19
Cover Story
Banking
on Change
Banks have been playing hardball with events
businesses, but are they right when client
objectives are certain to change? Martin
Fullard talks to SXS Event’s Johnny Palmer
“We are a production AV
company. We do everything
from building stages and
scaffolding, through to content
and marketing strategies for
live events,” Palmer tells me
concisely. “The best way to
describe us would be an
agency, but all of our
resources are in-house.
“Most of our revenue is high
level corporate, working for
clients like IBM and Microsoft
and working on events where
those kinds of businesses are
sponsors. We also get involved
in product launches, and for
fun we get involved with
festivals to keep things fresh
and creative. Our core
business is typically around
corporate, conferences, award
shows, product launches, and
broadcast-based experience.”
Palmer adds that SXS Events
operates overseas, too, and
not just in the UK, and that he
employs 25 full time staff.
Before asking Palmer
about the future, I ask him
about the past. In 2019, I
ask, did he think the industry
was going virtual, and was he
making plans with that in
mind? “I always thought the
industry was based on a lot
of legacy habits and
traditions,” he says. “I always
felt over my 20-year career
that people need to shake
things up and look at things
differently. One of the things
I’ve been looking at is how do
we make events less binary?
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