| NEWS 09.17.09 12:15 PM |
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Emmy Parties and Suites: TV Guide Is Off, ET Moves to Vibiana, HBO Gets Euro Style, EW Partners With Women in Film
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With the Primetime Emmys coming up this Sunday, September 20, the calendar is bustling with related events following on the big show's heels, with only one significant dropout. Here's a roundup:
In what has been a tough year for the publication, TV Guide will not host its traditional big party this year. Event Eleven, helmed by Tony Schubert, who has produced the event in past years, will work on the Entertainment Weekly party at the Sunset Marquis on Thursday night. For the magazine's seventh annual event, Entertainment Weekly has partnered with Women in Film's new TV and media committee. Maybelline New York's new Colorsensational Lip Color will sponsor, and organizers will infuse the brand’s color palette throughout all the details of the decor. PMK/HBH is handling PR.
Among the other big pre-parties is Family Guy's event, which will take to Avalon Hollywood on Friday night to celebrate its nomination for best comedy. Night Vision Entertainment is producing the event, which is set to include a 45-foot inflatable Peter Griffin character out front. Inside, conductor Ron Jones will lead an orchestra. And instead of a standard photo booth, guests' photos will go into flipbooks (simulating a cartoon—get it?). DJ Rick Rude will spin ambient tunes upstairs in Bardot. Entertainment Fusion Group is handling PR.
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RELATED TOPICS
Emmys, Award Season, Women in Film, Family Guy, Maybelline New York, Niche Media, Los Angeles Confidential, Gift Suites, Entertainment Tonight, People, Entertainment Weekly, Academy of Television Arts & Sciences, Governors Ball, Comedy Central, HBO, Fake Bake, T-Mobile, Save the Children, Susan G. Komen Foundation |
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| Q & A 05.28.09 2:33 PM |
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Brent Bolthouse on Big Budgets, Smaller Parties, and Keeping Young Hollywood Entertained
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 | Brent Bolthouse
Photo: Randall Slavin |
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Brent Bolthouse has been an established name on the Los Angeles nightlife scene for years, with his own production company and its roster of corporate clients including Dior, Target, Maxim, Prada, and HBO. After a series of partnerships brokered in the past year, he now runs events as the head of full-service production company Bolthouse Vox Events, the product of relationships with some of the leading names in the L.A. event industry. Bolthouse merged his firm with Vox Entertainment and SBE, and the new company has an exclusive catering contract with Wolfgang Puck. Bolthouse took some time to speak with us about the strategies behind the alliances.
Bolthouse will also speak at the BizBash Expo June 11 at the L.A. Mart in Los Angeles. Information about the show is here.
Why did you decide to join forces with Vox Entertainment, SBE, and Wolfgang Puck?
Last year we started exploring possibilities to expand our event business and talked with Vox. They were always a nuts-and-bolts production house, and we were always on the entertainment side. We had a core warehouse of furniture, and they had [elements like] lights and barricades. Just looking at the economic climate, we decided it’s smart for us to pool our resources and create a joint venture to really strengthen our position in the marketplace. Our companies complemented each other.
Wolfgang Puck is the best caterer in the country. This year, in the spring, we all thought how great it would be to have a partnership with them as well. We wanted to take all of our resources and give that value to our customers.
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SLS Hotels, Brent Bolthouse, T-Mobile, Dom Perignon |
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| EVENT REPORT 04.20.09 3:33 PM |
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Marketers Consider Coachella Too Important to Skip in Lean Times
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 | T-Mobile's late-night hangar party
Photo: Polk Imaging/FilmMagic |
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Ask any marketer with a presence at the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival and he’ll tell you that the opportunity to promote in the desert during the festival weekend is unmissable and nonnegotiable—even in a downturn. Chalk it up to the sheer concentration of well-connected and enthusiastic music industry folks, fans, and friends captive in the middle of the desert, or to the extreme temperatures and terrain, or to the totally immersive quality of the whole thing—but the attendant brands felt they couldn't afford to be left out, even if this year's economic climate made sponsorship participation and overall budget dollars tougher to wrangle. The festival kicked off on Friday and wrapped Sunday night in Indio.
“This year was really difficult. Sponsors are putting each event under a microscope, and they want to make sure it’s the right type of event for the right R.O.I.,” said Andreas Herr, publisher of Anthem magazine, whose desert party has developed a reputation as the most authentically hedonistic and bacchanalian of the weekend. “But the reason it’s so important for us is that it’s all about contributing to the lifestyle that we cover inside of the magazine. So many people look forward to this event throughout the year. At a time like this, it’s really important to give our fans and our readers something to really look forward to. That one weekend when you can really escape reality and go out there and have fun. It’s our biggest event that we do throughout the year, and we have a lot of fun doing it.”
This year, Anthem’s signature event included a Saturday pool party at a sprawling five-acre ranch property with a three-acre lake. (Herr characterized it this way: “The rough theme is '70s porno ranch meets disco. Does that even make sense? It makes sense to me.”)
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RELATED TOPICS
Coachella, T-Mobile, Anthem Magazine, Levi's, Ray-Ban, Urb Magazine, Filter, Vitaminwater, Goodlife.com, Going Green |
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| NEWS 02.25.09 4:25 PM |
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Recording Academy and T-Mobile Announce Lineup, Dates for Grammy Concert Tour
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Yesterday, the Recording Academy and T-Mobile announced the lineup of Grammy-winning and -nominated artists who will be a part of the 2009 Grammy Celebration Concert Tour Presented by T-Mobile Sidekick. The five-city concert tour, in its second year, will include musicians like Leona Lewis, Katy Perry, and LL Cool J.
The tour will kick off in Los Angeles at the Hollywood Palladium on April 9 with a performance by Lewis. It will continue with a stop in San Francisco at the Warfield on April 14; in Boston at the House of Blues on April 28; in Miami at the Fillmore Miami Beach at the Jackie Gleason Theater on May 13; and in New York at Terminal 5 on May 28. In Miami, Grammy nominee Perry will perform, and in New York, Grammy winner LL Cool J will wrap the tour. —Alesandra Dubin
RELATED TOPICS
Recording Academy, Grammys, T-Mobile, Sidekick |
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| EVENT REPORT 02.17.09 4:48 PM |
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T-Mobile Stages Celebrity Shootout During NBA All-Star Weekend in Phoenix
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 | Katy Perry performing at the T-Mobile Celebrity Shootout
Photo: Chris Polk/Film Magic |
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While a handful of marketers flew to Phoenix over the weekend to host events around the NBA All-Star Game—among them ESPN, House of Jordan, 944 Magazine, EA Sports, and Sprite—many brands followed the precedent set at the the Super Bowl this year and opted out, or ran with scaled-back (read: cheaper) versions of what they're typically known for. New to the scene, however, was T-Mobile's Celebrity Shootout, a charitable game of horse between Miami Heat guard Dwyane Wade and celebrities like actress Eliza Dushku and Scrubs star Donald Faison.
Held Friday night in and around the Hotel Valley Ho's pool deck, the event was a multipurpose party that T-Mobile used to both promote its new G1 phone and launch its myFave's Shot of a Lifetime, a national sweepstakes that offers the winner and their "fave five" the chance to play horse with Wade at the Eastern Conference NBA Finals and to win $50,000. (For non-basketball fans: Horse is a game where two players take turns at trick shots; the player unable to duplicate a shot gets a letter in the word horse until one player spells the whole word and loses.)
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RELATED TOPICS
N.B.A., T-Mobile |
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| NEWS 02.12.09 1:16 PM |
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In The News: T-Mobile Gets Free Guerrilla Marketing, Vanity Fair Stages Oscar Return
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Here's a quick look at some of the bigger stories grabbing our attention this week:
T-Mobile Inspires Public Disco: A recent British commercial for cellular provider T-Mobile that featured 400 actors dancing in London's Liverpool Street station inspired more than 13,000 fans of the ad to do the same thing. They planned the event, dubbed Liverpool Street Station Silent Dance, on Facebook for last Friday and stormed the station at 7 p.m. Police had to close that station for more than 90 minutes, but there were few arrests for what a police spokesperson called "a peaceful and fun event." Organizers are already discussing another outing. [Telegraph]
Vanity Fair Returns to Oscars: One year away from the Academy Awards was enough for Vanity Fair. The magazine will return to Los Angeles for a week of pre-Oscar events and its hot-ticket post-awards party this month. Among the events on tap are an opening party for the BMW Art Car installation and a silent auction sponsored by Christian Dior. As for the big party, it’s moving to the much smaller Sunset Tower hotel, making invites that much harder to come by. [WWD]
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RELATED TOPICS
T-Mobile, Vanity Fair, Oscars, Academy Awards, BMW, Christian Dior, Desirée Rogers, Fashion Week, Halston, Live Nation, Ticketmaster |
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| EVENT REPORT 10.16.08 12:32 PM |
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Fashion Week Sponsors Hawk Wares With Focus on Causes, Style
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 | The scene at Smashbox
Photo: BizBash |
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The five-day swirl of shows and parties that is Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week in Los Angeles kicked off on Sunday at Smashbox Studios in Culver City. And although L.A. Fashion Week is in danger of phasing out in its current capacity if Smashbox co-owner Davis Factor cannot continue to generate the sponsorship dollars necessary to keep it going during the economic downturn, this season's sponsors are still working hard to impress showgoers at the tents. This time around, the bounty of product and service offerings is largely focused on environmental or philanthropic messages, plus—bien sur—stylish presentation.
Title sponsor Mercedes-Benz brought three of its cars to the tent lobby, including a new clean-diesel BlueTEC SUV, next to which a techy touchscreen display allowed guests to visualize their dream cars by personalizing the available options. A hedgerow backed the vehicle. The brand also brought the GLK, which appeared in Sex and the City: The Movie and will be available for sale in January. A film loop showing behind the car showed it traveling through photogenic Southern California locations. Key to the Cure logos and signage surrounded a third car, an example of the vehicle one woman drove across the country to promote breast cancer awareness. "The cars represent talking points, which speak to causes and show our philanthropic side," said Mercedes' western regional PR manager, Larkin Hill. "Stylish people who set the trends [are] our target audience, and we want to show them we have a conscience."
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RELATED TOPICS
Fashion Week, Mercedes-Benz, Key to the Cure, American Express, Rose's, Ultra HD, Flor de Caña, Domino Magazine, BlackBerry, T-Mobile, Sponsorships |
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| EVENT REPORT 10.13.08 6:15 PM |
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Gen Art Turns to Artists to Highlight Event Sponsors
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 | The runway for Gen Art's fashion shows
Photo: Tiffany Rose |
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Gen Art’s Fashionably Natural and Fresh Faces runway shows last Thursday and Friday at the Petersen Automotive Museum focused on showcasing the collections of up-and-coming fashion designers. But for the arts and entertainment organization’s senior vice president of events, Elizabeth Shaffer, the task of presenting event sponsors in interesting and captivating ways was equally important.
“My job is about coming up with brand activations and figuring out ways to convey messages,” Shaffer said. “I worked closely with corporate sponsors to showcase brands in nontraditional ways, and in ways that didn’t make guests feel like they’re being over-marketed.”
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RELATED TOPICS
Gen Art, T-Mobile, BlackBerry, Soyjoy |
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| EVENT REPORT 04.28.08 4:02 PM |
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New Slate of Coachella Party Hosts Increases Nighttime Offerings
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 | Anthem magazine's Coachella pool party
Photo: BizBash |
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FROM INDIO, CALIF. Since the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival, which wrapped yesterday after a three-day run at the Empire Polo Field in Indio, dependably reinvents itself every year, it's perhaps not a surprise that the brands that host piggybacking parties in the desert also change and evolve.
DKNY Jeans, which set up a multiday pool party at a luxury home last year, sat out this year's go round, as did Hugo Boss. "It's just hard to find the right house very close to the fields," said Hugo Boss Fashions' New York-based vice president of marketing and PR, Katja Douedari, who oversaw Boss's event series in 2007. "Loved the Mod Resort last year, but it's a long drive. And if you can't do it right, then better not do it all." (Nevertheless, Douedari made the trip out to the desert for some non-work-related fun.)
So what brands did have the strongest presence in 2008?
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RELATED TOPICS
Coachella, GQ, Anthem Magazine, Gap, Etnies, T-Mobile, Sidekick, Condé Nast, Heineken, Newcastle, Belvedere Vodka, The Fader, Boost Mobile, Le Sportsac, Levi's, Wet n Wild, Adidas, Jeremy Scott |
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| NEWS 04.18.08 3:40 PM |
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Coachella to Feature New Amenities On Site, New Brands for Parties Off Site
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 | The crowded festival grounds in 2007
Photo: BizBash |
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Next weekend, many of the Los Angeles residents who fall into a certain demographic (loosely defined as young and music-minded, most with hipster affiliations and some disposable income), will flee the city for the desert in the annual pilgrimage known as the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival.
The festival at the Empire Polo Field, which noticeably works to reinvent itself annually, will bring with it some first-time initiatives (not to mention the last-minute add of Prince to the lineup). New for this year will be an expanded lobby area at the entrance, which will offer lockers, vendors, restrooms, and water fountains; the area will leave more room on the main polo field for people to mingle, as the space has become increasingly crowded. Also new: Coachella will offer fancy camping packages—tent options including beds, a breakfast buffet, and even air conditioning against the desert heat. Also, as we already reported, festival organizer Goldenvoice has partnered with Amtrak on a shuttle for campers between L.A. and Indio, one of many environmentally friendly projects underway for the festival.
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RELATED TOPICS
Coachella, Amtrak, GQ, Condé Nast, Anthem Magazine, Gap, T-Mobile, Sidekick, PlayStation, SingStar, Goldenvoice, Going Green |
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