Festival organisers, suppliers and event production teams are set to see their work officially rewarded this October when the inaugural Festival Supplier Awards are launched.
Designed to recognise the best suppliers to the growing festival industry, the Festival Supplier Awards will showcase the companies and individuals that help create some of the UK’s most well-known and best-loved festivals. 24 awards will be presented in total, with categories honouring all aspects of festival production from staging and safety to barriers and bars – together with a special award for the industry’s rising star.
“Many event suppliers have indicated that the festival sector represents a significantly increasing proportion of their business,” explains Michelle Tayton director of AMP Events, the team behind the Festival Supplier Awards. “With festivals also offering a good benchmark for the way live events are transitioning e.g. through RFID technology and experiential marketing and with over 60%* of music tourism delivered from festival-goers, we felt the timing was right to launch a dedicated awards evening to highlight the creativity and innovation that festival organisers and suppliers deliver on every occasion.”
The Festival Supplier Awards will be judged by an expert panel, chaired by Nic Howden, a journalist with over 12 years’ experience covering the event industry. The awards ceremony will take place on the evening of Wednesday 22nd October at Newbury Showground, coinciding with the culmination of the first day of the Showman’s Show, the premier exhibition for outdoor event services. The black tie dinner will bring together suppliers from across the UK in what is also set to be a superb celebration to the end of the season.
“We are confident that the Festival Supplier Awards will provide a spectacular finale to a busy summer season for the UK’s event industry. With the festival sector diversifying rapidly in the last few years, meaning it’s so much more than ‘rock ‘n’ roll’, we wanted to provide a platform to celebrate the ‘behind-the-scenes’ teams that are the lifeblood of any successful festival. We believe these are the only awards to do so and are excited to crown the winners in October!” added Paul Allott of AMP Events.
AMP events is a collaboration between Adam Parry and Paul Allott, owners and co-founders of Event Industry News and the Event Technology Awards; and Michelle Tayton, owner of Eventive Communications. For more information about the Festival Supplier Awards, which will be open for entries from (date), please visit (website) or follow @TheFestAwards.
*based on AIF statistics
