Big Cat Events are now back from sunny Spain after having built and opened the fantastic Star Trek: The Exploration exhibit.  The exhibition is now running until Feb ‘11 in the science museuem in Valencia’s stunning Ciudad de las Artes y las Ciencias.

The build of the exhibition took 2 weeks during which Big Cat worked along side the venue’s in-house crew (muchas gracias) and Victory Hill Entertainment who designed the show.  Long hours and hard work paid off as the finished show looks amazing.

You can check out photos of the build and completed show as well as a daily video diary here:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/bigcatevents/

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ixyBIHHoc-s

http://www.cac.es/prensa/noticia/?contentId=115554

After recently completing a degree in Theatre, performance and Event Design at Birmingham City University, I began scouting around online for event companies that could offer me an internship. With my aspirations in mind, I contacted The Custard Factory Events team enquiring about possible work placement opportunities. I have always loved The Custard Factory and it has been an ambition of mine to work at events there. Within a week, I had an interview at Big Cat, quit my part time job, worked at my first event and began my 3 month internship as an Event Executive. Fortunately, my course prepared me for the fast pace of the events industry so this was all second nature to me. I have thoroughly enjoyed my first week in the company of all the lovely staff at Big Cat and am quickly learning the roles and responsibilities of a member of the events team. I look forward to my first wedding next week at The Old Library and to many more exciting events in the future.

The Old Library came alive with energy on the 6^th March when hundreds of fashionista’s flocked to get their hands on the most unique vintage items they could find. The vintage fair was founded by Louise Whitehead, who after running her own chic vintage store in Sheffield decided to open her horizons into the world of fairs.

Situated within Birmingham’s creative community The Custard Factory, The Old Library was the perfect venue for such an event. It’s souring vaulted ceilings and stunning stain glass windows streamed an almost holy glow of light onto busy shoppers, creating an electric energy which only facilitated in the ferocious exchange of money for goods.

Queues streamed down Digbeth High street with people of all ages, willing for the chance to enter The Old Library and be part of the whirlwind of sales within. Inside there was a fantastic old-school unity between stall holders creating an essence of community, which nowadays is a novelty when comparing it to the modern experience of shopping that most have to endure in more corporate large chain stores or shopping centres. This unique Buzz continued solidly from open to close, leaving stall holders exhausted and elated at their empty stalls, and shoppers with endless bags of quality exclusive bargains. To top it all off the organisers had hand-made 200 of the most imaginative cup-cakes in flavours that were truly delicious and so popular they could have sold out 3 times over.   

Not only was this a day of shopping, but a day of fun, excitement and mystery, allowing each to discover the most perfect one-off vintage item they could find. The old library has such a historic and magical essence to it, you couldn’t ask for a better venue. Is this not the sort of shopping we should get to experience all the time? The Vintage Fair returns on June 12^th for its next mini adventure.

Following the success of Bodies Revealed, Big Cat undertook a similar 360 degree agency project in the form of CSI: The Experience, an interactive entertainment experience. Big Cat events ensured that the shipping of the containers from Poland before loading the show into Birmingham’s Bullring shopping centre. Once unloaded, the show took seven days to build with a total of 10 crew.  Big Cat took charge of all the logistics, technical work and the aesthetics of the entrance. During the exhibition the General Manager looked after the day to day running, reporting to the Event Director before the show was broken down and loaded to its next destination.

Sunday 2^nd May saw the first big music festival of the summer in Birmingham and unsurprisingly it was bitterly cold as revellers enjoyed music from Fatboy Slim, Calvin Harris, Chase and Status and Annie Mac. Located slap bang in the middle of Digbeth in the heart of Birmingham’s Independent Quarter, the Electric Carnival entrance was on Heath Mill Lane off Digbeth High Street, Heath Mill Lane was shut off from the general public as well as the adjoining Lower Trinity St, Gibb St, Adderley Street and Bromley St to make way for an inner city myriad of music and hedonistic partying. The site infrastructure had a main stage in AIR car park, 4 marquee structures and 3 warehouses scattered over the site.

Big Cat managed the advancing of the show and all Health and Safety content which included security, police fire and first aid provision, road closures, TEN applications, SAG management, build and break safety advancing, site risk management and sign off with all elements culminating in the event manual document. Big Cat had overall site responsibility pre, during and post the event.

We are happy to report another successful safe event for Birmingham under the Big Cat team.

Heading up the event division of a leading communications agency I fully embrace and push for the integration of digital communication and live events to enhance the quality of content and delivery of a specific project, but during my daily commute I read an article entitled ‘Twitter dating for tech-savvy singles’ which I had to comment on.

The following article explained a new style of event in Canada where essentially hundreds of singles attend an event and ‘flitter’; a mix between Twitter and flirting.

Each singleton is given a number on a sticker (e.g. #129) and during a drink if you like the look of a potential ‘love of your life’ you twitter their number and start a flirtatious conversation on your phone whilst at a distance. One guest twitted “#129, you’re so fine, but #152 you’re hot too.”

Call me an old romantic but is this a little wrong, what’s happened to asking a women out on a date face to face? Aren’t the nerves, sweaty palms and crackling voice all part of the excitement of finding a potential soul mate?

I’m glad to be out of the dating game.

The Big Cat event team is becoming busier and busier with loads of exciting events coming up over the next few months. With a new exhibition launching  in the next few months the events team are in need of a new work experience person to help the team.

If you are looking to break into the event industry and are finding it a tricky task in such hard times this could be the opportunity you are looking for. The lucky person will gain tons of great experience working within a busy events team. This is an unpaid, full time placement that could lead to a paid position within the company, or at the very least some valuable experience and a great reference. Which is an absolute must when breaking into the events industry. The applicant needs to be driven, hard working and outgoing with a passion for events.

Please email L.campbell@bcguk.com if you think you could become a part of the Big Cat family!!

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Since joining the Big Cat events team this summer I have been a part of organising many wedding receptions. However, last week was the first ceremony that I have done at the Old Library, and what a lovely event it was. Though I was slightly gutted to be on guarding the door duty and didn’t actually witness the “I do” bit, that didn’t take away from the excitement of the day.

Seeing the bride arrive looking super cool in a 40s inspired dress and bright red lipstick, to the transformation of the space that had to occur from simple and elegant for the ceremony to a retro cool ambiance for the evening do, made the whole day a interesting challenge for me. The sun shined for the barbecue and drinks on the bandstand, everyone drank lots of wine and danced the night away. What I have noticed working on the various weddings this summer is how young the couples are.

Everyone talks about how society is waiting longer to settle down and is putting off marriage, but from the weddings I have witnessed that isn’t the case. Maybe it is due to the Custard’s factory’s arty, bohemian feel that the people attracted to the venue are younger. Whatever the case, I love the young Weddings that tend to be far more inventive with their themes, giving us organisers lots of fun ideas to work with.

Is Health and Safety in danger of suppressing all human inhibitions? I recently spent a weekend in Torquay (not the best destination, but still enjoyable) and on arriving went to enjoy the outdoor swimming facilities which overlooked Torquay Bay, however I found the view obscured by no less than eight warning signs. No diving, No running, No swimming (nearly).

I then took a walk along the cliffs and found that a section of the footpath had been closed due to insufficient railings being in situ. The footpath was over 3m wide and I found this level of precaution completely ridiculous. Surely everyone on this planet has to take a degree of responsibility over their own actions and constantly assess the risk of situations they face.

If I was with a young child I would then assess a situation on their behalf and them observing your actions is one of life’s learning experiences.

We all think that our director is pretty brilliant but now we see that the industry agrees. Event Magazine has published the Event 100 Club this month and after a crazy year in the events industry with the level of innovative event solutions being higher than ever before, the readers had plenty of choice for their top 100 most influential people. More than 2000 people voted nominating more than 300 key figures and Nick Morgan was voted number 71!

Now before I get down to business I would like to wish everyone a happy New Year from all the events team. This is an exciting New Year for events and some changes have been made within the company that needs to be celebrated. The main change for the events team is that former Senior Events Manager, Nick Ruffles has been appointed as Events Director.

Having studied Product Design and Marketing at Southampton Institute, Nick joined the Big Cat team in 2008 and made quite an impact. Within a year Nick has already worked on some of the regions most prestigious events including Hello Digital; Birmingham’s first digital media and film event and the Creative City Awards.

Nick said: “Big Cat has given me many unique and fantastic opportunities in such a small space of time. Events I’ve worked on range from the URA Star concert which was for 6,000 people at the NIA, to the more corporate Innovation Advisory Service workshops which are run in conjunction with Business Link.

“2010 is set to be another outstanding year for us with a number of high-profile events both in the private and public sector. The past year has been a struggle for the events industry across the country as many clients are severely cutting budgets and expecting a lot for nothing, however it’s our job to make the most of the resources we have and ensure our suppliers are competitive which will in turn ensure the events we put on are something to be proud of.”

Congratulations Nick you deserve it.

Well what an exciting week we have had at the Big Cat office. The whole office has been buzzing over the Old Library refurbishment which is starting next week. The £100,000 refurbishment will give our fabulous event space at the Custard Factory a much needed facelift. A new lighting system will be installed, as well as new flooring and an entire repaint, leaving the venue looking it’s best for the upcoming events. So expect lots of pictures next week of the entire process, including all of us in our overalls getting covered in paint. 

As the newest member to the Big Cat Group, I am reporting to you my experiences of various events from a new perspective. One of the recent events that has caught my eye is the T-Mobile’s new Life’s for Sharing campaign’s flash mob event, that made quite an impact throughout the world. The first event was the hugely popular impromptu dance off in the middle of Liverpool Street station that, considering 6 million of us watched on YouTube, I am sure you will have seen it?

So here’s my question of the week: What do you think of flash mobs? Do you know what they are? Love em? Over them already? Whatever you think, Birmingham needs one. Soon! Hmmm, this could be worthy challenge for Big Cat. Do you want to see 500 dancers – or jugglers? mime artists? opera singers even? – in Victoria Square? I know I do! Watch this space….. 

The new events girl, Leila.