Last weekend I managed to escape the torrential rain and thunderstorms by not going outside at all. I spent the best part of 48hrs locked away in dance rehearsal rooms and theatre dressing rooms as part of the cast of Eyebrow Productions’ 5th Showtime Challenge at Her Majesty’s Theatre (Phantom’s regular home) on Sunday 8th May 2011.

The idea behind the Showtime Challenge is to rehearse (from scratch) and perform a musical on a west end stage in 48 hours. This year the show was 1920s Riviera set The Boy Friend. I was one of the handful of ‘civilians’ taking part, adding ‘Brand Consultant’ to the small assortment of a doctor, nurse, fireman and an accountant joining more professional performers in this exhausting and exhilarating challenge. Watch the video below to see the process from auditions to stage, introduced by the evening’s host Anneka Rice:

The whole experience was truly fantastic, and I had a great time working with some very talented people. Our labours were on behalf of a great cause in the shape of The Prince’s Foundation for Children and the Arts, and it seems those labours were successful; Mark Shenton, theatre reviewer for The Stage tweeted: “Seriously – #theboyfriend could transfer tomorrow, intact, for an extended run in the West End… “, a fantastic antidote to the fact that my exhausted legs stopped working the moment the curtain came down…such was the frantic pace of dance rehearsals.

As a final thought…any choreographer that can make me look like I am dancing in such a short time has earned a very large drink! Bring on #6 in 2012.

Last night was The Value Engineers Christmas Party and, to further celebrate the launch of our Manhattan office, the theme was ‘New York, New York’…

• ‘I can’t wait to get back to New York City, when at least when I walk down the street noone hesitates to tell me exactly what they think of me’ – Ani Difranco
• ‘They say that life’s what happens when you’re busy making other plans.  But sometimes in New York, life is what happens when you’re waiting for a table’ – Sarah Jessica Parker
• ‘One belongs in New York instantly; one belongs to it as much in 5 minutes as  in 5 years’ – Thomas Wolfe
• ‘Ideas matter in New York. I am certain that more conversations in New York are about ideas than anywhere else’ – David Frost
• ‘If a man can live in Manhattan, he can live anywhwere’ - Arthur C. Clarke

Borrowed with pride from all over the place.

As already trailed through the appearance of the Empire State building on our website, we are delighted to announce the launch of The Value Engineers North America, which is possibly our most exciting news since the company was founded twenty five years ago in 1986! 

To celebrate this great moment, we held an open house at our offices in Manhattan with the great and good of marketing and a sparkly snowman all dropping by.  Thanks to all those dear friends of The Value Engineers who came to raise a glass to our new venture.  For those who could not make it here are a few snaps of the night.

We are very pleased to welcome two new Engineers, both with a specialism in quantitative research: Richie Heron and Sally Kay.

After graduating from Nottingham with a first class degree in marketing, Sally Kay spent some time at TNS in their quantitative consumer division. In 2006 she moved to brand consultancy Clear where she specialised in quantitative insight and strategy, while also working more broadly in qualitative insight and brand innovation. She has built up considerable experience in personal care, financial services and healthcare. Since moving to The Value Engineers at the beginning of November, Sally has been involved in understanding the prestige car customer which has since upped her desire for a flash motor… here’s hoping!

Sally is passionate about helping organisations grow their brands, be it through segmentation, customer insight programmes, strategic intents or innovating new products. In her spare time she usually spends time exercising, wining and dining or being creative… although having just bought a new house most of her weekends are now spent in IKEA!

Richie Heron graduated from the University of Newcastle with a degree in Statistics and started his research career with Martin Hamblin working on segmentation and pricing studies in the healthcare sector. In 2002 he moved to Research International (now TNS) working in new product development and innovation primarily focusing on concept testing and volume forecasting. From 2006 he was based in Chicago working through a key clients innovation journey spanning multiple brands across the globe with the goal of becoming the leading brand in each market.

After 4 years in the US he’s become somewhat Americanized – a fan of ice hockey and country music, a chicken wing connoisseur and gained an understanding and appreciation for the Super Bowl and the advertising extravaganza that goes with it! A fan of history and historical novels (in particular the work of Conn Iggulden) with an indefinable passion to watch or read anything to do with the Titanic. Richie’s current hobby is understanding the business of sport having recently completed a course on hockey general management and scouting.

Last week we took the formal step of ‘wetting the head’ of the new Manhattan office.

It was a small but auspicious step. We had visitors from the UK offices of all of our hub companies, as well as from Cello head office (grilling us over budgets for next year and pushing for even bigger and better things).  The office houses teams from The Value Engineers, Insight Research USA and Leapfrog in America, all of whose comings and goings amplified the buzz of activity. To add more excitement we were greeting clients, running workshops and interviewing for more staff at the same time.

Jenny, our amazing office manager, managed to keep everything running smoothly and the much threatened state of too many meetings / not enough rooms never actually arrived.  We did run out of chairs but people were moving so much I don’t think anyone actually noticed.  We do, however, need a bigger coffee machine, to ensure jet lag caffeine demands are fully met.

Hopefully this will be the first step in many in the US.  It certainly set the office feel we’d like to keep.

Actually, to make sure we take at least one more step, we are going to invite all friends, associates and clients to a drinks party on the 2nd December.  If you happen to be in New York then feel free to drop by and raise a glass. It’ll be even better than last week as the group FD has promised to send us real champagne glasses!

To contact our New York office get in touch with Simon Dannatt or Alex Waters.