With just more than an hour to spare before more than 1,500 guests arrived for the Hockey Hall of Fame's induction celebration Monday, Steve Ozimec, the organization's manager of special events and hospitality, was still trying to secure the venue and restrict access to his event, held in the Allen Lambert Galleria at Brookfield Place, a busy thoroughfare in the heart of the city's financial district. But Ozimec, who's been planning the event for the past five years, didn't appear phased.
"It was really a minor hiccup in the general scheme of things," he said, noting that last-minute challenges come with the territory when you're planning a cocktail party for 1,000 guests that's timed to coincide with a live broadcast in a public space in the downtown core. "It's like planning two events in one night."
Five hundred V.I.P. guests attended the induction ceremony, which was broadcast live from the Galleria and aired throughout the hall of fame, located on the concourse level of Brookfield Place. The V.I.P. guests—and the 2008 inductees, Glenn Anderson, Ed Chynoweth, Igor Larionov, and Ray Scapinello among them—joined the reception following the broadcast. "It really is a hockey industry event," Ozimec said of the ceremony. "It is the reason we exist in terms of having those members." Although tickets are sold to the public, they are offered on an application process, he said, adding that organizers wanted to create an intimate feeling for the ceremony, produced by Jack Budgell.
"The evening lines up as a closed circuit broadcast of the ceremony," said Ozimec, who reported that the hall added the show component to the event in 2007, which complicated the planning process. "We never used to do the broadcast from the Galleria itself," he said, which means "everything has to start much earlier in advance with the city to obtain parking permits for the satellite trucks."
The setup is a time-consuming process. "The set itself takes up the entire west side of the Galleria. It's an 18-hour load-in," Ozimec said. The H.H.O.F. is currently in the second year of a three-year commitment to use the set, designed by McWood Studios for the 2007 induction ceremony. Thankfully, Ozimec said decor is one aspect that he doesn't have to tackle. "The venue itself has built-in decor," he said, noting that the H.H.O.F. unveiled a new exhibit Friday in honor of the Montreal Canadiens' 100th anniversary.
TSN's deal with the NFL (the network airs football on Monday nights) also factored into the event this year and prompted the NHL Network to pick up the ceremony and broadcast it live. Ozimec noted the change did have a plus side. "Part of the benefit of doing it with the NHL Network means that one of the things that disappeared for us was the time restriction," he said, noting if the event runs long, TSN can simply edit the footage for its later telecasts. (The network is broadcasting the ceremony several times this week.)
Marigolds & Onions handled the catering, serving more than 5,000 passed hors d'oeuvres—including Korean beef rolls, mini quesadillas, and spanakopita—to guests and setting up 19 food stations and eight bars throughout the venue. The menu included sushi, seafood, and carving stations, as well as a martini bar dubbed the "Induc-tini Station," where servers offered madras chicken skewers with couscous and Montreal smoked meat with red cabbage in stemless martini glasses.
Monday's induction wrapped up a weekend of activities that included autograph signings, a Q&A session about the Stanley Cup, a fan forum, and the H.H.O.F. Game at the Air Canada Centre. Event sponsors included RBC, Molson, Panasonic, Hugo Boss, and Sirius Satellite Radio. All proceeds from the gala benefited the Hockey Hall of Fame and Museum, which is a registered charity.
Correction: The original version of this story incorrectly credited PIX Design for Scott Veber's signage in a photo caption.
