Simon Mellor, president, dmg events Middle East & Asia, shares his Top Five criteria for appointing event service suppliers.
1. Reliable and agile
The most important quality for me is reliability and the ability to turn things around very quickly and a willingness to drop everything to do so.
When we are in build-up of a show and something happens that may be detrimental to the opening of the show it is vital that we are surrounded by trusted contractors that will go above and beyond the call of duty to pull out all the stops to ensure the show opens on time.
Our bigger shows present the biggest challenges and I would say that we have called on all our official contractors at one time or another to provide solutions and make sure visitors are walking into the halls at the designated time. Also prior to the buildup it is important to be able to turn things around relatively quickly, so we can deliver a fast and efficient service to our internal team and our exhibitors.
2. Professional and dynamic
We look for companies that can push out the boundaries and come up with new and fresh ideas. Harlequin are a great example here when I think about the ME Petroleum Club, every year they take a brief from us and then they put together new and great ideas but they also understand us, the client, the market and our clientele.
3. Costs – realistic and flexible
We value contractors who not only work within normal set budgets but also when we need to operate at minimal costs, the contractor accommodates our needs regardless.
Basically we have the kind of relationship where our suppliers know if they are flexible with us we are flexible with them, working together to help each other, knowing that excess costs can be regained on another project.
4. Previous Experience
We don’t take risks on the unknown. We only every appoint companies who we have worked with before or they have been recommended through someone or a company that we respect very highly.
5. Trust worthiness and consistency of key account managers
To be able to trust a company or person and know that they will do what they say they are going to do and by the time they say they will do it is very important.
Consistency and relationships with the key account managers are also important as you don’t have to keep going over how you like things – forming strong relationships with the account manager means that they already know what you want and how you want things, saving valuable time for the operations team.
An international exhibition and publishing company, dmg events produces market-leading exhibitions and conferences for the global energy, construction, digital marketing, coatings, hospitality and interior industries, with events in the Middle East, America, Europe and Asia.
