Felicity Shankar: why every major event wants a hospitality house

0:03James Emmett:Hello and welcome to the Leaders Worth Knowing podcast, the sports industry show from leaders where we talk to the people worth knowing in sport. On the show this week, a deep dive into the evolution of the hospitality house. What are they? Who are they for? And why have they sprung up out of the Olympic movement and into more or less every major sports event around the world? And crucially, what are the elements, part art, part science, that go into setting up a great one? Who better to do that with than Felicity Shankar, the CEO of the iLuca Collective, strategic experiential agency that helps official event partners and organisers bring their association to particular events to life.

0:44James Emmett:Felicity is a doyen of the hospitality house, and she's been working at iLuca, a specialist in the field, since just before the Vancouver Games in 2010. Again, Felicity spoke to me a few days after delivering FIFA House for, you guessed it, FIFA in New York for the final stages of the World Cup. They also delivered Deloitte's activation at the Milan Cortina Winter Games earlier this year and have delivered from multiple partners at multiple major events stretching back into the early 90s. This is a follow-on conversation from the episode with Charlie Buck a few weeks ago, the Live Era CEO. Ove.

1:22James Emmett:Earlier this year, iLuca was acquired by Levy, which makes them the newest member of the Laivira Sports Hospitality Group. This is Felicity Shankar. And Felicity Shankar is here in the studio now. Felicity, how are you doing? Very well, thank you. Let's start at the top. What is the iLuca Collective? We're an event and hospitality and marketing agency all bundled into one that focuses on delivering at event time for sponsors and stakeholders of global sporting events. Okay. Sorry, go on. That covers everything from the strategy about how you're going to activate at event time, the project management, the delivery, the procurement and the operations for creating memorable experiences at games time.

2:16James Emmett:Okay. And who do you tend to, what's your typical client look like? How big is the organization? Give us some sort of facts and figures. We're about 50 people at the moment spread across the world. we go up to about 500 to a thousand at event time so it's it's very cyclical uh we have offices in la now obviously new york recently we've just closed in milan and our headquarters are in london yep uh and you work with um sponsor organizations with rights holder organizations yeah we've we've we've we're very kind of open and honest about that, which is we only work for sponsors, stakeholders, broadcasters, official bodies.

3:06We think that's something when our clients have invested significant investment in what they're doing, they deserve to be protected from ambush marketing and other activities in the city. So we will only work with official bodies that are connected with the sporting event.

3:23James Emmett:Yeah. Now, if you didn't work in and around the sports industry, you might be forgiven for thinking that iLuca was some sort of offshoot of Apple, some kind of mad new Apple Watch product. But give us the potted history of iLuca and why the name? Gosh, I wish we were. I wish we were part of that. The name came actually from the guys that founded the business in the early 90s. And they were looking for a name that actually didn't exist. And if we can imagine, I don't even think we had an iPod, to your point, in the early 90s. it's a small fishing surfing village in northern New South Wales where one of the founders came from and it was a happy place for him it was a place where you could be close to nature friendly community you know enjoy yourself very sporty and they wanted something that didn't have a connection to anything in the broader area of sport but actually talked more to the essence of the type of agency we are okay and and what was it found so it's founded in the 90s to do what so they started in the 90s actually they were both they won't forgive me for saying this but they were both ski bums okay um and and creating ski events but both both in the winter and and also then water ski and they worked at you know holiday resort managers and and things and they were working in the French Alps when the Olympic Games, Winter Olympic Games, were going to Albertville.

4:57And the very first deal they had was they ran across the Canadian broadcasting, sorry, the CBS, the US broadcaster, and they convinced them that they could help them with their logistics of getting the broadcasters, their guests and things from the airport up into the resorts. And as they were doing that, they said, well, you need hosts to do that as well. So they then recruited a whole lot of hosts and then they needed to look after, well, where were they going to feed all these people? So they started doing that. And having done that, they had sort of worked on their first Olympics really as sort of glorified resort logistics managers.

5:43In those days, the Olympics were very close together. They were all in the same year. So Johnny and Richard then went on and worked in Barcelona in 92 because they were there. And then before they knew it, you know, we were at 94 and we were at Lillehammer. And so these, you know, they'd done three games before they knew it. And they were like, there's a business here. And that's how iLuca started really in the business of people, transport and then subsequently ticketing.

6:10James Emmett:Now, Felicity, I'm delighted that you're in with us today because you are something, or you mentioned it there, the houses. You're what I would describe as a doyen of the hospitality house, right? You've got long experience in this game. And I feel like in this era, sports industry entertainment era that we're living in at the moment, the hospitality house is absolutely everywhere. If you are not a major event with a hospitality house strategy, what are you really? And I'd love to go into what it's all about and how it's developed with you. So in your view, talk to us about the explosion of the hospitality house.

6:48James Emmett:What is it and what are they for? I think it's a really good question. And I've reflected on it quite a lot because I think what a hospitality house was versus what a hospitality house is today. And even I would question whether they're hospitality houses today or whether they're more than that. and they've become a critical part, as you say, of being able to extend the experience outside of being in the sports arena. What I think we have seen is an immense coalition almost between what was known as showcasing and activation and what hospitality houses were. So when we go way back when, hospitality houses were very rarely brand driven.

7:42They were in as much as a sponsor would do them. They would be much more institutionally driven. So you would see something like the USA house or at the Olympic Games, or you would see, I mean, both Australia and Switzerland, I mean, Switzerland, for example, invest a lot of money in Swiss house. at every major event and it's funded by their tourism and their inward investment agencies and things. And it's a moment in time in which to showcase, you know, a destination when you've got lots of people around. I think what we're seeing now is much more people understanding that, you know, activating at major events is a very expensive thing to do.

8:27And if you're smart, you can bring a whole lot of your needs together in one place and have one piece of real estate that services multiple needs. So we're seeing increasingly more and more showcasing. We're seeing increasingly more and more opportunity for, if you like, traditional hospitality. I need somewhere to feed someone. I need somewhere to bring people together to have some content or, you know, a speech or things. And it becomes logistically easier to bring everybody to one place. it becomes more cost effective to bring everyone to one place and it allows them to extend and get further into the detail of the sports event.

9:10Because when people go to a sports event, they don't get all of the paraphernalia that sits around that and actually really deeply understanding kind of the values of that event, the opportunity to engage with merchandise personalization. And have we seen more activity out of the US where I think, you know, those audiences, much more than anywhere else in the globe, we're seeing it now. And I think it's impacting everywhere. They want to be up close and personal with the sport. They want to understand far more. They want data insights. They want to play with memorabilia. They want to meet the athletes.

9:55You know, they don't just want to go and watch them on the field of play. They want to feel like they've had a unique and special experience. And the house allows you to do that.

10:04James Emmett:I remember my first sort of exposure to houses was a hospitality house in the sports industry was during London 2012. And I was a journalist at the time, sports business journalist at the time. And I remember all these interviews being set up during the Olympics and they were all taking place at these different sort of houses across temporary sort of setups across London in some very swanky venues. And the first couple I went to, I found it very interesting. But then as I went to more and more, I recognized that all of these places had a completely different feel to them. And eventually I was sort of like trying to tick them off as if I was sort of collecting kind of Olympic badges, you know, how people do.

10:46But I found it remarkable, like the difference between the Dutch Olympic Committee, for example, had Heineken House up at Alexandra Palace.

10:55James Emmett:And that was a huge party feel. Obviously, Heineken's a big sponsor of the Dutch Olympic Committee. And yeah, they were just having parties every day. And then Japan House was somewhere in some kind of exclusive embassy type building off Green Park. Very formal, felt very kind of reserved and australian. almost like real Japanese style and it was fascinating and clearly so much thought had gone into presenting an atmosphere and as you say showcasing something more to a variety of different guests that you're coming in obviously the Olympics is an amazing Olympics is like the home of the hospitality house you've got all these different competing nations and partners all together for a few weeks.

11:43James Emmett:But we're seeing it with the FIFA World Cup. We're seeing it in Super Bowl week. Anywhere where lots of people gather for a significant period of time and there is a lot of money in that event. You're seeing these hospitality houses. What would you say when you're advising a client, maybe at the kind of prospecting stage, someone comes to you and says, hey, we're thinking about doing a house. How do you talk them through the process at the very early stage? What considerations do they need to have to understand what they should do at any given event? I think you made a really good point in that question around there's lots of them and you can almost go around and it's become almost its own sport.

12:28I think one of the things that we're at risk of is saturation. and I think that people need to be really clear about why they're doing it and what they're doing it for not because you can um but but but but who's going to come and why they're going to come because you know you as a journalist when you went around and did those things you know they would be most clients would be very excited that they had journalists coming around and you you know, in a controlled environment with the messaging they want to tell them. But when it becomes a sport and a sport itself, it's probably lost the cut through that you might have been looking for originally.

13:17So when we advise clients about it, we will most often talk about what is the purpose of doing the house. And we'll spend a lot of time with them trying to work through audiences. because it can be very tempting for people to say, oh, I want a consumer activation. But actually, are they a brand that typically works in the space of consumer activation? And what are you trying to achieve through that consumer activation? We look at who are the audiences that they've got on programs, if you like, ticketed guests and why they can come. But then we'll talk to them a lot more about circles of influence.

13:56and and as you say you get lots of people gathering together they're all in town how else can you amplify your message with those people or become a convener of of people with interesting content and allow people to see you differently and you're not going to do the whole job in a hospitality house but but you know success looks like someone knows more about you as it as a brand in what you're doing is opened up with kind of better eyes on why you're associated with this event and what special things that you're bringing to this event. And a lot of the sponsors and partners that are involved in these big events at the moment struggle really to communicate what it is and why they are involved in the event.

14:48But actually, their stories are really rich. their stories are really really rich and and having an a an environment in which they can talk about their stories and bring that content to life and really be able to engage the right audiences not just people on program with ticket people off program with without tickets convening space and and to a certain extent I always say you should make sure you are a party place because that's when people feel like they have fun. I mean, you talk about hospitality houses. My first starting point is this is your home because when people come into your home, they're immediately more relaxed and more interested and beginning to understand the nuances of you as a brand with your brand personality rather than your how big a logo can you stick on or how much can you spend on athletes to be in your advertising?

15:45James Emmett:Yeah. So the nitty gritty of how these work, then these houses and who you have to work with and for to put together the kind of ultimate experience for them. Let's take an example of an Olympic partner, maybe someone like Deloitte. They would want to, at a very basic level, support their partnership of the Games by being present in the host city, first and foremost. They need someone somewhere to convene the first circle of kind of stakeholders, their people, I guess, their principal people who need to be there at games time. And then several other concentric circles of potential guests, right?

16:28James Emmett:Stakeholders that are important to them, different guests in different kind of categories at different times. So they need a physical space that can accommodate those people and also an idea of what to program for those people to attract them there. Right. Yeah. And then also logistical support and resourcing to make sure that it's a nice experience when those people are at the physical place. Is that right? Yeah. Okay. They need a big idea. Yes. And they need a big idea. They need a big idea. And who's... They need a raison d 'etre. Right. Which is usually explain your link and what's the point of you being here?

17:06Yeah. Well, it depends again on the audience. So, you know, there's a different job to be done with different people in the audience. I read something many years ago, it stuck with me for life, about making Disney films, the making of the early Disney films, where they realised that not only were the children going to need to be entertained, but actually the adults were going to have to watch it as well. So making sure you had a double-layered story. So when we think about houses, we always think about a double-layered story. So there are people, if you're a Deloitte or a Samsung or any of the big brands, who you are going to have at the house who are immediately important to you, not necessarily your leaders.

17:48Of course, you want your leaders to be happy, but actually your most important, most valued customers. and the chances are for them to be there, they're already working with you and they're working with you in your business quite a lot. So we look at they know what you do. So what are you doing in this environment? Why are you doing that? How is that demonstrating your expertise, your capability and how might we engage in similar ways now we know you've got this expertise? You know, I did a big program for a sponsor in Brazil and they had like five different lines of business, but every single customer that came only worked in one line of business.

18:33So our objective was to tell them playfully how many other areas there were in the business. And that made sense. So I think being clear that you've got people in your house that know you probably almost as well as you know yourself. And then you've got a whole lot of people in your house who probably know the name. You know, they might know the name and they might even then have a perception of you as a certain thing. You know, if you look at Tuluet now, you know, they're, of course, amazing brand. And, you know, we're very delighted that we get to tell this story with them. But, you know, for lots of people, they're perceived, you know, as accountants or consultants or whatever else, as opposed to the digital innovators that they are today.

19:24So this ability to be able to migrate the story and tell that story more fulsomely within a kind of house environment is important. And so for the people that know nothing or know the logo or it's a brand, our ability inside that house to tell them a story, which is much more simple. And that's often a challenge for sponsors because, of course, they want to tell a very considered business message to people that know who they are. But actually understanding whichever sport you're in. When people are at sports events, they want to be at a sports event. They don't want to be told this is who we are as a business.

20:06So it's really about, you know, how do you enhance their sporting experience through the capability that you have?

20:14James Emmett:Yeah. And everything always comes back to storytelling, doesn't it, in sports marketing. And I thought it was interesting the way you talked there about describing different facets of an organisation's raison d 'etre, objective purpose in a playful way. and I wonder within the context of a hospitality house and the work that you would do in a hospitality house, what are the storytelling sort of opportunities, what levers can you pull to get these playful messages across? Is it sort of physical infrastructure? Is it demonstration somehow? Is it sort of programming talks? What is the nitty-gritty of it?

20:55I think it's all of those things and I will go as far as saying it is the interior decor.

21:01James Emmett:Okay. It is the, it's the food that you eat. I think it's the ability to create a vibe that shows that you're comfortable with yourself and your brand. So you, you know, you really, these houses, as I say, are homes and the, you are, you as a sponsor or a stakeholder are able to create the kind of comfort and forward thinking and sense of place that, that a confident brand would do. Not, you know, these are not showcases. You get the opportunity to showcase, but in a much more intimate environment, I feel. I think we see more and more, I mean, the power of digital now and the kind of exhibition tools, talk about storytelling, you know, we get a lot of inspiration from kind of museum storytelling.

21:56because I think people engage with content in a variety of different ways. We have a strong, we do all our recruitment ourselves. So we run a process for all our clients, which is our kind of guest experience framework process, which allows us to really get into the heart of what the brand is and who they are. I often, the example I always give when we look at it is, you know, the Atlantic on Virgin or British Airways or American or United. At the end of the day, they're all a metal tube going from Heathrow to New York. But every single brand experience is completely different. And that is parlayed through, you know, the food, the check-in experience, the recruitment profile, the uniforming, the content on the TV screen and things.

22:43And I think that's the job of a house through the people, the experience, the touch points. And it's, I think, important not to be intrusive about content, but stimulating through content. Because at the end of the day, you want people to be having the kind of conversation we're having. You know, ultimately in a house, you want people to be able to sit down when they're feeling emotionally very open, very happy because of the sports experiences and the inspiration they've had, and be able to get to know each other better. And, you know, from that spins great business conversations.

23:18James Emmett:Well, and that's where I want to go further, because when you're dealing with these types of creative artistic inputs, really, the whole idea of building a brand proposition with lighting and food and artistic choices, vibe, as you say, you're creating a vibe. It's sometimes really difficult to measure success of that. um uh it was difficult to measure you can measure outputs you can measure you know it looked like this we had this many people through the door yeah i'm interested in how you measure the success of these things because um with artistic creative inputs sometimes very difficult for the money men to kind of narrow it down to well here's the roi on that and i wonder how you when you've wrapped up a project measure the success of it on your end and by extension how you help clients measure their success so i'll say first and foremost uh when you submit these questions i was like when i think about how i measure success first and foremost we're under budget yeah okay yeah we're under budget and we deliver it on time yeah um and and i can say that's not without its challenges because if you can imagine you know every single event city is different it's not like Wimbledon's there every year or everything's at Chelsea and they're always at the stadium you know you are going to strange and different places for these events and you're building temporary infrastructure and everything is all coming together at the same time from an organizing committee to a city to a sponsor to build to permissions and things so so I think accomplishing those two and the date's never going to move that you've got to deliver.

25:06So I think accomplishing those two things are always a measure of success. But truthfully, it comes back to where I started. It comes back to what are your objectives of being there in the first place? And then we will look to how we measure that against each of those different audiences. So when I think about a business conversation, you know, the purpose of creating an environment for a rich and meaningful business conversation, whatever happens, that business conversation is going to be 20 minutes, 30 minutes, maybe an hour. People are going to think about it differently. So most big brands have very deep, immersive kind of workshops that they will run for important future clients.

25:46So we will often look at going, okay, can we convert someone from there

25:50James Emmett:to then going and spending three days with them and really delving into what the connection is between them and their business. And if you can do that, you know, there's a pathway that goes through that and that's kind of measurable. Can we convert, you know, if we look at a kind of consumer activation, can we capture data? And there is, you know, through that engagement, is there data that actually helps feed the brand in other ways that there are? We'll look at can we create content moments that then amplify through social media and other areas, which, again, have quite sort of measured, measurable attributes to them around kind of advertising impressions and content and things.

26:37So we'll look to build the picture over a period of time. When we've got people on hospitality programs, so let's say a two to three day experience with us and going through, we will always do post-event surveys to look at how people found the experiences, but also how it shifted their perception of the brand you know how you know did you know that before how likely are you to know that before i mean i i did a project for dow i did several projects for dow um and one of the things that was amazing for them was that they actually uh built the the silicon kind of science on the bottom of the bobsleighs and and and the skeletons and nobody knew that about them but you know and then straight away people are going oh i didn't know you did that i thought you put stuff in paints i thought you did stuff um uh in you know personal care products and things like that but i didn't know you did that and so straight away those conversations are being triggered which far more expert people than me in those businesses will go in and take on and capture but i think conversion from i've come on the program I'm interested in one thing.

27:50I'm here for a reason, but I've now stretched my reasons for engaging with you. That's a big measurability for us. We also look at a big measurability, which is around how can you act as a convener? And in a convening space, if you think about, you know, CEOs, C-suite guests and things, you know, a big corporate C-suite person will spend a lot of time on airplanes going around the world, meeting different people. A house, you know, linked to a hospitality project and things, a house, call it a home, allows those C-suite guests to kind of be in situ in one place and bring a whole lot of clients to them.