An appearance by celebrity DJ Samantha Ronson—recently confirmed to be Lindsay Lohan's girlfriend—at the Microsoft Advertising launch Thursday at Kultura generated such an overwhelming response from guests that organizers had to switch up their plans for the night just a few days prior to the event. “We had to basically reevaluate the whole evening,” said Trish Knox of TK Events Inc., who worked with the company to plan the launch.
“Initially it was going to be a dinner for 80 to 100 guests,” said Knox, noting that close to 200 guests confirmed their attendance. “We thought we’d just turn it into a stand-up cocktail reception.” Kultura removed its dining tables and chairs to make room for the crowd, and Knox brought in furnishings from Contemporary Furniture Rentals to create a lounge. She also placed plasma televisions on each of the three floors to ensure all guests could view the announcements and speeches about Microsoft’s new advertising network, DRIVEpm. (Microsoft is also the exclusive provider of display advertising on Facebook.)
“We’re officially launching and unveiling Mircosoft Advertising to the Canadian market, and we’ve invited representatives from advertising media agencies this evening as well as some of our direct advertisers,” said Jodi Kasten, director of sales for Microsoft Advertising Canada, who noted that the guest list impacted the choice in venue.
“When we’re working with the media agencies the audience tends to be a little bit younger,” Kasten said. “We thought we needed to have something that was fun and cool and hip, and we also wanted to choose a venue where people could move around and mingle. We also have a celebrity guest DJ which is very popular and everybody is really excited. It’s the hot ticket in town tonight.”
