MEET – THE EVENTS EXPERT (OR GURU)
She has been at the helm of over 3000 show-stopping
events, launched a multi-award winning catering
company and is now taking the marquee market by
storm. Kim Maher, joint owner and director of Wirral’s
Cheeky Chilli Catering, event supremo and all-round
wonder woman tells us all about her busy life as one of
the regions most respected event professionals.
With a background in luxury hotel management and a
host of high profile clients under her belt, Kim has spent
her entire career in the events industry. From planning and
managing show-stopping weddings to delivering some of
the North West’s most exceptional events, she has served,
planned and smiled her way through more events than
most of us will experience in a lifetime.
On the eve of launching her most exciting venture to date,
we catch up with Kim to talk weddings, work and why she
thinks Wirral is the best place on the planet.
So Kim, you are a busy lady! Tell us a bit about your
exciting new venture.
Having launched Cheeky Chilli with my fellow director Phil
Williams just over 9 years ago, we have both been blown
away by its success and the amazing feedback we have had
from clients. We’ve got an incredible team and worked
tremendously hard to make Cheeky the ‘best of the best’ in
terms of event catering and management and we are both
really proud of what the team have achieved. Inevitably, lots
of the events we have been involved with over the years have
been outdoors and been hosted in a marquee of some kind,
so taking the next step into marquee supply was an obvious
move.
I teamed up with a trusted business colleague, Lee Dunbar
and together we invested in what has become Signature
Marquee and Event Hire earlier this year. So now its full
steam ahead with our full-service event management
offering.
Tell us a bit about the new marquee.
Well I’ve always been a ‘go big or go home’ kind of girl so we
have gone all out with the new marquee. It’s a state-of-the-
art facility which can be adapted to accommodate anything
from 100 – 1000 guests. It comes with a partial clear roof –
perfect for dancing under the stars, is totally flexible and is
a perfect blank canvas for any event.
We are absolutely over the moon that the new marquee
venture will allow us to deliver exceptional end-to-end
events here on the Wirral, in our own stunning events space.
We are based in Neston and the support we have received
from the local Wirral business community and beyond has
really been instrumental to our ongoing success.
And we understand it’s going to have a magical home
here on the Wirral. Can you tell us a bit more?
We are absolutely thrilled to be working with the team
down at Parkgate Festival Fields to give the marquee a
semi-permanent home here on the Wirral. It’s an absolutely
incredible site with stunning views of the Dee estuary. I think
the Wirral is the most beautiful place in the Northwest and
this must be one of the most stunning locations on Wirral
so we are delighted to be launching the marquee as a venue
in its own right – Mostyn Grange.
A little bird tells us you have a pretty epic launch party
planned for Mostyn Grange?
Yes! We are teaming up with you guys to do the Wirral
Life Summer Ball on Thursday 25th July and we couldn’t
be more excited! It will be an amazing event and a great
showcase for both Mostyn Grange as a venue and of course
our Cheeky Chilli event catering.
Working with the Wirral Life family means we can launch
the Mostyn Grange in style to the right audience and
show the Wirral what we do best – show-stopping events!
As a semi-permanent events space we will be encouraging
clients to come and have a show-round and see the space
in action but it’s also important to stress that the beauty of
having a marquee is that it can be packed up, moved and
positioned pretty much anywhere, so clients can get the full
Mostyn Grange experience in just about any location.
With all that going on, dare we ask what the rest of the
year has in store?
Obviously we will still be working hard to build on Cheeky
Chilli’s amazing reputation. We have exclusivity at 22 high
profile venues across the Northwest as well as still catering
for ad-hoc events across the UK and Europe. We have an
amazing new partnership that we are developing over in
Miami with leading luxury event planner Michelle Stubbs
so that is super-exciting and other than that it’s just all the
usual events mayhem!
We can’t wait to officially launch Mostyn Grange to the great
and good of Wirral at the Wirral Life Ball next month and
we are already taking bookings for this year, next year and
even 2021 so it’s going to be a landmark year for us.
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