IN THE NEWS - GL events

22.Cover story
agency Market Place, who were set to produce
this convention, immediately tried to find a
solution. With the economic crisis to contend
with too, the need to bring all the employees
together remained a priority for MMA. The
group wanted to take advantage of its status as
France’s favourite insurer and mobilise its
forces around the key themes: inventiveness,
competitiveness and complicity. On 20 October,
less than a month before the first planned
roadshow date, Market Place thus proposed an
alternative: a multicast “on line” meeting, with
the CEO Christian Baudon, that all the
employees would be invited to enjoy in
simultaneous transmission. MMA found the
idea appropriate… “It turns out that this
improvised solution has opened up a range of
perspectives for the MMA group in terms of
communication. Now, they plan to use tools of
the Web TV type internally on a regular basis.
From our point of view, at Market Place, we
have also learned a great deal by developing a
technical set-up that we had never used at
such a large scale,” explains Morgane Ley,
project director at Market Place. In other words,
necessity is indeed the mother of invention…
VENUE MANAGEMENT
GL events develops
its network
of “premium”
destinations
To anticipate evolution in an increasingly
international, globalised market,
GL events is developing an international
network of “premium” destinations.
This commercial innovation is only the
beginning….
> Barcelona, Brussels, Budapest, the
Hague, Lyon, Nice, Paris, Rio de
Janeiro, Shanghai… In the last few
years, GL events has developed an international
network of “premium” destinations. The aim is to
anticipate evolution in the event organisation
market which, today, is more international than
ever. There are now many event organisers who
trade show
A good idea
successfully
carried out
For a recurrent event, it is not always
easy to get journalists to attend. For
the 2009 Car Show, GL events offered
them a press trip of a totally new
kind…
> For the 2009 edition of the Lyon Car
Show, GL events innovated. The
communication directors of the car
manufacturers wanted the press day to be as
attractive as possible. Their priority was to
avoid highly formal press conferences which
often fatigue all the participants. As a solution,
GL events suggested a first: co-organising and
co-financing a press trip including test drives of
courtesy test cars, an enjoyable evening, a free
visit to the trade show and the exclusive
presentation of a study on the impact of ecology
on buying behaviour. This original format
appealed immediately to the car firms. In
practical terms, the press trip was conceived in
two stages. First, the roughly twenty journalists
from the national and regional press who
answered the invitation were taken to test drive
a range of different brands of vehicles at Mont
Cindre, for the photography for the site. With
three distinct tracks, each manufacturer made
two vehicles available. In total, 64 test drives
from a wide range of models thus took place.
The day continued with a cocktail buffet at the
Ermitage Hotel in the company of the CEO of all
the brands present: BMW, Citroën, Fiat/Lancia,
Mercedes Benz, Peugeot, Renault/Dacia and
Volvo. “Everyone, from the journalists to the car
manufacturers, had a great day and found the
experience positive from a public relations
point of view,” reveals Nathalie Avallet, the
trade show’s director at GL events.
their enthusiasm, like Gredy Raffin for the
Journal de l’Automobile: “The idea of being
able to test all these cars in such a short space
of time was interesting, both for comparing
the cars and for saving time. For once, the two
days spent at the show were totally productive”.
In total, with 160 articles in the press, 114 on
the web, 18 radio mentions and 9 on TV, the
image and dynamism of the Lyon Car Show
were reinforced for both professionals and
the general public. Given the success of the
operation, the car manufacturers have already
confirmed their own willingness to repeat the
operation in 2011.
convention
Market Place: the
art of reactivity
In September 2009, faced with
the threat of a flu pandemic, the
insurance group MMA abandoned its
plans to bring all its teams together
“live” for a roadshow that was to have
been produced by Market Place. In
response, one month later, the agency
imagined an “on line” encounter.
> In September 2009, the French,
mostly just back from their summer
holidays, were in panic mode thanks
to the strangely named Swine Flu. Facing the
threat of a pandemic, MMA, the mutual
insurance company with more than 7,000
employees, had to respect the government’s
recommendations and avoid all risk associated
with the concept of bringing large groups of
people together. The company thus abandoned
its plans for “live” encounters in the initially
planned form of a roadshow with 6 dates. The
Enthusiastic journalists
The next day, for the open press day, almost one
hundred journalists made the trip to Eurexpo.
The journalists present for the event expressed
GL events magazine - Avril/April 2010