Recent Productions
Happening at the same time as the Technology conference, this event was an offsite meeting for the Executive Leadership Committee of one of GRP\'s largest clients. While the meeting was relatively informal in nature, flawless execution was essential as the attendees and presenters were all the senior level executives within the organization.
In addition to three days of general session, there were off site dinner presentations, and ten breakouts to be seup and managed. Each breakout required full AV and the results of the breakouts had to be quickly assembled into a summary presentation that was given after the breakouts concluded. This presented quite a challenge as each breakout addressed several question with some breakouts addressing the same questions. In all over 50 individual responses had to be organized and assembled into the summary all in the span of 10 minutes. It was a tense 10 minutes but everything was ready when the first presenters took the stage.
GRP was also asked to create a lounge for attendees to go after the formal dinners to relax, play cards or watch television. The room was not available for setup until an hour before attendees were set to return from their off-site dinner. Working with our furniture, lighting and AV teams, and working in close cooperation with the hotel, GRP was able to get everything loaded in and setup in the limited time available. The result was just the environment that the host and planners were looking for.
One of two events taking place over the same week in two different locations, but that presents no problem for the GRP team.
During the height of the technology bubble, this was one of the largest and more complex conferences each year. Following the burst of the bubble however, this event is now only a shell of it\'s former self but it still presents a new challenge each year as we are called upon to do more with less, due to the annual budget cuts. This year\'s event was downsized once more and was even being held at the clients small conference center in Midtown Manhattan. Nearly all of the formal presentations had been eliminated and the conference was now mostly small group meetings. At the last minute however, GRP was notified that all the meetings needed to be webcast to comply with Reg FD, the federal fair disclosure regulation.
The challenge was that while the room setups were ideal for small meetings, they were not designed to handle webcasting. Working with the conference center staff and our webcasting partners, GRP was able to develop a solution. Unfortunately only about half the available meeting rooms could be adapted for webcasting, Bringing in the additional equipment, and phone lines needed for the other rooms was not an option from a timing and budget standpoint, so GRP worked with the meeting host and event planner to rearrange the agenda and meeting room assignments so that every meeting that needed to be webcast was in a room where it could be webcast. A simple cost effective solution that for this conference worked well.
This conference immediately followed the Pharmaceutical conference. Although planned at the same time, the conference provided a definite contrast to Pharmaceuticals. To save costs, this year's conference was moved from a midtown hotel where it was traditionally held to the conference rooms at the corporate headquarters.
This change required a complete redesign of the AV and staging. Although the corporate conference rooms were equipped with some AV, the rooms were not designed to host investor conferences and additional equipment would be needed to make the rooms work. GRP worked with the in-house AV, engineering, facilites and meeting services to determine exactly what was available, what could be used and how it could be adapted to meet the needs of the conference.
Once the internal capabilites were known, GRP determined the additional equipment and personnel needed and coordinated the delivery, setup and connection of the additional equipment provided by multiple vendors to ensure that everything worked as planned. In addition GRP provided onsite management during the conference to ensure a smooth event. In the end, the conference ran without problems, and GRP was able to meet the client's expectations even with a reduced budget.
For the seventh consecutive year, GRP provided production design and management for the annual series of investor conferences for a major financial services company. This event is one of their largest each year with five meeting rooms hosting concurrent meetings totaling nearly 200 presentations over the three day conference. Nearly 1000 investors would be attending during the three days.
The meeting rooms are not available for setup until 11pm the night before the conference begins, meaning an overnight setup in order to be ready for the 8:00am conference start. In addition, the meeting rooms are not on a 24 hour hold so entire rooms must be taken down at 5pm to accommodate evening events the hotel has booked for another client. Rooms are then reset after the evening function for the next days meetings. In addition, the economic downturn resulted in a significant contraction of the conference budget requiring GRP to do more with less.
The GRP team reviewed the challenges and developed an efficient, cost effective solution. Due to time constraints, hard sets and rigging were not an option, so GRP designed a clean & simple stage set using basic lighting and pipe and drape which allowed for a faster setup and tear down. The simple design could also be duplicated in all rooms regardless of their size or dimensions. Working with the hotel and our AV partners, GRP arranged a load in and setup schedule to allow room setups to begin as soon as a room was available without disturbing other rooms that were still being used. Throughout the conference GRP maintained close communication with the hotel banquet department to learn of any changes to the strike/reset schedule and adjusted accordingly.
The GRP presentation management system and network allowed the team to monitor and track the multiple presentations and revisions being sent into the conference to ensure that the proper presentation and version were on screen when that presenter began their presentation.
The GRP planning and experience ultimately paid off as the conference went flawlessly for another year.
One of the five identical conference rooms
One of GRP's financial services clients wanted a different look for a series of regular client Due Diligence meetings. The two day events are generally held in the main conference room at the corporate headquarters. The meeting host wanted a more dramatic and look to present a consistent and more dynamic image to potential clients.
The conference room itself provided some unique challenges. The room was equipped with the typical drop down screens and projectors, a basic built in sound system, dull beige walls and very low ceilings. The room layout and meeting requirements provided additional challenges.
Working with the in house producer, GRP was able to transform the conference room and provide the new look the meeting host was seeking, using only gray pipe & drape, several LED lights and 3 - 42" plasma monitors. The LED lights also allowed the look to be easily and quickly altered while at the same time drawing minimal power.
For the third consecutive year, GRP provided AV support and management as part of the annual MBA recruiting program for one of our clients. These events, a combination of networking receptions and formal presentations, are held around the country in venues on or near the major business schools, such as Wharton, Georgetown, Northwestern and Harvard. The AV requirements are usually fairly standard - one of two presenters requiring powerpoint,and video playback, sound system and several wireless microphones. But the logistics are often much more complicated, as the venues are usually unknown and the time available for setup and testing is often limited. GRP works with the client, vendors and venue to arrange and coordinate the AV setup and operation and also provides onsite management to ensure that each meeting is successful.
For the second year in a row, GRP was contracted to provide AV and staging support for inductees at the annual Kappa Beta Phi ceremony for the New York Banking chapter. Kappa Beta Phi is a professional society. Members of this chapter include CEO's and senior executives from all the leading banks and financial institutions.
Just before the Christmas holidays, one of the largest asset management companies in the country contracted GRP to design, produce and manage a week long internal meeting for its retail sales force. The meeting included two concurrent general sessions, ten breakout rooms with a rotating schedule of meetings and equipment requirements, in addition to two on-site dinners and two off-site dinners with full AV presentations. The logistics involved in pulling together all of the requirements was formidable, and complicated by the fact that the meeting was scheduled for the week after New Years, less than three weeks away. Despite the short notice and the holiday schedule, the GRP team was able to coordinate all of the aspects of the meeting and put the meeting together. The week long meeting went off without a hitch and the client was extremely pleased.
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