The One Million Euro Man.
At a certain major company in Germany I am still known as ‘the million Euro man’
Often Event managers of big companies think that by simply engaging a local, high profile event-agency, everything will just get done.
Did you ever notice as an event manager that foreign events are always somehow more expensive than at home?
Why is that?
Firstly there is the perception of the local events company.
They want to do their best to please you and make the event work, so they put their whole team on the job to make sure everything is covered.
A noble gesture, but at the end of the day you pay for all of them.
For instance, The first time we were in China, we had a preliminary briefing with the local production company.. there were 25 people present, just to receive the first briefing. Obviously this was a bit too much, we revisited their organigram and cut around 70% of the people just like that. In the end they did actually work on the event, but not all as executive producers and with far lower wages.
Secondly there is always the issue of technical equipment. You put a wishlist on the table and 3 days later they make you a first offer, the prices are extremely high? Why?
Again because they want to fulfill all your wishes, and if they don’t have the equipment over there, they will buy it and make sure you have what you ordered. But again, you pay the buying price instead of a rental price. So it’s very important that you have someone to translate your wishes to the local rental market, so that you get fair value for money.
Concerning decoration, it’s always bit more of a difficult one. Your partner/supplier will always try to produce it in the cheapest imaginable way, and then will try to sell it on to you it as expensive as possible. In Europe and the USA you can rent a lot af decoration, but in other countries they will always tell you “it does not exists”. And of course you’ll have to pay the full monty for the manufacturing of the whole decoration. Curtain-rentals don’t exists, stages are always custom made, there are no standard exhibition walls and so on.
At this point, it’s crucial that you communicate your expectations accurately. At Mundomatic, we often base our specs on standard materials that we’ve used in the past, which our partner simply has to copy and manufacturer.
But don’t forget, in our world things are made to last as many as 100 rentals. This kind of quality isn’t necessary for your single event. So things can be produced cheaper and still look good, for off use. Of course you have to be aware your partner doesn’t produce stuff too cheaply and the stage collapses, or the curtains are see through. That’s way we always ask for samples off everything.. and of course a pre-build example of everything.
And then of course there is the schedule. The way we build and manage events in Europe or the US is very quick. We go in, build the show in 3 days, do the show, and get out in one night.
This is almost never possible abroad. Different mentality, different skill sets, another culture.. etc, there is always a reason. That’s why we always make sure one of our own team is on site, so we can follow the process and steer things where necessary. This way we know at any given moment where and why things are going wrong, or where things need to be speed up.
By taking into account these four major points, we can often reduce your event-costs significantly. As I said, I reduced the costs for a certain client form 3 million Euros to 2 million Euros in just 20 minutes. By changing technical specs, checking out the local rental market, optimising the crew and schedule, and negotiating materials and prices on decoration.
So the main lesson? Take your own technical director with you, someone who knows about the equipment, who knows how to plan, has decoration-experience, and understands the culture so he can adapt the planning and workload accordingly.
He will recoup his wages more then you could have ever imagined.
If you need more info, please drop us an email at info@mundomatic.com or check out our website : www.mundomatic.com
Kind regards,
Piet Winten
CEO Mundomatic