THE MEETING PLACE IN BRIEF
• YORK Brewery, a historical working brewery located within York’s city walls, has undergone a redevelopment of its facilities and organised trails to better suit the needs of the corporate market, and now offers a selection of refurbished meetings rooms.
• cOnfeRence Aston has launched a new campaign promoting the city of Birmingham. The conference centre and hotel has produced a guide to encourage visitors to make the most of the city by checking out insider recommendations on the best places to eat, drink, visit and enjoy a night out. The guide is being launched later in September and forms part of Conference Aston's ‘We Love Birmingham’ campaign.
• cOtswOlds & Forest of Dean Tourism has launched a new meeting room and conference venue sourcing facility for the region. The new website,
BoardroomStyle.com, will officially be launched at the end of September and offers a new way to check for suitable meeting room and conferences venues, and availability.
• A new meeting facility is now on offer in Horsforth, near Leeds. The Meeting Rooms, in association with Bar 166 & Bistro, have been designed with small businesses in mind with capacity for up to 30 delegates. They have full phone, fax and wifi facilities, as well as award-winning catering from Bar 166 & Bistro. The rooms are tastefully decorated and have ample natural daylight. Hire charges are per hour rather than per delegate, and start from £75 for three hours. Catering options include breakfast at £4 per person and a buffet lunch at £9 per person, or there's 15 per cent discount off the Bar 166 menu. Two of the three rooms can host 18 in boardroom style and ten in boardroom style respectively, while the third room – the largest and most versatile – is located at Bar 166 & Bistro has capacity for up to 30 delegates.
• THE Academy of Medical Sciences has refurbished 41 Portland Place, London, and opens it this October as a venue for non-residential meetings and events. Located in the heart of London, the Grade II listed building designed by James Adam in 1773 is close to Euston train station and a five-minute walk from both Oxford Circus and Regents Park tube stations. The Regency townhouse has been subject to a £5million renovation programme which sees its facilities now comprise seven meetings rooms spread across three floors; an exhibition area and a purpose built conference suite. Audiovisual services, wifi access and videoconferencing are all available.
➔Wembley scores with events success
DAVID CAMERON clearly embraces the importance of face to face communication. His ‘meet the PM’ series of regional events put him very much at the forefront as an exponent of audience engagement. Given that he has not shied
WEMBLEY Stadium recently welcomed its 250,000th visitor to its corporate facilities since the iconic London football stadium reopened for business. The venue says its state-of-the-
art facilities can cater for meetings for two people through to 1,000 for a conference, 2,000 for banquets and 3,250 for receptions. Its Pitch View Rooms are suited to groups of eight to 12 people, while the Bobby Moore room, Great Hall and Wembley Suite can host
significantly larger gatherings. Jackie Boughton, head of sales, conference and banqueting for Delaware North Companies at Wembley Stadium, says, “Our success is down to our superb facilities, creative food policy and an outstanding event management team. This is among the most flexible function spaces in London and I'm especially delighted that to date, since opening the Stadium, we have already successfully delivered over 1,500 events.“
QHOTELS INCENTIVE FOR BOOKERS
QHOTELS is offering conference, meetings and events arrangers the chance to win a trip of a lifetime to South Africa with its new booking incentive scheme. The group is running a promotion until the end of September whereby all enquiries with a value of £1,000 or more will automatically be entered into a prize draw. The prize holiday for two people includes a stay in Cape Town and safari trip. The promotion has been launched to help boost QHotels' third quarter bookings and follows customer feedback that the chance to win a holiday abroad is high on the list of incentives that draw bookers to a venue. Debbie Milburn, director of marketing services at QHotels says, “We've all seen so much of South Africa during the World
Cup this summer, and now our customers are being given the opportunity of a lifetime to visit this vibrant country. We are always listening to our customers to ensure we know what kind of incentives really appeal to them, and feedback has been that a holiday abroad tops the list.“ To be in with a chance of winning, simply contact the company with your inquiry on 0845 074 0062 and quote 'South Africa'. Alternatively, if submitting an online enquiry at the group's website –
www.qhotels.co.uk – insert 'South Africa' in the 'other' section of the 'Where did you hear about us?' box. QHotels has 21 properties across the UK, including hotels in York, Leeds, Manchester, Oxford, Cambridge, Shropshire, Kent, Nottinghamshire and Hampshire.
away from difficult questions – occasionally to his detriment – he has also learned the true potency of this live medium. By providing access to the media and creating a link to the No.10 website he has certainly managed to reach an audience significantly greater than those present at the live event and, in doing so, is further leveraging his return on investment. As is increasingly proven to
be the case, live events are one of, if not the most effective mediums of communication, especially when they are used to drive messages on a broad scale and create engagement at a local one. We must, therefore, hope that
the government bears this in mind when they seek to cut government departmental expenditure on activities such as events, and take considerable resources away from organisa- tions such as the COI, with a consequent knock-on effect in terms of jobs among all those event agencies and companies in the supply chain. As the Prime Minister himself recognises, live events have an absolutely vital role to play in the communications mix and this must continue to be embraced by his government. If the coalition government is
to make what are going to be some very painful cuts, it must remember, more than ever, that there's a very real need for live events to engage with the public along the way.
EVENTIA UPDATE
MARK SAXBY EVENTIA CHAIRMAN
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