Te SECC relies on the warmth of its staff and developing strong personal relationships with clients and partners, at home and abroad
BY KEVIN O’SULLIVAN I
’m with colleagues when I first meet Kathleen Warden, Conference Sales Director at the SECC in Glasgow. It’s a few short days after Hogmanay and
though it’s crisp outside Kathleen is positively brimming with excite- ment as we sit down for coffee in the warm and cosy interior of the Clydebuilt bar & kitchen. She is excited about Glasgow, the
SECC and its people, not necessarily in that order but it’s a story she is keen to tell: there is a real sense of pride about the venue, the place and the relationships being forged with the likes of the Glasgow City Market- ing Bureau, a partnership which has flourished in recent years and per- haps is a living embodiment of the kind of community ethos invoked by the People Make Glasgow brand. It’s a slogan that has proved
to be tourism gold for the city as well, having been endorsed for its marketing nous and sense of real meaning by the New York Times. Yes, Glasgow is very much a city
at ease with itself; in the two years since the Commonwealth Games the place doesn’t feel as if it is coming to terms with loss, as can happen with global cities in the aftermath of a ‘mega event’. “I think the Commonwealth
Games actually endorsed our ability to deliver complex and challenging events,” says Kathleen. “But this is something we’ve been doing, in the case of the SECC at least, for the last two decades. And I think what our citywide branding sought to evidence, and does actually dem- onstrate, is that we have the people, the skills and expertise which dif- ferentiates us from the rest. I really believe that.”
IF YOU CAST your eye outside the centre itself, unveiled 30 years ago by the Queen on an admit- tedly rather barren-looking patch of wasteland, the skyline has also altered tremendously, as a result of
The SECC is a front-runner in the global events business projecting its sphere of influence across the UK and beyond
both pre- and post-Commonwealth Games investment in infrastructure. World-leading architects Foster
& Partners created the now iconic Armadillo and more recently the SSE Hydro arena, which act as the visual eye candy alongside the more functional SECC; the Zaha Hadid Transport Museum glitters on the horizon, and the Glasgow Science Centre also competes for the prize of the most shimmering pearl on the Clyde. “Tese places really are as cool as
they get,” adds Kathleen. “But it’s not just the great architecture and the skyline; we’ve got five hotels on campus and another three being added, giving us a total of 1,600 beds for delegates. And just a short walk away is one of the most thriv- ing restaurant districts in the UK, in Finnieston. Tere are around 40 restaurants there now - it’s a really funky and up-and-coming place.” Whilst painting a picture of a
place may be pretty and romantic Kathleen inevitably wants to convey the sense of Glasgow as a continu- ally developing place as well. “If you look at a map 20 years ago,
when the perception was that the SECC was an out-of-town industrial area, and look at what the area is like now, it’s totally transformed,” she says. “We’ve had massive infrastructure development, we’re sitting next to the number two live
entertainment venue in the world by ticket sales at the SSE Hydro, placing it above Madison Square Gardens and Berlin, and the SECC is a very big and growing player in the global conference market, which is sited on an ever-evolving events campus. Whilst a few people still have the perception of Glasgow as an industrial city, it’s a far cry from how it was in the 1960s.” Kathleen’s enthusiasm for the
city may be infectious, and ever so slightly partisan, but the guide books line up behind her: Te Rough Guide, Fodder’s, Te Tele- graph, Te Guardian and Wander- lust have all placed the city on their bucket lists.
THERE IS, however, another topic Kathleen is keen to talk about, and that’s the SECC and its business focus. It is of course well known for big
expos and exhibitions with the likes of ComicCon packing the rafters with an assembled cast of Darth Vaders or Stormtroopers. But the venue has also become a destina- tion for huge 2,000-plus delegate events for the large conference mar- ket, for the likes of the Association of Medical Education in Europe. Doctors also declared last year’s annual Royal College of General Practitioners gathering “their best
EVENTSBASE | MARCH 2016 | 27 Continued on page 28 ➜
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48