Judges
Your entries will be judged by a panel of experienced professionals from the events industry.
More judges will be announced shortly.
John Sachs, Chairman, Variety Club
Companies previously worked for include Blackburn Sachs Associates ( Creative management of TV and Radio presenters, Sports personalities and actors ) Talking Heads ( Voice over agency )
Talking Heads Production Ltd ( Production company ) Seemore properties ltd ( Property company ), Holiday FM, European radio stations (partner with Capital Group). Non-Exec Director INB Holdings Ltd, Resort Radio and Cruise FM. Earth IPTV ltd, Internet Television Productions ltd.
Awards include Variety Club Radio Personality of the year 1988, and New York Festival Silver World radio personality of 1989.
Radio stations - Swansea Sound, Radio Tees, Radio Hallam, Capital Radio ( 1979-1992 ) KROQ ( USA ), BBC Radio 2 , Jazz fm and Magic FM.
Films - Music Supervisor on “ Divine Rapture “ Produced Barry Navidi, Music Supervisor on “Big Bad Love “ Produced Deborah Winger/Navidi
Wilde
Music Supervisor on “ Merchant of Venice “ Produced Cary Brokaw
Movision/Navidi-Wilde. ( Release Dec 3rd 2004 ).
Exec Producer on “Busby Babes” Producer Barry Navidi in development
Music Supervisor and co-exec producer “ Napoleon “ starring Al Pacino
Producer Barry Navidi…Principle photography Summer 2007.
Producer “ Vampire Virgins “ pp October 2007
Television -8 x Series Gladiators (itv) 3x Series International Gladiators (itv)
5 series Four Square BBC One network
2x Audience with Freddie Star (itv)
4x Series Brian Conley show (itv)
2x Series Extreme Sports (lwt)
3x Series Trained to Win ( itv )
2x Series Vroom Vroom ( Sky )
Casting director and Audio supervisor 2 x Series Robot Boy ( Cartoon Network and France 5 )
Written, directed and produced 100s of radio and TV commercials for Daily Express, Sunday Express, OK magazine, The Star, Continental Airlines, Brands Hatch, MTV Records.
Writing -” Private Files of the stars “ ( NO 15 in Best Sellers and NO1 in HMV and Tower Records charts ) pub Harper Collins.
“ Secret Files “ pub Blake Publishing. Top 20 best seller.
Newspapers. Assorted articles and interviews for Sunday People, The Sun, The Mirror, Sunday magazine.
Events - Variety Club Showbiz Awards, Chairman and Event Producer, CRTG Awards, Producer
Alison Wills, Sales Director, Confex Group
Alison has 11 years experience in publishing and large events. In her time as Sales Director of International Confex she has continually grown the show and added to the diversity of the exhibitor profile. She has introduced many new features and initiatives to help cement Confex as the UK’s flagship industry event. She works with all of the key media and associations across the event industry and immerses herself within the industry to stay ahead of all of the trends.
Alison has also re-launched The National Venue show to Event UK, now the largest exhibition for the events market outside London.
Izania Downie, CEO, Eventia
Industries include health and wellness, professional services, IT and media.
She is an experienced marketing strategist for Live events including: content development, overall planning, delivery, reporting and analysis. With specific strengths in marketing comms, media management and PR strategy.
Since 2006 she has lead the direction of the Events industry association (Eventia) and is well established as a key connector within the industry's fragmented sectors. She is a regular speaker at industry events and a judge of related awards.
Izania is a regular contributor in main stream media and marketing event press on the key issues facing the industry. She blogs, tweets and keeps the industry informed on www.eventia.org.uk.
Her vision for the association is to create one strong united voice representing the face to face communications industry.
Specialties
Izania is a dynamic, creative thinker with a track record of exceeding targets and successfully leading a team towards achieving goals. An excellent communicator, driver/director & lateral thinker Izania is goal oriented and has the tenacity to deliver on time and on target.
Zoe Watts, Head of Events & Catering, The Natural History Museum
Before being recruited by the Natural History Museum, Zoë spent eight years at the Tate, having joined just before the opening of Tate Modern. She implemented the catering offering for events at Tate Modern and Tate Britain and subsequently managed the public catering at Tate Britain and the regional sites. At Tate, Zoë was also responsible for tendering for new catering contracts and project managing new start-ups. Zoë has also held senior roles in events and catering at Gardner Merchant Leisure at RHS Gardens Wisley and Catering & Allied at The Royal Society of Arts.
With a strong history in the events and public catering industry, Zoë oversees the marketing, sales, operations and public catering contracts at the Natural History Museum, as well as directing the refurbishment of the Restaurant and Cafés. With the Darwin Centre opening in the autumn, Zoë’s focus is very much on promoting it as a new and spectacular events venue and ensuring that operationally, it is ready to hold up to 300 guests for events.
Rick Stainton, Managing Director, Smyle
Within 18 months his event concepts won the company’s first Gold ITMA award but by March 2003 Rick felt he needed a fresh challenge.
He set up Smyle Events, in partnership with the existing Smyle Productions.
Rick has never regretted such a move and Smyle’s penetration into both the corporate and private event markets has produced dramatic results.
Over the last seven years the event and production teams have produced the most creative celebratory events, product launches, parties and conferences for a cross-section of clients such as BlackBerry, ITV, Intel, Great Ormond Street Hospital, Rolls-Royce Motor Cars, The Marketing Society, The Outward Bound Trust, Cisco and Guards Polo Club at the Cartier International Polo, as well as private events for high net worth individuals. Smyle’s events have been attended by most members of The Royal Family and numerous celebrities.
In their 1st year (2004) Smyle Events won the CEA’s (Corporate Event Association) ‘Best New Company’ in the industry award.
The future looks very exciting – the Events & Production companies formally merged in 2007 and Smyle’s team of 20 staff relocated into a 13,000sq ft state of the art HQ just north of London.
In 2008/9 Smyle was voted ‘the best of the best’ by the judges at the Eventia UK Awards, receiving the coveted Platinum Award along with 3 other Gold’s including Production Agency of the Year. Rick has delivered numerous key-note speeches and was voted twice into the Event 100 club.
Rick comments that Smyle’s ultimate mission is simple – “be recognised as the best company for producing the most creative events”.
Dennis Hagerty, Parade Marshal, New York Tartan Day

