A trip to International Confex at Earls Court in London reinforced the irritation I was experiencing. Given that this is an event industry trade show you would think we could get the seminar areas right! Once again little money or thought has been given to the environment for the delegates. In recent years it has become fashionable to install see through walls to the seminar rooms but it’s very distracting for delegates and presenters alike. Very low screen bases mean that visuals cannot be viewed from top to bottom, except from the front row, which all too often is empty anyway and the audio reproduction for speech is inadequate. I think it’s embarrassing!

Is this lack of finesse and expertise the result of people being brought in who simply don’t have the experience or training to know any better? This isn’t just about budget. I don’t know why we put up with poor technical support and shoddy environments, particularly at events for our own industry!

One positive in all of this, it’s been a good month for catching up with industry news and although the outlook remains tentative we see a busy month ahead with the run up to retail and financial events in April. There is talk too of possible roadshow events in May and June. Could roadshows be making a come back?

The end of February sees us taking a break from the coal face and enjoying some team building coupled to an incentive in Morocco. The chance of a few days in the sun could not come at a better time after the hard winter we have been experiencing this year. And with the latest announcements of the UK economy beginning to show signs of life once again we’re looking forward to a much needed return of confidence in the live events market – when clients revisit their face to face meetings and experiential events programmes. When that happens everyone will benefit!

 A story in the press caught my eye recently. A local Green Party Councillor, Andrew Stringer, (one of the first Green Party Councillors elected in Suffolk), had promised to plant a tree for every vote he received in the elections and now he was scanning around for land in different places to plant them all on. It’s a little known fact that here at Corporate Events Plus we are on a mission to offset our environmental impacts by planting trees; so it seemed like a good idea to lend him a hand – one hand, the other is bandaged up you’ll remember.  Anyway, we got in touch and we were able to help. We have already planted 101 native trees in the grounds surrounding the office and aim to plant many more so giving some space to this initiative struck us as a good idea.

Of course I have to admit that it’s not just our work that we need to offset because I’ve been racing around the track with the Classic Sports Car Club rather a lot this year. In fact I’m delighted to have been awarded a trophy by them for finishing 3^rd overall in the 1600cc motor racing class events in England, Germany and Belgium that I competed in 2009. I am over the moon about it! Two things helped us achieve this trophy – reliability and consistency. Characteristics that we always hope to apply to work as well as play!

 The other great thing about this time of year when work quietens down is of course the great opportunity to get in touch with those we only see occasionally as well as our regular clients, suppliers and freelancers. It’s great to be able to say thank you for all your help and support in the past year and to wish you all the very best for 2010. Let’s hope it’s a good one.

JANUARY 2010 

So here we go getting ready to settle down to some serious work in the coming year! It feels to me a bit like first day back at school after the holidays with a new term stretching out before us. The new wall planner is up and starting to be filled in and last year’s has been pulled down and consigned to the bin. I won’t be spending any time poring over it to reminisce, that’s for sure.

Let’s hope the coming year is better than the one just gone. I must say we’ve got a good few things to be looking forward to. The year starts with a planning meeting for an event in May and there are a number of events postponed from last year to start planning for soon. We all seem to hold our breath when it’s an election year and it seems that whoever gets in we are keen to make a fresh start and to push business and delayed projects along, we all just want to get on with it. So let’s hope that the coming spring or summer is a turning point – away from the gloom and disenchantment of last year and towards a more productive and optimistic outlook for the future.

It’s good to see a client recognising how valuable these events are for their business. Good team morale and positive attitudes seem ever more important but sadly this is an easy target area for cutbacks. We’ve been coming under increasing pressure from desperate competitors in our market who are buying business at a loss to either secure a new customer or they are making promises they can’t deliver. It’s no good us saying “we did tell you …..” but it is frustrating when we know that what we are offering is deliverable, our service level is good and we are competitive on price, only to find ourselves edged out of work in that way.

Does this mean it is going to be survival only by those who can sit tight and ride out the recession? I just do not see how it is sustainable to be delivering on high value, high challenge projects without making profit on the work you are doing. Fortunately, we’re in a good place in terms of sustainability. The relocation to home turf in Suffolk came at the right time and we can work anywhere nationally and internationally from here. Being flexible and adaptable with costs is just so important, now more than ever.

Obviously the Conference market is in a trough in this period so I was interested to see how other related industries are trading, I have past work contacts in the world of TV and I was able to visit them at Sky and take in the amazing buzz of the News and Sports studios first hand, an incredible atmosphere to work in.

I’ve also been able to spend more time networking this month and made the time to visit the ‘Destination Growth ‘09’ event held at Duxford and organised by EEDA, the East of England Development Agency. A great opportunity to hear from a range of well known business professionals such as Lord Sugar, Greg Dyke, former Director General BBC and Michelle Mone, creator of Ultimo. Other speakers I particularly enjoyed listening to were Professor McDonald talking about buying and Max McKeown, an innovation guru, on “Innovate Your Way Out of Recession.” I’m currently reading his book and it really is inspiring, The event was a fantastic opportunity to network and soak up advice and tips on business in general. I shall definitely return in 2 years time when the project is run again. It will be interesting to hear what we’re talking then. Let’s hope that by then recession is a distant memory!

Had our “Year End Accounts Review Meeting” and I’m pleased to report that we made a profit. Only a small one admittedly but when we see so many businesses in our sector reporting big losses it does give us an excuse for a modest celebration. This has definitely been the toughest year since we started in 1998.

The warm glow from a celebratory cup of tea in the accounts department was unfortunately quickly forgotten when a freelancer called to complain he hadn’t received payment. Could we check with the bank to find out where his payment had gone?  Hours of investigation finally proved that he himself had paid in our cheque but because he’d paid in something else at the same time he hadn’t recognised the amount! It would be laughable if it weren’t such a waste of time and it’s really frustrating. Good freelancers need to be good small business administrators too.

Thinking back to last weekend I was lucky enough to be invited to Belgium to visit friends who are building an eco-house. They’re using solar panels and taking their heat source from the ground via pipes buried in trenches. We try to be environmentally friendly at Corporate Events Plus but I’m going to see what more we could do.

Did some work this week for another production company visiting the local area as part of a simultaneous 14 venue presentation for a new diabetes drug.  It was a good opportunity to work with someone else in the same market and to take on board different ideas on presentation technique and style.

The Destination Growth Event is being presented by the East of England Development Agency at Duxford on the 3^rd November. There are some interesting Keynote speakers and it looks like a good opportunity to network with other business leaders in the region, so we’ve registered to attend.

Off to give blood this afternoon. I just hope I don’t have a bit of a funny turn as I did last time. Apparently I went a very funny colour before I was helped into the recovery position!

Monday; another great day today. Spent this morning in Arif’s studios filming a piece for our new web site. It really did bring it home to me how difficult it is to speak to a camera, even when it’s a subject you know about and really believe in. But I enjoyed it, it was a good experience and helped me to realise what our customers have to go through when they are presenting.  Doing the filming this morning with Arif and the team seemed to generate a load of positive energy which has carried on throughout the day.

It’s been a busy couple of weeks really. And in the middle of a hectic series of six events, including Tesco and Unum, I’ve just completed a charity function for the local church and provided a stage for the RAF Honiton Band to help to raise money for the church funds. To be honest I could have done without that this week but like the buses, they all seem to come at once. Anyway, it all went very well.

Been experimenting with Skype for free internet based telephone and video calling. There seems to be a lot of people using it. We loaded the software onto Sandie’s machine and found she already had 103 contacts in her address book already using it. So we’ve been playing around this afternoon linking our machines in the Suffolk office with Hertfordshire. So far we’ve got sound and vision one way but only vision the other, which is a bit frustrating so much so we’ve even got to the point of reading the manual. We’re three quarters of the way there, so watch this space. It could be a useful facility for our customers if they’re interested in using it.

We’ve been going through a very protracted tendering process for a client. Believe it or not a five stage qualifying process for what is only a small job. If we cost in the tender process we won’t make money on it but I think we want to show willing. Note to self – invite some of the procurement people who don’t seem to get a lot of opportunities to leave their desks to come down to one of the events or conferences we are setting up. I think it would be good for them to see how much effort goes in to ensuring everything works well, looks good and runs smoothly and I think they’d enjoy seeing it.

Been for a reccie with a client to the Grove in Watford; that’s a nice hotel. We’ve got an event there at the end of the month. It was nice to get some good positive feedback from the client on the last job we did for them too. I’m keen to debrief at the end of each job but it is difficult to arrange on a formal basis with the client. If everything has gone well then it’s hard for clients to find the time.

Wednesday. The end of a long day. We didn’t get that job that we were jumping through hoops for and I don’t know what to think about it. After a five stage process and several presentations we were amongst the last two companies in the frame and we lost because the other people (don’t know who they are) were 40% cheaper! 40%!!! I can’t believe it. We’ve checked and re-checked. We know that no one supplier owns all of the outdoor events activities they wanted so whoever does the job will have the cost of bringing those in from a number of sources. What else is there that could make such a difference? It’s not as though we’re operating from expensive offices. Mind you someone did say that people are prepared to bring in casual untrained labour to operate and pay them cash on the day. We won’t be going that route. Too much is riding on it – literally!

Another long day! This time mainly going through stuff with solicitors on the new lease for the building. So now I’m off to the pub for a pint before dinner. I reckon I deserve one. It’s surprising how long it all takes but it’s good to get the house-keeping done while it’s not so busy.

Better news today. We’ve been appointed official suppliers to another international financial corporation. It’s a good step to get the official seal of approval from procurement!