With resilience a key theme of Global Exhibitions Day 2021, we speak to some of the winners of the World Exhibition Stand Resilience Awards 2021.
SharpEnd
Platinum Winner Best Pivot to Virtual for a Client
Client: Campari Group
London-based agency SharpEnd was engaged by Campari Group to reimagine an exhibition stand for The Moodie Davitt Virtual Travel Retail Expo 2020.
The collaboration involved landing a private jet in the virtual exhibition hall and whisking visitors off to Venice, Kentucky and Scotland.
SharpEnd’s client lead Eddy Peters says that, although exhibitors were forced to adapt to a digital-first landscape, the agency’s approach has remained one of being led by experience.
“The move to virtual events opened up a wealth of possibilities, not just creative but also data and analytics, allowing us to understand more than ever our audience, their preferences and behaviours, which enabled us to optimise the experience in real time and improve for future events,” Peters says.
OrangeDoor
Diamond Winners for Best Pivot to Virtual for a Client
Client: Dell Technologies
OrangeDoor’s ‘Go Beyond the Senses’ partner incentive programme pivoted Dell’s annual two-day face-to-face event for 30-50 partners into a virtual event that activated the senses for 130 winners from 11 countries. The results exceeded the stretch registration and revenue targets and Edward Low, head of growth at OrangeDoor, believes that, in future, businesses will have risk/Covid policies restricting travel and exposure. “This will mean there will be fewer international events and more, smaller, local exhibitions with higher-level attendees,” he says. “Gone will be the days of lower-level delegates collecting freebies at expos – senior decision-makers will attend to make a final purchasing decision. There will also be more money spent on the experience and higher-quality, more VIP experiences will drive competition for immersive stands, high quality meeting environments and more theatre.”
Low foresees a trend towards brand and partner roadshows. “Mobile and reactive. Experience-led and immersive. Akin to the shift in retail from concessions in large department stores to brand experience retail outlets. Think Nike Town or the Apple Store, but bringing it to the customers. Virtual will organise, inform, segment and excite the customers before-time, while physical shows will react to that intelligence and take the appropriate experience to the customers,” he says.
Brandfuel
Diamond Award for Best Company/Staff Support Plan and Platinum Award for Best New Product Development
Agency Creaplan’s Michael Debaveye (CEO) and Vincent Lievens (COO) say the Resilience Awards were confirmation that continuing to innovate can be rewarding, especially in challenging times.
“We created our safety solutions to help our customers make their workplaces Covid-proof.” they explain.
“We also accelerated the digitalisation of our offering by acquiring businesses with a strong expertise in digital and hybrid events to offer an even broader service, such as online streaming events, with the quality of a top-level TV broadcast.
“In the background we optimised our internal processes, measuring more data and fine-tuning the standard operating procedures for the creation of our stands,” they add.
The team is continuing to seek new ways to integrate technology and interactivity into its stand designs and Debaveye believes stands will become increasingly modular and circular, with sustainability as the goal and that the booth of the future will be hybrid. “Brand experience happens partly on site, partly online. You can be organising a product launch at your stand with 200 VIPs present, but you can stream that event live so that 2,000 people can follow from home.”
