Venue Focus |
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Alistair Stewart and I had an incredible conversation . He was telling me what they were building in the UK and I was telling him what we were building in the States . We always said that at some point , it would probably make a tonne of sense to bring you these two great organisations together . We danced a few times where they say the third time ’ s a charm . And , thankfully , this was the right moment in time to bring the two businesses and brands together .
Our plan is to have one company , two brands . There are 13 venues part of the etc . venues brand – three in the US . We ’ ve got 22 Convene venues and other interesting things in the pipeline . We feel that the future of our industry looks and feels more like the hotel industry where you can operate multiple brands that speak to different segments of the market , and to different size meetings and different budgets .
What I like about the portfolio we have in particular in London is this mix of great venues geared towards smaller sized training and meetings , but it also speaks to the budgets of our customers in particular around their internal facing meetings and events . And then , with the addition of 22 Bishopsgate , and County Hall and 155 Houndsditch and St Paul ’ s , we have a growing network in London of what is larger scale premium conferencing and event venues that deliver a different type of experience .
You mentioned Europe . Do you have plans to expand there ? RS : We have the same scale in New York as we do in London – our two biggest markets , but we ’ re also in Boston , Chicago , Philadelphia , Washington DC , and opening in San Francisco . We ’ re in the process of expanding into Canada . And we will have , in the next 24 months , several locations in Toronto . There is definitely an opportunity to add more in London , and in Manchester and Birmingham . Then Europe would start
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to be the focus . Our head of real estate growth has been spending time to better understand the European markets . Our thing is always for customers to lead the way . We have a list of six to eight cities and markets in Europe where we think we can be successful .
When looking for a new location , does it have to be a particular type of building or space ? What are the key characteristics you look for in a venue ? RS : Each brand has a little bit of a different typology . If you look at the bigger conference and event , you obviously need more square footage . You need large column free space and ceiling heights to run large capacity events . So that ’ s definitely a challenge in any market . Ideally , you ’ d like to be able to control the welcome experience and be able to move people in seamlessly . We always say hello , coffee and goodbye is really important . How do you feel when you show up ? What ’ s the last thing you remember ? And how do you feel when you walk out the door ? Controlling that welcome experience is really important . And then what ’ s nice about the more training oriented , etc . venues portfolio , your smaller square footage can go into smaller buildings and to some extent , you don ’ t need to be in a classy office tower with 40,000 square foot floor plates to open one of those . We ’ ve got more flexibility there .
Diversification of the customer base is important , so we like to design spaces for progressive organisations , regardless of shape and size .
For the most part , we have two core products , we have our meeting event conferencing and training product , which really comes in two shapes and sizes : we ’ ve got the smaller etc . venue venue , kind of training meeting , and then we ’ ve got these bigger flagship venues that can do events of , 1,000 people . And then we ’ ve got what we call our
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“ If you ran an office building like a hotel , and brought in the amenities , the meeting and event space , the food service , the tenant lounge , and cafe , you could create a better experience in the building .” |
workplace product . As part of that we have both private offices where companies of 10 to 100 people outsource their office to us , and get access to all of the amenities and shared infrastructure that we build .
We also have a small but growing part of our business that ’ s membership based .
How much emphasis do you place on sustainability ? RS : It definitely feels like the European customer base is a little bit ahead of what we ’ re seeing in the US , but it ’ s a commitment not just by us , but our clients , and also our landlord partners , to continue to find ways to be more sustainable . And that has broad implications that change how we design space , getting rid of single use plastic , managing food waste . We have a plan to become carbon neutral and we share that with our customers .
In the in the UK , I ’ ve been to 20 or 30 meetings in the last six months with the head of global meetings , events or procurement , and I would say in 90 % of the meetings , the first question was ESG related . It ’ s the first question , so it ’ s definitely front and centre .
In 2019 you delivered over 6,000 events . Last year , you did just under 3,000 . Are the numbers increasing ? How are forward bookings looking ? RS : What we ’ ve seen in revenues this year means we ’ ll be pretty much back to 2019 , although the way we ’ re getting there is different . What we ’ ve seen is fewer events , but bigger , more experiential events with larger budgets . In many cities in the US that we ’ re in , I ’ d say most people are in the office , maybe two to three days a week . It feels like in the UK and in London in particular there seems to be a quicker return to office and also just face to face . n
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