“ We pride ourselves as magazine publishing company and an events company ,” he says .
Setting sights When it comes to growth , Allen is open-minded and in his own words “ opportunistic ” without any hard and fast parameters of sectors beyond their remit .
He says : “ If there ’ s something we like , that has value , that we feel we can do something with , then we ’ re interested . In most markets , in the business-tobusiness-side in particular , we would be interested in , then we provide different synergies .
“ We have seven or eight different music magazines . We bought one music magazine , because I happen to be interested in jazz , from that we then developed a synergy around it .
“ We are looking opportunistically but if they fit within our existing sectors and add strength then that is a key point . But I wouldn ’ t rule out anything .
“ Some people might criticise us for
that , but the reason why we have been so successful in the past two years is because of the range of sectors we are involved in . If one sector is feeling the pinch , then other sectors within our group likely to be doing well . It ’ s been incredibly helpful for the group as a whole .”
Future fears Looking forward there are some potential hurdles on the horizon for exhibitions , Allen says .
“ The main problem for the exhibitions industry is we are living in very uncertain times ,” he says . “ We ’ ve got the pandemic still raging in China , a lot of people and businesses don ’ t want to travel to certain areas . The war in Ukraine is obviously of huge concern and spilling over to other parts of the universe . We have great pressures like the cost of living crisis and all those different factors are going to have an effect on events sooner or later , somewhere down the line people are going to be looking at purse strings and deciding whether to sponsor or attend an event . That is going to have an impact .
“ Hopefully , most companies will be able to come through , but they are enormous challenges .
“ It ’ s almost harder this year to predict the future than it was at the onset of the pandemic because there are so many different things going on there .”
Optimism Despite the difficulties of the past two years , Allen says the pause of events gave them the chance to slow down and reflect on where to make improvements .
He says : “ What ’ s happened over course past two years is best companies have got stronger .
“ We ’ ve done really well . The ones with the most problems are going to fail . That will go on for the next few years and a number more companies will go to the wall . The best will survive and get better , but some won ’ t .
“ You can ’ t suddenly shift the axis of the world by yourself . What you can do is try to be as creative as you possibly can and see if there are opportunities in a murky world .
“ There ’ s always things you can do in controlling your costs . On the exhibition side , we want to be in the greatest venues and have the nicest furnishings and for everything to look really good , but sometimes you have to think whetherwithout putting the event in jeopardythere are things you can do to save on cost .
“ Don ’ t throw out the content or quality but there may be things we can do which the punters coming to events won ’ t notice .
“ We have always done well in a crisis . When there ’ s been recessions and difficulties we ’ ve done well . We ’ ve got a really superb team who have grown with us - very creative thinkers with can-do spirit and they think outside the box and those people I have tremendous admiration and confidence in .
“ You have to come into work and think ‘ how can we improve our performance ?’ That ’ s where you can score points and make a difference to the final outcome .” EN
July — 41