Event planning and event management is a rapidly growing, multi-million pound industry.
Events can range from the 7.7 million-ticket London 2012 Olympics right down to a small wedding with 50 guests.
This industry is varied and expanding fast – with intense competition and high demands – so how do you get into the game?
Many dynamic businesses offer a range of exciting, challenging opportunities for professional event managers, party-planning companies or wedding planners. Events management is a sustainable industry.
A primary goal for an events-planning business is to create a fresh experience, but still rooted in its founding customs and principles
Fresh experience
Manchester Pride is one of the biggest annual celebrations of lesbian and gay culture in the UK, blossoming over the last few years to include a range of art, cultural, music and social events. It raised raised £105k for charity last year, which 2009 is set to top.
Manchester Pride is known for reinventing itself year after year, a big asset to any event. A primary goal for any events-planning business is to create a fresh experience, but still rooted in its founding customs and principles.
As Pride organiser Jackie Crozier states: “Manchester Pride has traditionally been a fundraiser for the LGBT and AIDS/HIV communities and is the only Pride event in the UK that has consistently done so.”
Tradition is key, and valuing heritage can make any event's success sustainable. The prominent music festival Glastonbury learnt this the hard way.
In 2008 the field-dwellers were outraged by the appearance of rapper Jay-Z on the same stage that so many indie favourites had performed on. Noel Gallagher, outspoken guitarist of the now disbanded Oasis, blamed poor ticket sales on this factor, telling the BBC that “Glastonbury has a tradition of guitar music…I'm not having hip-hop at Glastonbury. It's wrong.”
Opening Doors and Venues is a corporate events-planning business started by Rose Padmore nine years ago. On her approach to event management, Padmore says:
