Most businesses probably don’t ever actually hire an international event company. So let’s be clear about this from the outset: this term is used very loosely, and you could be reading an article that would have you convinced that a corporate dinner needs a company with four offices. It doesn’t.
However, there are times when organising your own international event (or using a general events agency) is going to create a thousand more problems for you, some of which a specialist would have easily already prepared for by lunchtime that day. Knowing when those times are is always more important than a generalised answer of what international event companies do.
The difference between an events agency and an international event company
Events agencies do all the organising for you. They source the venues, sort out the suppliers, get everything in line for you, and sort the logistics. They do this well, and for events localised to the UK, they usually do everything you need.
The value of Event International as an international event company comes in their ability to apply the knowledge and expertise of international event management. The suppliers and vendors used by Event International are not one-off contacts. They will not have to send in requests for quotes for catering in a foreign country or rely on recommendations. They have an understanding of the laws that govern noise levels and licensing that are different in each country. They have the ability to understand the requirements and not rely on the literal translation.
The value of this knowledge becomes evident whenever laws and customs become an issue in the planning of the event. If you are simply renting a room in Amsterdam for a meeting and the hotel takes care of everything for you, then the value of having an international company for your event is questionable.
The event is not contained in one country.
One of the strong arguments for using an international supplier is the ease of having a quality event that is the same everywhere. That would include having a product launched on the same day in London, Paris, and Frankfurt supported with the same level of speech and presentation. This would require effective coordination with three different vendors in three different countries with a strong level of quality control. This is not something that is easy to do from a company with offices in the UK.
You’re taking a large group abroad.
Are you considering Barcelona for an incentive trip, a company away day in Seville, or a client entertaining event in Monaco? The headline activities tend to be pretty easy to arrange. The airport transport for three separate hotels is not easy. Buying a restaurant to fit 80 covers in a city where you don’t know which restaurants are good, and what restaurants have a good website and good reviews, plus the risk of a supplier cancelling the day before. This is why you hire an International Events Company. They have a long history of planning and organising events in that city, they know the suppliers and the good restaurants, plus they know who to get in contact with to have the problems fixed fast.
No knowledge is truly load-bearing.
There is a broad range of events that what you don’t know will actually cost you. A gala dinner in a historic venue in Rome is a perfect example. You will find an Italian equivalent of permits, catering restrictions, insurance, and who knows what else for your function room in Birmingham. Getting this wrong will not just ruin the flow of your event it could mean that you are on the hook for something you never knew for which you were financially liable. In these instances, local knowledge is not an extra or an aside it is the reason for hiring the company.
Your client demands a certain level of execution.
For corporate events with a client or high-level stakeholder audience, there’s less margin for error. International event companies will generally be at a higher level of production than a typical agency, not because they’re necessarily better at the fundamentals, but because their clients expect things to run smoothly, and they’ve built their systems around that. If you’re planning an event where things going wrong would be costly and embarrassing beyond the event itself, that’s probably worth the cost.
When you probably don’t need one:
You are securing an overseas venue, but the venue does all the arranging once you arrive. Conference hotels in major European cities deal with International clients day in, day out. If an event is fully contained in the venue, and the venue’s events team is skilled, a competent in-house team or a general agency can manage it.
Your group is small enough for the logistics to be simple. A group of 12 traveling to Lisbon for three nights is a travel booking and a dinner reservation, not a large scale International event. That does not require a specialist.
The event is simple in structure and in an unusual location. A reservation for dinner for 40 in a nice restaurant in an unfamiliar city is not a large scale International event. The restaurant has done it before and knows the process.
Typical Fees
International event companies usually charge a management fee, often a fixed fee per project, or a percentage of the total event budget, which is 10 – 20%. For large incentive trips or complex multi-location events, the management fee is often justified many times over. For most straightforward projects, compare the fee charged with what a hotel’s in-house events team would offer at no charge.
The complexity of the event is what the fee is based on. For most straightforward international bookings, the fee is not justified. However, where the complexity of the event is in the coordination, the fee is justified.
Looking to organise a corporate event? Take a look at the full guide to planning an office party, or check out the UK cost breakdown to see what events typically cost per person.