Executive Director's Blog
Executive Director’s Blog: March 2007
Welcome to my blog – and if you haven’t jumped straight here from Eventia’s Business Briefing newsletter, I strongly recommend you check it out immediately after reading this. You’ll see it’s packed with all sorts of interesting legislative updates. A huge thanks, as always, to our Regulatory Committee who put in so much work on our behalf: Brian Kirsch, Roger Harvey, Michael Wigmore and John Greenway MP.
One of the areas I’d like to highlight is the first ever ‘British Tourism Week’ which took place from 12-16 March. HRH The Prince of Wales was patron of a series of events, the main purpose of which was to raise awareness of the importance of tourism as a whole to the UK economy. Within this context our goal was to ensure that Business Tourism and Events specifically get the recognition they deserve. The briefing document that you will be able to read from the Business Tourism Partnership states that we are worth £22 billion which is 26 per cent of the overall value of tourism. This is a pretty significant amount, and it’s up to us to make sure we make enough noise about it so we get the support from government for our industry.
There are so many different ways that government can help us, such as providing funding towards pitching for large events/congresses to be held in the UK. Building a London Convention Centre would also be a good start, other main capitals in the world have one, why don’t we? Also, limiting the development of certain ‘convenient’ taxes where we know the money is going to an empty pit rather than actually helping the issues they are supposedly designed to assist. More funding is needed for VisitBritain - we heard that Joss Croft and his team have to fight for every ££ they can get, which is ridiculous when you compare their budget to others from around the world. They need to be better funded to help bring events business to the UK. But this isn’t about pointing the finger, we should be banding together to fight this cause as an industry, for the good of the industry.
Raising the awareness of the strategic value of events in the corporate agenda and positioning ourselves where corporate decision-makers will engage with us is high on Eventia’s list of goals as the industry association. This needs a multi-faceted approach, part of which is to get us in the mainstream media talking about the impact and effectiveness of live events. The breakfast seminar helped with this agenda by having mainstream media in the audience.
Another of the activities we are supporting is the corporate buyer programme to IMEX, where we are delivering a seminar in association with C&IT magazine on Event Marketing Strategy – incorporating the CSR factor and how this is one of the pillars to a successful events strategy. Prior to IMEX I’ll be attending a meeting in Switzerland where the heads of the European associations and the CEOs of Swiss tourism will be meeting with senior-level European buyers for round-table discussions on CSR issues and their wider impact across Europe.
Add these latest initiatives to our collaboration over the past few years with CIPS – the procurement profession’s professional body - and you can see that we are chipping away at the corporate buyers on the industry’s behalf and will continue to do so.
Not stopping there, we are raising the industry’s profile to the level of royalty! At the official launch of British Tourism Week I got my one minute to talk to HRH The Prince of Wales (and after the introductory pleasantries of, ‘How’s the gorgeous Harry?’ and ‘I like your Duchy range of organic shampoo’) we did manage to discuss how holding events in historic churches could assist in raising the finance to restore this part of the heritage of our country. He smiled at me and even if only for a second I just think I may have struck a chord there. Who knows, next year he may just begin to understand what Events mean in the overall picture.
And maintaining the royal theme, two days later I found myself in Harry’s favourite bar ‘Mahiki’ in Mayfair, listening to a showcase from ‘Young Guns’ - the funky music management company that provided the entertainment for our last Eventia ITM awards in February. One of the things I love about our industry is if you are passionate about something it’s one of the easiest industries to start your own business in, and yes you need to have all the ingredients right to make it a success but not every industry has such an accessible entry level. Dominic and Alexander Lyon, the brothers who started ‘Young Guns’ literally had a dream, a whole load of passion for what they wanted to do and £1.5k start-up cash. Two years down the track they have signed some fantastic acts and according to Dom are doing well enough to expand the business in to new areas. Listening to Al that evening reminded me why I’m in this industry, he is only 27 years old and is already running his own business, talking me through the story of their start-up, his eyes sparkled excitedly as he declared, ‘this is more than a business, it’s my life, it’s my passion, it’s what I love doing’ and he thinks himself lucky to be able to do what he loves every day. Something tells me there is more to it than luck, I’m definitely feeling the ‘fire in the belly’ tenacity in this duo that separates the good from the great and it’s that kind of inspiration and passion that we should be supporting in our industry.
At ‘Mahiki’ some great new acts were showcased including a ‘Rock-Opera’ called Appassionata. An idea that I personally love! You will get to see more at our brand new upcoming networking events as ‘Young Guns’ have agreed to be entertainment sponsor for Eventia and I am thrilled to be working with such an inspirational team.
The first of our networking events is on Wednesday 25 April so register yourself online, meet the rest of the membership and Board, and find out how you can get the most out of your membership AND have your say in the association. You know what they say: ‘you will only get out of it what you put in’ so come along and be a part of it.
Hope to see you soon, maybe even at RSVP this week. We are not exhibiting this year but I’m walking the show to check it out, so who knows you may just see Eventia exhibiting there!
Yours,
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