BizBash Florida News

EVENT REPORT: Plan Ahead Events Debuts in Style�

]]>Kravis Center for the Performing Arts hosted the launch party for Plan Ahead Events, a full-service meeting and event management company, along with its first West Palm Beach franchisee, Sandy Dorsey. Prospective clients and guests enjoyed the double celebration full of decor, entertainment, and networking.

Guests sipped cocktails and mingled in the main hallway of the center before being welcomed into the event by Street Talk Orchestra, the live band set up inside the parlor. Palm trees with snow-white palms lined the room, while tall, clothed lamps glowed soft hues of orange, purple, and red to illuminate the space. Five vignettes were set up within the room, each featuring a different theme and decor elements. From an elegant Moroccan lounge with exotic centerpieces and a chic sitting area with antique golden hues to an updated tropical lounge with brilliant cranberry and purple, event planner Teresa Harrington provided guests with a sneak preview of the talent and creativity Plan Ahead hopes to offer its clients.

EVENT REPORT: Welcome Home�

]]>U.S. Tent & Rentals' new 20,000-square-foot warehouse and showroom on June 18. The event gathered together many of Sarasota and Tampa Bay's best caterers, coordinators, and industry professionals for an evening of networking under the stars.

A ceremonial red carpet and staff members offering champagne greeted attendees as they arrived. They were then gathered together and given tours of the state-of-the-art facility and showroom before being led out to the main party. The company transformed its loading docks into an energetic event space with the construction of a 50- by 160-foot Anchor Navitrack tent.

EVENT REPORT: Time Travel

]]>Ritz Ybor's grand opening event on June 26. The 1920s-themed festivities offered local vendors, press, and special guests a glimpse into times gone by and of celebrations yet to come. After 91 years and $750,000 of interior renovations, the beloved theater in historic Ybor City is now open as one of Tampa's premier special event venues.

Upon entering the historic theater, built in 1917, at the opening, guests were immersed in clever branding techniques with the venue's signature logo and motto, "Ritz Ybor: Rise to the Occasion." Everything from the welcome mats, lighting effects, napkins, and ice sculpture to the five-foot logo on the checkerboard dance floor was branded.

EVENT REPORT: Mini Takes the States 2008

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The festivities began on Friday evening, as more than 500 Mini Cooper drivers from all over the Southeast flooded the streets of the Magic City. Downtown's Bicentennial Park, in conjunction with Fade In magazine, hosted the meet-and-greet, which featured an outdoor screening of the film National Treasure 2. Mini owners and enthusiasts met up again in the morning at Homestead Miami Speedway, where the event kicked into full gear.

EVENT REPORT: Foodies Serve It Up to End Childhood Hunger

]]>Broward County Convention Center to help raise funds to end childhood hunger through Share Our Strength's 16th annual Taste of the Nation event on June 11. More than 50 restaurants participated in the fund-raiser, including Abokado and Chef Allen's. The convention center was filled will a variety of delectable dishes for sampling, including slow-braised beef ribs from the Capital Grille, a vast oyster raw bar-displayed in a small wooden boat-courtesy of Legal Sea Foods, and jasmine-tea-scented duck confit from Café Maxx.

VENUE NEWS: Number Four for HB's On The Gulf

Naples Beach Hotel & Golf Club restaurant, HB's on the Gulf has won Wine Spectator magazine's "Award of Excellence" for the fourth year in a row. In order to receive the award, restaurants must have a wine list offering no fewer than 80 vintages and the list should also match the menu's theme in price and style. HB's on the Gulf boasts a list containing 140 varieties. The beachfront restaurant is open for lunch and dinner daily.

VENUE NEWS: New Summer Hours at Grass

Grass Restaurant and Lounge announced that it would cease its lunch operations for the summer and extend its hours for dinner. The Miami Spice restaurant-showcase participant will now be open Thursday through Saturday from 6 p.m. to midnight, with its lounge closing at 4 a.m. Grass will be open for lunch again in September.

THE WALKTHROUGH: A Modern Slice of Heaven

]]>Heaven Event Center in Orlando is as modern and aesthetically pleasing as it is functional. Accommodating groups of as many as 500, the center consists of two main event areas: a 7,000-square-foot raw, multipurpose space and a 2,000-square-foot outdoor terrace, as well as a chic lobby that features a two-story waterfall and a plasma TV. In addition, the venue also boasts a 450-square-foot state-of-the-art all stainless-steel kitchen available for use by outside vendors or even for cooking demonstrations and wine tastings.

THE WALKTHROUGH: Art. Lounge. Event Venue.

]]>Nova 535 is one of the newest event venues to hit St. Petersburg. The 7,000-square-foot, bilevel 1920s space has been restored and updated to create a multiple-room venue for meetings and events of various themes and purposes. The space features a 60-foot granite S-shaped bar, plus an additional bar on the second level, a fully equipped catering kitchen, a floating DJ booth, two wrought-iron staircases, a V.I.P. suite, and a covered smoking terrace. In addition to the second floor's private bar and V.I.P. area, an LCD HDTV and surround sound system are also available. Nova can accommodate 200 seated guests or as many as 400 for a reception.

LOCATION SCOUT: State of Transition�

]]>REACHING NEW HEIGHTS
Scheduled for completion in late 2009, the new Panama City-Bay County International Airport will not only increase accessibility to the area and attract larger groups, but is also part of the West Bay Area Sector Plan, a mixed-use initiative to conserve 41,000 acres of shoreline and wetlands, set to be the future home of a nature preservation center.

SHOP TILL YOU DROP
Set to open this spring, Pier Park, is a 1.1 million-square-foot retail and entertainment complex developed by real estate giant the Simon Property Group. In addition to retailers such as Target, Dillard's, and Old Navy, the open-air mall will also feature several restaurants available for groups, and a 16-screen movie theater. And the on-site lake will act as a beautiful backdrop for outdoor events.

THE SCOUT: Upstaging the Ordinary�

]]> WORTH A THOUSAND WORDS They say one picture is worth a thousand words, so what about four pictures? Companies such as PowerSnaps: Digital Photo Booth Rental and Splashlight Studios are now providing a unique event service that gives guests a chance to interact while being furnished with professional-quality photos.

Power Snaps can set up an easily deconstructible, 30-square-foot photo booth with room for eight-complete with funny wigs, hats, glasses, and more. In addition, the booth supplies guests with sharp, professional photos taken with superior lighting and printed right on the spot.

Splashlight Studios has a different take: By setting up a set just like on a professional shoot, they allow your guests to experience the feeling of being in front of the lens for a professional shoot. Splashlight provides the essentials, including a photographer, equipment, backdrop, and lighting, so all that is needed are guests who are ready to strike a pose.

THE SCOUT: Teambuilding: Extreme or Not So Extreme

]]>BLOW 'EM AWAY At Orlando's Thompson Aire, groups of as many as 50 are broken into teams of two to four and put to the challenge of trying to plan a hot air balloon flight, from launch to landing. Noting that hot air balloons fly only with the wind, each team is provided with the latest weather information, as well as identical area maps of launch and landing areas. Using the information provided, it's up to the individual teams to choose launch and landing sites for that morning's flight in a briefing and planning session with a Thompson Aire pilot-who accompanies teams on every flight and evaluates the wind layers to better determine the most effective direction and speed to the chosen landing target. The winning team is determined by whoever lands at, or closest, to the target field and has the closest flight time to one hour.

Once landed, groups are treated to a champagne toast and breakfast in a private room at the Black Angus Steakhouse and given 10 minutes each to present their views, flight plans, and strategies to the opposing team before the pilots choose the winner. All participants are given a Thompson Aire T-shirt as a memento of their adventure, with the winning team also receiving a keepsake photograph of its balloon in a presentation folder with their flight certificate!

THE SCOUT: Healthy Delivers

]]>Fit2Go Meal is an online ordering system and delivery courier in one. These prepackaged healthy gourmet meals-available fresh or frozen, for lunch and dinner-are part of a two-month revolving meal plan designed by a chef and dietitian together. The Fit2Go meals (which are microwavable, making the service a great option for the office) start at just $8.50 per day for an appetizer, main course, and side dish-all under 600 calories! Making eating smart easy, the company also lists a breakdown of every meal's nutritional information on its Web site, as well as packaging, and, taking personal tastes into account, offers customers the ability to customize their meals.

THE SCOUT: Get Jiggy With It�

]]>Bubble Miami has come out with a brand-new way of creating multiple areas within one event space. Enter: the Jigsaw Wall. Made from roto-molded plastic, which is stronger and more easily curved than acrylic, the walls are versatile enough to offer planners a unique way to separate V.I.P., staging, and set up areas from the main event space, or simply provide a unique decor element. Jigsaw pieces are color-customizable, allowing you to create whatever pattern, mood, or design fits your event theme and can also be branded with company logos. Each piece measures 24 x 24 x 8 inches and can be constructed into various sized walls. However, there are two standard sized walls available: 9-piece renting for $280 or 16-piece for $500. Individual unit rental is priced at $55.

INFLUENCES: Coming Together�

]]>How did you come up with the idea to do multimedia collages?
I was actually asked to do a book, and I knew that I wanted to do something different from what you normally see. I'm not an interior designer, but people assume that I am because I studied it in school. I had this idea of following the trail of inspiration and wanted to focus on the finished product without ignoring the journey getting to it. It's meant to really show people what goes on in the mind while you're creating and inspire others to create.

I'm such a creature of journaling, photography, and sketching and have so many journals from my travels. It just so happened that I had gone to Southeast Asia to find the inspiration behind the book when-completely jet-lagged at my desk-I had all my research piled up all around me and I saw one thing over here match another thing over there and I saw a textile match a photograph. So I just started cutting everything out and pasting it together, and that's kind of where the collages started; then I couldn't stop. I didn't leave my kitchen floor for months. It took three years to do the whole book, so it was definitely a process.

Q & A: Why Panama City Beach?�

What makes PCB a great destination for meetings and special events?
Panama City Beach has the most beautiful white-sugar-sand beaches, which create the perfect backdrop for any function. Also, there are so many things to do and see for attendees, including families-Ripley's Believe It Or Not! and Shipwreck Island Waterpark are great options.

How has the city grown since you started your business?
The face of Panama City is changing. The spring-break mystique has been lifted, and that's changing my business for the better. A lot of the mom-and-pop hotels are gone, making way for condos and resorts that are more family-friendly and appeal to the corporate market.

Any advice for planners bringing an event to the area?
Though there are some beaches with public access, beach functions require permission from the structure or entity in front of it. Some planners assume that the beach is free, but here we have strict guidelines for beach access.

EVENT INTELLIGENCE: Capitalizing on a Growing Industry�

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By building relationships with local universities in your area, you can recruit some of the most passionate and knowledgeable volunteers and interns. As an added bonus, these students are driven and keen on building their résumés with professional work experience, thereby giving providing you with an eager employee who's ready to work.

Cost-efficient recruitment. Partnering with universities opens you up to a pool of potential full-time employees without any recruitments costs. These students understand the event industry and are well versed on pertinent vocabulary, which cuts on training time, thus saving money.

According to Tom Barr, coordinator of experiential learning at Rosen, job fairs are another great way companies can save money on recruiting. As many as 75 companies, ranging from hotels and D.M.C.s to corporations seeking an in-house planner, participate in the school's biannual fair every year.

Q & A: Taste Buds with Chef Michael Jacobs

]]>First Step Inside the Kitchen

With a career as an analytical chemist behind him, chef James Slattery of A Land Remembered restaurant at the Rosen Shingle Creek Resort received his formal training from celebrity chef Emeril Lagasse. For eight years, Slattery studied under Lagasse at his Orlando restaurants, Emeril's Orlando and Emeril's Tchoup Chop, beginning as a sous chef before making his way up to executive sous chef while at Tchoup Chop. Slattery takes cooking as seriously as he did chemistry: with extreme precision.

BASIC STATS:
Executive chef: James Slattery
Company: A Land Remembered at Rosen Shingle Creek
Years in the industry: 9

You are an accomplished chemist. How does that make its way into your industry?
I have a master's degree in analytical chemistry from the University of Central Florida, but that is just part of my foundation for cooking. After all, cooking is simply weights and measures, mixing items to create something new, and seeing the reactions between them. I think that it's my intimate knowledge of how ingredients thicken, or how different acids-such as lemon juice or vinegar-enhance the flavor of a soup that has helped me become a good chef, something I didn't begin to pursue until I turned 30. I have taken my knowledge from being a chemist and my passion for cooking and put them together to do something I love-serve others great food.

EVENT INTELLIGENCE: A Flair for the Dramatic�

]]>Venue matters. Where you hold your event determines the type of permits you'll need. According to Steve Freedman of Sparktacular Inc. in Dania, the least amount of paperwork is typically involved when you work with a hotel. In these cases, you don't need to involve the city, as the hotel's event managers will use their discretion as to what they'll allow on their property. However, if you're holding your event in on public property, such as a beach or a park, Freedman emphasizes the importance of contacting the city to avoid legal issues arising during or after your event.

And if you want to take your fireworks out over the water, there are additional legalities to maneuver around, thanks to increased maritime regulations following September 11, 2001. To shoot fireworks off a barge, a company has to submit a permit for approval to the Coast Guard a minimum of 90 days before the event, according to Ernie Ruiz, owner of Party Sparks Inc. in Miami. If a new water location is to be used, such as a private boat or yacht, a minimum of 120 days is necessary for permit approval.

Securing the paperwork. To get a permit for a pyrotechnics display, the fireworks company needs to submit at least five things to the local fire department:

o An application for the permit
o A list of the materials being used
o The fireworks company's insurance documents
o A survey of the launch site
o Proof of license

EVENT INTELLIGENCE: Capitalizing on a Growing Industry�

The University of Central Florida's Rosen School of Hospitality Management is an institution that is constantly supplying the industry with qualified students. The faculty works with industry partners to get their input on the ever-changing field, so that the curriculum offered can be tailored to the current state of the market. In the past several years, the university's event management program, along with many other institutions, has adopted courses in hospitality and event risk management, as well as event technology, to keep students up to date on issues.

By building relationships with local universities in your area, you can recruit some of the most passionate and knowledgeable volunteers and interns. As an added bonus, these students are driven and keen on building their résumés with professional work experience, thereby giving providing you with an eager employee who's ready to work.

Cost-efficient recruitment. Partnering with universities opens you up to a pool of potential full-time employees without any recruitments costs. These students understand the event industry and are well versed on pertinent vocabulary, which cuts on training time, thus saving money.

WHO'S DOING WHAT: New Events Chief at PBCCC

]]>Palm Beach County Convention Center. Bright was formerly an account executive at SunSplash Events, a D.M.C. with offices in Fort Lauderdale and Nassau, and event coordinator for the City of West Palm Beach. Her new role has her overseeing all the events-ranging from 10 to as many as 4,000 people-in the 143,000-square-foot event space.

NEWS: So Cool Now Offering Live Ice Sculpting

So Cool Events, a Miami-based decor rental company, has recently added a new service to its repertoire, live ice sculpting. The company's experienced sculptors can now be contracted to attend your event and create your ordered sculpture right in front of your guests, providing you with a customized sculpture and entertainment.

NEWS: Vettes' 10th Annual at Renaissance Resort

]]>Renaissance Resort at World Golf Village on June 14. The 10th annual "Vettes at the Village" showcased pristine Corvette models from 1953 to 2008, parked right outside the newly remodeled resort. The North Florida Corvette Association and Corvette Club of Mandarin sponsored event, was open to the public and featured a hole-in-one contest where the individual who sunk a shot in the resort's replica of the infamous 17th hole at TPC Sawgrass walked away the owner of a new Corvette. In the end however, none of the participants were successful.

NEWS: Vettes' 10th Annual at Renaissance Resort