marquee outside the Lowry. A myriad of the industry’s best chatted over burgers and salad downed with specially mixed cocktails in our turquoise and green event colours that packed quite a punch despite the candy like appearance. Revellers partied the night away with Brian Kirsch, Sarah Webster and Andrew Wright leading the way on the dancefloor. Up in the bar the terrible twosome, Nigel and Hamish, were entertaining various folks, not to mention the bar staff, till the wee small hours. Meanwhile, back in the party tent, the excited new chair Patrick Collins and (immediate past chair) Rob Allen were conferring notes for the following morning’s welcome session. Feeling like a pair of old pro’s, now onto 3rd conference together, John Walker and I confidently strolled up, gave them both a few words of encouragement before slapping another couple of cocktails down and assuring them that once they drink these it will all be alright in the morning!

Nothing like a good reality check first thing in the morning as Roger Martin-Fagg, our keynote speaker, assured us that we are, in fact, heading for a global recession and to hold onto our cash for the next 18 or so months as everything else will be decreasing in value. An intriguing lesson in economics, a haze of charts and graphs backing up the in-depth theory, and most were left gasping for breath and wondering what would happen to our businesses over this time. Then followed an analysis on the latest trends in experiential marketing and corporate spend on events by experiential marketer & anchor man for the conference, Neil Jones, who then led a panel discussion of Jeremy Petty (client perspective) Denise MacDonald of IHG (hotels) and Graham Burt from Maritz, who each commented from their perspective on how they saw this affecting the industry and also gave ideas of how to get through the trying times ahead. Graham assured us that there is the work out there, we just need to be smarter and more savvy to win it. The rest of the day was filled with various workshop sessions ranging from regulatory issues, CSR, health and safety, technology, procurement, client/agency relationships, the provision of destination services, and meeting business objectives through staging effective events. Members of the National Tourist Office collaboration ‘Where The World Is Your Oyster’ were able to promote their countries’ attractions though a series of one-to-one appointments with hosted buyers on the first day of the conference. The day ended on a more light-hearted note as our own version of ‘Room 101’ was staged, with a few outgoing personalities sharing their pet hates with the conference. These included misleading budget airline pricing, email ‘trails’, fam trip last-minute no shows, over-hyped ‘green’ credentials, and Vanessa Cotton advised that white wine should be served at 13degrees so we binned the serving of warm white wine. But by far the favourite was Tina Morris with her ‘bad client briefs’; she announced she had a pair of Henriette’s in her bag which she would rather wear but was more often forced to wear baggy holey ones that clients often serve up – so the baggy briefs were voted in the bin!

That evening I was absolutely stunned by the transformation of the Gorton monastery, a social enterprise who gave us the facilities for our evening dinner and party. We held a raffle prize draw and raised £1,845.95 which was donated to the Monastery so they can continue the good work they do in the local community. The party continued back at the hotel bar where Walker jnr (John’s son Ben) tinkled the ivories for us, and not just for the hour we booked him for. Talk about going above and beyond the call of duty – the poor guy was still playing at 5am when I left the bar! Ian Lapworth was leading the singing and, between him and Laura Sharrock, they knew most of the words to the rock and pop anthems Ben was playing. The surprise of the night though was our very own Tina Morris - a diva in waiting!! That lady is not just a very smart business women but boy can she belt out a great tune, and I wasn’t the only one impressed - Anthony Hyde and Duncan Reid were caught leaning on the bar staring awestruck as she sang ‘leaving on a jetplane’. I’m sure I saw some teary eyes… and last but certainly not least Hamish Reid didn’t disappoint with his rendition of ‘Suspicious Minds’. Helen Moon seemed to take on a new role as photographer while Nigel Cooper in his ever generous way started a kitty to give Ben some more dosh for his efforts. All’s well that ends well but I still don’t know exactly who was responsible for banging on my door with bottles of champagne long after I was sound asleep… apparently it was the piano in my room they were after!

Tuesday morning and our last day… the first thing I heard at breakfast was that the Lowry team were extremely pleased with the bar takings, the most they have ever taken in one night. The morning sessions kicked off with a debate on fees led by Mike Ford and Leigh Jagger, the result of which was a universal plea for the establishment of a common commercial methodology for pricing event agency services. So a focus group is being set up and led by Mike and Leigh to this end. The last session of the conference, led by Randle Stonier, was a debate on the education in our industry and the need for employers and educators to work together to ensure the future of our industry thrives with an abundance of enthusiastic and well trained talent.

The train journey home was rather more subdued than the one arriving on Sunday but we still had a few bottles of champagne left, which the hard core few helped polish off before we arrived to say our goodbyes back at Euston station. It was a wonderful few days with some great memories, and for those who know me well this may come as a surprise that I wouldn’t actually change much about how it all went. Being somewhat of a perfectionist I can usually pick holes in most things but I can honestly say, as I drifted off to a peaceful sleep on that aircraft, I couldn’t think of one thing that I would do differently… and that is a testament to the education committee, Rachel Ley and her team, plus my team at the office in Birmingham, who all worked so hard to make everything come together on the day. Well done Team Eventia, you’ve done us proud!

One person obviously missing over Summer Eventia was Matt Storey. He did join us for the train journey but had to rush back home to assist his wife who was getting ready to give birth to their first child. I am very proud to announce the arrival of little Rafi Storey, who we have now adopted as our Eventia baby. Maybe when he’s a little older Matt might bring him along to one of our events so we can gush over the little fellow… well done Matt and Sirine, now the fun of parenting really begins!

The other good news is that the merger with the BACD is now officially taking place as voted by BACD members at their AGM in July, working towards being effective 1 Jan 09. So watch this space for more news on that front as we develop our plans to integrate the members into the Eventia family.

Enjoy your summer and hope to see you at Event UK in Birmingham 16th -17th September on the joint Eventia/BACD pavilion.

Yours,

Izania