Event Organising The Malvern College Summer Ball 2009

"Thank you all very much indeed once again, it was a really superb night"

This was the fourth year running that Malvern college approached us to produce their annual end of term ball.

Having built a fantastic relationship with faculty over the past three years we were confident this year would be the best yet.

With extensive notes from last year and knowledge of what production works well within their grounds we bounded into our first production meeting with school boy enthusiasm.

The brief was simple:

To entertain 500 guests aged between 17 and 97 after dinner in the schools' houses.

As with previous years, both ourselves and the college wanted to make full use of their fantastic historical grounds and architecture.

As guests walked over from the houses after dinner they would approach the central courtyard of the school, flanked on three sides by the medieval architecture, with a St George statue in the middle and sweeping steps leading to flat tarmac and a grass area.

It was here that we erected three marquees.

The first would house a 30ft long bar, hog roast, chocolate fountain and live jazz quartet. Its sides would be clear pvc, allowing guests to look out across the school grounds and the magnificent views to the Malvern hills. We installed a series of low sofas, tables and giant bean bags to give guests a relaxing place to sit. It was fully carpeted with colour changing LED lights to slowly up light the marquee linings throughout the night.

The middle marquee was centrally positioned in front of the clock tower and St George at the top of the main steps. It was completely clear, allowing guests to soak up the fantastic architecture, watch the fireworks and enjoy a drink at the 12ft cocktail bar even in the event of rain. Poser tables and high black leather bar stools were placed around this area.

The final marquee was for the full mobile night club rig. With an impressive black and white dance floor overlaid onto red carpet, fully integrated light rigs using the latest technology and a powerful speaker system this room was designed and erected purely for dancing.

Red carpet was laid throughout the whole event space, leading to the top of the main steps to welcome guests. In the grassy area above the marquees we installed a series of outside furniture. The surrounding medieval buildings were up lit with a series of city colours, powerful up lights and two fantastic sky trackers. Small event flood lights were used to give light to the darkest corners and two gas flambes were installed either side of the steps by St George.

With finishing touches of fairy lights, red bar down lights to match the carpet and some extra large bean bags the event space was set up and ready for guests after a two day build.

Despite some torrential down pours the event was a huge success. The series of 3 marquees with a central clear span roof meant guests could enjoy the wonderful atmosphere, set off by the architectual lighting, flambes and sky trackers without fear of getting soaked.

A professional fireworks display was fired at 2230 hrs, with guests having a 360 degree view through the clear span. It was a fantastic backdrop to the event before guests enjoyed a cocktail, dancing and the chocolate fountain.

As always, it was a pleasure to work with the college again and we look forward to continuing success in 2010!

Testimonial from client:-

Dear Ben and Nick,

I'm writing to thank you both, Kate and all the staff you had working with us on

Friday at the ball. Throughout the evening a host of pupils, parents and teaching

staff came up to me to say what a superb event it was. It seems all the elements

came together extremely well: bar, music, marquees (especially the transparent

section), seating, lighting, fireworks, organisation and the overall smooth running

of everything.

In the three years I've been doing this event Friday was undoubtedly the most

successful thanks to your hard work, planning and organisation. We're almost

verging on "well-oiled machine" territory now for the Malvern Ball.

Thank you all very much indeed once again, it was a really superb night.

Regards

Mat

Chill Out Hire from Capability Events Ltd

Here at Capability Events Ltd we are always on the look out for ways of getting our clients attention and actually getting them to book once we have quoted. I figured that you might be in the same boat.

Here I have put together a few sweeteners which will help you swing the deal in your favour.

Our soft furnishing packages are simple and easy to pitch to your client using our unbranded photos which I am happy to let you pinch and use to show your client. (as long as you come and book with us at some point in the future!)

Package 1 fits very well in the corner of a marquee and consists of:-

15 x Cube Bean Bags, Cream - Allow guests to sit on, not too soft.
4 x Giant Bean Bag Cushions, Cream - 1 x 1m each.
4 x Giant Bean Bags, Cream - Allow guests to sink further into the bag. Appox 1m x 1m x 700mm.
4 x Classic Low Sofa - Available in a variety of colours.
2 x Simple Low white tables.
12 x Simple soft cushions- Variety of colours

Total trade cost inducing delivery and set up:- £500.00 inc Vat (£434.78)
You can sell this package on for upwards of £800.00

Other packages are available just call 01684 833133 or email ben@capabilityevents.co.uk

Just another short sharp hopefully helpful nugget of information from Capability Events Ltd.

Here are the pictures you can use:- (please don't put them on your website, only in your emails to your clients or your paper proposals)




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10 Tips before you send your CV to an Events Company.

This is the contents of an email we send out to the hundreds of people who email us looking for work. Enjoy.

Thank you for your interest in my company.

At the moment we do not have any placements, internships, work experience or vacancies. However we do take people on, often for individual events if your skills match what we are looking for.

By now you will have realised that this is almost an automatic reply to your request as we get so many people email asking for experience or work.

Can I suggest the following if you intend to get into events. Some of these may apply to you some may not. This is general advice for anyone applying to event companies.

1. Take to time to read an event companies website and learn about them. If you do not know what they do they will not give you the time of day so spend 10 mins looking at their site.

2. For goodness sake check your spelling, syntax and grammar. Get someone else to read through your CV, Letter or email to check it is correct in every aspect. You would be amazed at the number of badly spelled emails we get.

3. Don't send Word docs. Save your document as PDF and send it through. Word Docs are terrible at cross compatibility, your time spent laying out your CV so it looks nice is wasted if my version is different from yours. Send PDF's

4. Always include a sensible, suitable for work, picture of yourself. We are human, we want someone who will represent the values and professionalism we wish to show to our clients.

5. Get a real world, non AOL, Hotmail or Yahoo email address. No one takes a email address such as Imapricess@hotmail.com seriously.

6. Clean up your public Facebook profile. Yes we do check you out on Google, Bebo and Facebook Etc.

7. If you have no experience, no one will take you on to organise or manage events, Period. So get experience. Get out there, organise events from charity parties or fun runs to volunteering to work at events for the council etc. And make sure you photo document what you have done. A blog is ideal for this.

8. Event companies really need Event sales people first and foremost because organising an event is easy. Selling the concept to a client is the hard part. So get some sales experience. We don't sit here with loads of event to plan, we have to go out and get clients to give us money to then organise their event. So sell sell sell. And document what you have done in your blog.

9. Everyone you meet in events from caterers to event organisers should be in your contacts book. Build your network.

10. Join our Capability Events Crew pages on Facebook and keep your ear to the ground. We advertise work on FB. http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=17716112748

PS. Never give up, Never moan, Always smile, Never turn your phone off, Never be late, Be reliable. Good Luck.

10 Tips on how to start organising a fantastic event

Here at Capability Events we get many enquiries from potential clients who are at the very start of organising an event. They know roughly what they want to do but all the details are a bit vague.

So we have produced a little 10 step list to guide clients in how to approach the start of their event.

Here it is:-

Before you call anyone to chat about your event it is best to try and decide these basics first so that your supplier can provide you with accurate and sensible advice and quotes. Decisions are key.

1. What do you want to do? You'd be amazed the number of clients who call with no idea what they actually want.

2. Decide on a date or a range of dates, without a date no supplier or venue can quote you or talk to you about their equipment or service availability.

3. Decide on a venue type. Marquee, field, lawn or hotel. Even if you don't have a venue to use yet try and decide on what type of venue would be your ideal.

4. How many people are you entertaining. It goes without saying that a party for 100 people is completely different from a party for 1000.

5. Whats the postcode of the venue. This is very useful for a supplier as it allows accurate location of the event and the ability to decide on the cost of transport. If you don't have a venue yet just saying I want to hold the event in Cheltenham is much better then nothing.

6. One person in charge. If you're the MD of your company by all means delegate the task of organising the event to an employee but make sure that employee feels they have scope of command and are allowed to make some decisions. It is very frustrating for a supplier to not be able to deal with the key decision maker as this makes quoting, and the inevitable following questions a very drawn out process for all involved. This is especially important if you are holding your event during peak seasonal times.

7. What is the purpose of the event? Are you celebrating, showcasing, selling or sharing something? These different event goals all require different handling in terms of your event production. It will effect the atmosphere of the event and what elements your suppliers recommend you have.

8. Try and have a good idea of what you want, even if its just the basic foundations of an event. Suppliers can drown you with ideas but you need to have a good starting point to get the ball rolling. Just saying "I would like to have a memorable party for my 40th" can be tough. However, saying " I would like to have a memorable themed party at home for 150 guests and all I know is I want food and fantastic fireworks" is much better as an initial opener. A decent supplier with good experience will be able to explain the practical pros and cons of different elements of your event to you so you can then make an informed decision about what will work for you and your guests.

9. Know your budget. This is one of the most important things to decide before talking seriously with a supplier such as ourselves. We can guide you, of course but ultimately you get what you pay for. If somebody offers to produce a dinner/dance marquee event for 400 guests for £15,000.00 then be very wary! Its a good idea to have a flexible budget so you can get quotes in on various options to allow you to make an informed decision. An experienced supplier will be able to tell you what is cost effective for your event within the realms of your budget. You will always find that by booking an event package from a single supplier you will always save money in comparison to booking individual elements from separate suppliers.

10. Enjoy yourself! Whether you're organising an corporate ball or a private party at home remember that event planning should be fun. A good supplier will let you be as involved as you want to be and will work with you to produce a very memorable event that hopefully you should get all the thanks for! Listen to their advice and experience and try and find something together that your guests will remember for weeks to come after your event.

Have fun, and last but not least; if your event is outside take wet weather insurance!!!

The Capability Events Team September 2008

Temporary Events Notices TEN's Does your event need one?

TEN's or Temporary Events Notices are a pain in the neck for first time event organisers. This small article should help you to make a bit of headway in the vast sea of licencing that you may feel you are presented with by your local council, police, planning and fire department.

First of all let me state now that I am not a laywer or solicitior and my advice is based on years of practical experience in event licences both the old Public Entertainment Licences and the permission to sell alcohol as well as the new TEN's and premises licences. So don't take what I say as gospel. If you need to get proper legal advice then go to Popplestone Allen They are always very helpful and will often answer simple questions before you start getting into the chargeable section of their services.

So let me dismiss some myths that I constantly hear from clients when organising events.

1. You need a licence to give alcohol away for free. This is not true. If you are giving it away free you do not need a licence. However read on.

It depends how "free" the drink really is.

Without getting into legal arguments:-

If you have a free party and give the drinks away for free then no licence in required. Ie a Wedding, house party, birthday party or company party.

If you charged for tickets for the party then you would need a licence. The council would take the view that its is a profit making venture.

So if you are having a wedding or private party or even a public party and you decide to give away for free the drink over the bar then you do not need a licence. However you must be careful if you are charging for tickets. The act of selling a ticket for money and then giving away alchool could be seen by a keen council licencing office as you selling the drink within the ticket price. This is really only a problem for balls.

The key phrase in the licencing act is "retail sale" and this is what you must always consider. It does not always refer to the exchange of cash for a drink at a bar.

2. You do not need a TEN for a wedding unless you are either charging your guests for access to the wedding with the pre determined view of making a profit or charging for drink over the bar.

3. You do need a TEN for other licensable activities such as dancing, live music and catering within certain hours.

Do give us a call for friendly and quick advice!