Please note the tarnscript is AI generated

Hello, everyone. Welcome to today's webinar. I'm your host Denise, and I'm delighted to join in today as Ryan is away celebrating his wedding. For those of you who are new here, welcome to HeadBox revenue service dedicated to putting revenue into your venue. Today, we're delving into a highly requested topic. To do with shrinking budgets and rising expectations.

We'll be sharing my insights on handling client budgets limitations to ensure your value success and capitalize on sales opportunities.

Budget challenges have been a bigger issues with recession and a cost of living crisis, meaning raising prices or client budgets are shrinking. In this session, we'll be exploring strategies, accommodate tighter and higher demands without compromising your quality. We'll be educating you on budget transparency, maximizing success, through different revenues.

Before we start, if you haven't already, please add your questions into the chat. We have our team on-site who will be able to answer any of your questions that you have. And like always, we love to see where you're dialing in from. Don't forget to take pictures, snap the picture, add it to LinkedIn to Instagram, and don't forget to tag us. I'm thrilled to announce today that I have two lovely guests today here. First off, starting with my lovely colleague Nadia, who is a a maintenance and event consultant here at for Gumnadia. I know you'll probably have loads of insights you share with us today.

Yeah. Thanks for having me.

We're also joined by Holly sales manager for groups and events at the Huxen, but we have had a long time working relationship already. We worked with Huxen quite a lot on our corporate events, have some events at Hoxon with HeadBox as well, which is exciting. So welcome, Bobby.

Thank you so much. Super excited to be here.

Super excited to have both of you today. So let's kick things off. I'm excited to hear both of your perspective and I think with Nadia working so closely with our business clients. You can help give us tips and tops for educating the clients. Or, Holly, you can give a venues perspective on maximizing sales revenue so we'll have a good mix of perspectives today, which is amazing. Let's start with you, Nadia. From your experience, what are the common challenges, event planners face while dealing shrinking budgets.

Yeah. So I think something we see regularly from our clients is wanting to fit everything into a small budget.

And as we work on so many inquiries day to day, we become more consultative and knowledgeable on what can realistically fit into those budgets. We're also very aware that rising venue costs make it harder to fit smaller budgets without operating at a loss. So this is something that we're always conscious of when reaching out to venues with budgets that are a bit tighter?

I think that's a great perspective to have, and it's clear that we are facing challenging times, with forty six percent of our planner report rising costs as their biggest obstacle and another twenty one percent reporting shrinking client budget as our main challenge. The difference between costs and expectation have never been bigger. And I think from both ends the venue as well as our corporate site, we really noticed that. Holly, could you shed some lights on how you approach pricing discussions with your clients who have shrinking budgets.

Yeah. Absolutely. I mean, it's a it's a tough market out there, and I think initially for us, it's always to have the open and honest conversation and really understand the client needs.

We love working with you guys at HeadBox because everything that reaches us, we can tell that you've understood your client, understood the budget, and exactly what you said now, you know, in terms of managing expectation before it even reaches us.

So then when we do propose to the client, it is, it is suitable on it. You know, it's gonna work and be a a valid option. At the end of the day, events is always about the guest experience and that really sits within our values at the Hoxton. So money saving exercises should never compromise the value of what we offer.

And and should never be compromised from a money money saving aspect. At the Hawks, we do run a zero rip off policy, which clients really love and appreciate, I was hoping that that kind of filters through to when you also speak to clients.

A common concept to the Hawksom which which carries you London and worldwide is our meetings and events based. So when you enter, you enter into our lovely pantry areas, where you've got unlimited tea coffee, you've got our lovely smeg fridges, stocked full of soft drinks. So There's never gonna be no, you know, big bill that we kind of inform you guys at the end of your clients, for something they weren't expecting. Which clients love. And that runs through meetings and events, but also our bedrooms as well where all of our, mini service is run at supermarket prices. So we won't be sending you guys a big bill for, you know, water and things at the end, at the end of the day.

So, yeah.

Amazing. I love the no rip of policy name, that rings nice to the ears. With that set, we have noticed that as well with our corporate client when they have an event and then afterwards if they get a second bill and all of a sudden, that flip board was an extra charge or that bar they grab the water from.

So it's amazing to see how you guys incorporated that.

And we feel it really helps build that long term relationship because they're not stunned with anything at the end. It doesn't leave a negative experience.

We try and be really fair, and we did review our prices recently against the rest of the, our comp set, which does take time, but it's really important for us see where we are sitting higher than the rest of the market. So we did notice that across a few things. You know, we reviewed it. We actioned it, and that has been implemented. Amazing.

It's great to see how you are balancing out that.

So you still wanna have profit, but obviously you also still wanna offer that quality. Amazing.

Nadia, how important it is for event planners to be realistic, when working with tighter budgets and what doctors should they consider?

Yeah. I think it's really important, to be realistic. And we really try at HeadBox to have those discussions with our clients before we move the venues, we kind of use the knowledge that we have from planning those events regularly and advise the clients on on where their budget sits, also kind of venue side, being realistic with your pricing is important because you don't want to lose the quality, and value of your venue, but clients do have higher expectations and higher demands, and event planners are then being asked to find ways to do more with less. So figuring out realistic pricing is an integral part of the event planning process.

So working to determine the total cost it takes to plan the event setting profit goals and reviewing your annual budget is really important.

Setting the price too high means lower sales, but then on the other hand setting the price bar too low means losing your profits. I think you also need to be prepared to adapt and improvise in case of any changes that may arise, because we all know that that happens when planning events.

I think you need to be creative and resourceful in finding ways to save money without compromising on that quality or experience, which I do think you're really good at at the Hoxton. You have that kind of high end feel without those high end prices that you see in other places.

On that, we can use examples kind of from other venues and events with our experience to advise the clients on how realistic their budgets are. This was touched on kind of in the first point that we were saying, as we work on so much we have that extensive experience in what is achievable, and kind of when you are realistic from the outset, as you mentioned earlier, it avoids disappointment later on down the line, I think.

Amazing. I love that now. Yeah. Realistic pricing is very much key to this, and transparency to our clients, both venue and again corporate sites.

It's good to be aware of any, like miscellaneous expenses that might affect the budget. So that's good to hear. Holly, how do you think or how do you effectively communicate the value proposition at the Huckson, and how do you communicate that, especially when they have budget limitation?

Yeah. So, again, it just leads on from our no rip off policy and being open and transparent is a real key value at the Hawks. So when you receive a proposal from us, which you obviously see. Everything is very clear.

It's very laid out. The inclusions of all that, you know, that fun stuff included in our room hire is all there. So there's that there's nothing hidden. Literally, the total cost you see at the end is what the client will pay, obviously, unless they're gonna add on things.

I think it's also really key for us and I've always done this throughout my career is to try and find those objections really early on. I don't think asking the question, are there any concerns about the quote or anything is is negative and to try and squash that early on is only gonna lead to, I think, quicker results and decisions, which is great for all of us. And a long term relationship. And as you said, that's only gonna lead to repeat business, which is great for all of us. And we all know it's easier to run an event the second or third time than the first.

So we wanna see repeat clients. We want, we want, you know, Hoch's family.

That's what we go for.

I love that name Hoch's family.

Family.

We really feel like we're all part of it.

Yeah. We're a part of Fox family at this point.

Amazing. Thanks Holly. That was such a great insight.

Demonstrating long term value, we've noticed that as well from our end with how the M and E team, brings that back to our corporate clients and how the Hoxen is offering that. So that is great to see.

Nadia, can you provide some strategies, examples of creative solutions that you have seen, how to implement and overcome the budget to restrain? Are currently going on?

Yeah. So I think, looking at the brief first and foremost and and really having that conversation with the client and being honest and saying, you know, there are maybe some things that we need to change in order to meet your expectations.

So for example, if they're looking at a three course seated dinner, maybe changing that to a Canopy service or a buffet, and equally looking at the drink. So if they're looking at having kind of unlimited drinks throughout the night, maybe advising them and to maybe pushing it to kind of two or three hour service that, can really be an effective way to bring costs down without compromising on the experience.

Equally from venue side. I know you know, I've I've come from a venue side, so I I know about this well, but showing clients added values where you really can't drop those prices anymore can really help. For example, I know you do this at the Hoxon, if you can't lower a bedroom rate any higher, maybe offering some upgrades.

This can really help the client to see that they've made those savings maybe in a different way.

And I know we touched on that repeat business, well, which is something that I think is really important and gets missed a little bit sometimes with those lower value briefs, looking at the future events the client is planning and seeing if there is any scope to agree to hosting more events but at a slightly discounted rate it's great to work alongside venues to negotiate those special preferred rates for the repeat clients that can really work as like a win win situation for both of us.

The client feels as if the venue is making a conscious effort to be flexible with those tight budgets, but you're also working towards a achieving these revenue targets that you have.

Absolutely. Amazing. Thank you for this insight Nadia. Now let's shift our focus to our next point, which is pricing for maximizing success. I've always admired hotels like the Huxen Excel in this area, are leveraging many pricing strategies to their advantage. So, Holly, on that, could you walk us through like the strategies you employ at the Huxin to maximize your sales and accommodating these strains.

Yeah. Of course. We have a range available, and I think that's why that makes us so adaptable to the full market.

So it might be things, and I think I'll most successful is we run minimum spend only for our evening events. I know you guys had an event with us recently.

We have definitely taken advantage of that. Yeah. We paid out the item room at Haksin, that was amazing. It was such a lovely event for a kickoff.

Yeah. And and that means that you guys get to spend that full spend on on food and beverages, which feels like only a benefit to to to the event rather than a room hire, which I feel like often can feel like a dead cost to clients. Yeah. So yeah, we we do that for evening events.

Our packages can be tiered as well, especially with like the private social briefs we do get, as well as corporate, but it's it's important to have different inclusions at different price points.

We're super dynamic, which is great for, you know, us and the team. We we think about those Monday, Fridays, where they may be, you know, less busy, different months as well. So offering different price points across that, is is really helpful to to fit all needs. And we're also lucky to have four Hoxtons across London. So if the budget, you know, it's not gonna work in Holburn, we can talk about Shepard's Bush, which is, you know, just just a twenty minute tube right away, but we might be able to offer that at a lower cost. So, yeah, we we have loads available, and we're really open to different brie and I'm really making it work for our clients.

Amazing. I think that difference hearing structure that you have, and especially like also in combination of the four different venues have been very beneficial as well from our ends, and we've noticed that as well. When you are offering, we might not be able to do this, but we could have you here in whole world. So amazing to see that. So thanks so much for sharing that. Those were some amazing strategies.

So we I see that we have a question coming in from Aaron Flat she wants to know whether to prioritize flexible venue hire, with extra sold AVs, and anything else, or wrapped up day delivery packages.

So, Nadia, let's start with you. What do you think?

Yeah. So I think, it really, really depends on the client and the events needs. A day delegate rate is always favorable because it has everything kind of wrapped up in one. And as we've mentioned multiple times, there are no hidden costs, so you don't have that mastery bill kind of at the end.

However equally, I think having room hire separate sometimes does work for those smaller meetings. So where they don't necessarily need that kind of full catering package, they have those two, three hour meetings that we do see kind of more and more of when they don't have that internal space available.

Taking each event individually, I think, is really important. And as you mentioned, how flexible you are, it really, really helps, when we are looking at the best way to cost save based on what the client is looking for. I think that's always the best approach.

Yeah. I agree. I completely agree. And I think with when I when we speak to the sales team, it's not a one size it's all, with what we do. We are super dynamic and and transparent with what we offer, but we would genuinely go with what's the best option for that client.

We want them to come back, so we don't want them to leave thinking, you know, we've just been pushed to take this package because it works for us.

Yeah.

And obviously we price correctly that we do, we have to maximize on, our, our sales revenue, but we will always genuinely suggest what is best for that client's need without them.

Amazing.

I think I also hope Aaron that they'll answer your question.

I think that takes us to the end of session. Thank you both so much your insight. I hope that everyone's tuning in found this as insightful as I did.

We will be sharing this recording of this webinar with you this afternoon. So please share it with your colleagues and we look forward to seeing you next month where we will bring the topic Brent awareness.

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