Event Industry News Podcast

This week’s Podcast welcomed Director of Broadcasting at Zut, Chris Holmes. He joined the show to talk about the various social media live streaming platforms and how they can be deployed successfully by event organisers.

During the podcast, Chris talked about the quality of content that can be put out and how organisers can best amplify their events down these channels. He also spoke about how these channels offer interactivity elements, allowing events to combine live streaming and audience feedback into one platform.

Referencing work that Zut has done for sports brand Umbro, Chris highlighted how China has seen a massive boom in live streaming, with the UK currently lagging behind the far east when it comes to adoption of the available services when it comes to events. 

In the second of our General Election reaction podcasts, Event Industry News welcomes two more guests offering their views and opinions of how the result could affect the event industry.

Podcast host James Dickson was joined by Director of Brookhouse Ltd David Phillips, a B2B Events & Marketing Consultant, and Nick Wright, a Teaching Fellow in EU Politics at University College, London. Nick’s highly informed input was made more relevant by his previous experience of working within the conference industry.

During the episode, David Phillips talks about the word ‘uncertainty’, and how its frequent use by commentators and politicians is potentially causing even more unrest among business leaders. He also considers whether pessimism within the industry regarding Brexit could lead to a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Following on from last week’s post-General Election special edition, the Event Industry News podcast continues the political debate by looking at how UK music festivals and the live music touring industries could be affected by a ‘hard’ Brexit.

Joining host James Dickson was Parcel Hero’s Head of Consumer Research David Jinks. As a specialist price comparison site, Parcel Hero act as an online broker for logistics, with a significant part of its business conducted in the live music sector.

Speaking under the scenario of a ‘hard’ Brexit, David highlighted many of the issues that could hit touring operations, including the issue of carnets and the financial obligations that would have to be met upon entering the EU zone from a post-Brexit UK.

He also gave some interesting facts and figures relating to European visitors to British Festivals, and whether a currency valuation drop would mean good or bad business for UK festivals.

Last week the country was thrown into turmoil as the General Election returned a hung parliament. Amid growing uncertainty in the business world, what does this election result mean for the events industry?

In a special edition of the Event Industry News podcast recorded on Monday 12^th June, host James Dickson welcomed two guests who lead significant companies within the industry, both of whom have been extremely vocal with their opinions about the UK’s current political status.

Group CEO of DRP Group Dale Parmenter was joined by Andrew Baxter, Managing Director of Europa Worldwide Group.

During the podcast, both guests spoke candidly about how they see the outcome of the election affecting the events industry due to the growing level of uncertainty regarding the makeup of the government and the forthcoming Brexit negotiations.

This week’s Event Industry News podcast welcomed Media 10’s Giles Perry to discuss the ingredients used to create and drive this established brand.

During an engaging conversation with host James Dickson, Giles talked about the challenges of moving the show between various venues including Olympia London, EventCity in Manchester and the SEC, Glasgow.

Giles also stressed the importance of understanding that they work in the entertainment industry and that the content and customer experience is key to them improving the event and delivering the experience that loyal visitors have come to expect.

He also gave his reaction to some well-crafted criticism of the catering at the Olympia show that was posted by a visitor on TripAdvisor. Despite a response by Olympia directing the customer back to the event organisers, Giles confirmed that the catering during their event is delivered by the venue’s own preferred suppliers, prompting a question as to whether the venue team should have taken more responsibility for the complaint.

This week’s episode of the Event Industry News podcast saw two guests join host James Dickson to talk about trackway and temporary surfacing. It’s often the first thing onsite and the last thing offsite and plays a huge part in the planning and execution of outdoor events.

Respected industry journalist and now director of All Access Communications, Nic Howden joined John Davy, founder of Floor Box, a new company that offers trackway and temporary flooring solutions for sale rather than for hire.

During the podcast, John explained how he sees a gap in the market for venues to purchase small quantities of product to keep permanently onsite. He also highlighted the consultation process he plans to offer to clients to make neutral recommendations on which product is best suited to their needs.

In addition to discussing the new venture, John also reflected on his vast experience of working within the temporary surfacing sector, including referencing several examples of how the UK hire industry coped with the huge demands placed on it during the summer of 2012.

This week’s episode of the Event Industry News podcast featured an engaging conversation with Helen Sartory, the creative artist behind a new live music experience called ANDRODES.

Under her stage name SARTORY, Helen has created what is billed as an immersive, cinematic musical journey that utilises 3D animated film synced to an electronic dance music soundtrack, which is performed live. The experience is dubbed ‘Cinematronica’ by Helen, who took time out from her busy schedule to talk to the podcast about the creative process behind the show and how interactive technology is helping shape her ideas for the show.

The ANDRODES show has led to Helen having her own Daft Punk style robot helmet created, as well as a custom-made crystal-like console that houses the various electronic instrument that she uses to perform the live soundtrack.

During the episode, Helen also spoke of her experience of being part of a Hackathon at the SXSW festival in Texas, during which engineers created an app that would allow Helen to send audio to the phones of audience members and utilise the device’s speakers to create additional soundscapes.

This week’s episode of the Event Industry News podcast looked at the Sunfall Festival, an event set to take place in London this summer for the second time.

The festival is a unique event that combines an outdoor daytime element that is then followed by official after parties in nearby indoor venues. Andy Peyton and Noah Ball from the festival’s senior management team joined the podcast to look at the various elements of the event and how it’s put together.

During the podcast, they talk about the challenges of working in an urban park, and how they could split some of the major infrastructure elements with another event that takes place on the same site.

They also talk about the task of ticketing the event with so many daytime/night-time options available and the meticulous level of detail that they paid to the quality of the audio production.

In the next episode of the podcast, host James Dickson will speak with the creator of ANDRODES, an hour-long live show that consists of a projected 3D animated film synced to an electronic dance music soundtrack, performed live by emerging artist SARTORY.

In the second of our live streamed Tuesday night podcasts, host James Dickson looked at the topic of ROI and whether traditional methods of data capture are killing exhibitors’ chances to analyse it successfully.

Joining the podcast was Captuvate co-founder Brian Anderson, a company that through its unique way of capturing exhibition leads has identified flaws in the way ROI can be measured. During the episode, Brian looks at the many different factors that affect how a company can measure ROI from an event, and how the process of lead capture and follow up is contributing negatively to the way it’s calculated.

In next week’s episode, the podcast will be joined by the founders of Sunfall, a brand-new festival coming to London this summer. Tune in to the live stream at 6pm BST via eventindustrynews.com

You can register for the live stream here.

This week’s episode of the Event Industry News podcast looks at the phenomenon of ‘persistence of vision’ and how it has been seized to help create an innovation in digital outdoor media technology.

The innovation in question has been created by Lightvert, a company that has developed a way to use persistence of vision to deliver branded messages. The company’s CEO Daniel Siden joined the podcast to explain more.

“Persistence of vision is a phenomenon that affects the human eye. It happens when you look at a bright light and look away from it. What happens is that you see a ghost of that light for just a moment. What we do is that we use that phenomenon to literally print an image in the human eye temporarily and safely.”

As Daniel explains during the podcast, the technology can be used to create images the size of skyscrapers that appear briefly to the viewer. Although the system has obvious applications in the world of advertising, Daniel also looks at ways that event organisers could use the technology once it becomes available commercially.