With a shiny new year ahead, we’re excited about all the students we’ll get to meet this year and all those fantastic new starts for our ever growing network of Event Professionals!
What better place to start than event venues and how to choose a venue your guests will be talking about for weeks? Based in London, we offer our students access to some of the top London venues like
Wimbledon,
the Shard, the
Olympic park,
Excel/
O2.
Enough of the name dropping: what do you need to know to choose a jaw-dropping venue for your event? Here are our top 5 tips.
1) Location
Figure out your target audience for the event and then look at where will be easy for them to travel to. It sounds obvious, but there is no point having the coolest venue ever if the people you’re attracting can’t actually get there for the event.
2) Capacity / size
Again, obvious but when you are paying a sizeable chunk of your budget for the venue you can’t afford to get this one wrong. A venue too big will deaden any welcoming and networking vibes whereas a venue too small will put everyone on edge. Think about how many attendees you can expect and activities you will have in the space.
3) Atmosphere
Use your creativity here! Before you look at venues you must have a clear idea of your target audience, your event objectives and the theme / concept for your event. When researching venues ask yourself “Can I imagine my event happening here?” If you can’t visualise it, then the venue probably won’t work.
4) Venue management
This is easy to overlook when you’ve got everything else to consider, but check what services the venue team will offer. For example: catering, tables, chairs, waiting staff, set up / clean up crew, audio-visual equipment, extra screens, flipcharts. Figure out what you need for your event and negotiate to get the best value for your money.
5) Cost
Last, but not least, cost is always going to be a critical factor in your decision making. Be clear on your budget before you start looking at venues and be prepared to shop around to get the most for your money. A useful tip is to remain flexible on dates as venue hire often varies depending on which day of the week you book.
Does finding a spectacular venue, wowing guests and using your budget wisely sound like a challenge you’d like to have in 2016?
If you’re thinking about starting something new career-wise and you don’t quite know where to begin, check our
foundation certificate starting at the end of this month. We’ll be taking our students to all those venues mentioned above and more …
Image by
Blondinrikard Fröberg used under a
Creative Commons 2.0 license.
