In this series, features and series developer Heather Nicholls takes you behind the scenes of some of the most compelling brand activations and events.
This week, we meet Goose Live Events, the agency behind Bentley Bentayga’s Speed Global Media Drive.
The Brief:
When Bentley Motors, asked Goose Live Events to launch the new Bentayga Speed, the brief was clear: position the vehicle as the pinnacle of luxury performance SUVs while generating impactful global media coverage.
Bentley wanted to showcase Bentley wanted to showcase the Bentayga Speed’s unique combination of performance, craftsmanship and luxury to an international audience of media and influencers. The challenge was that the automotive sector is crowded with highly experienced journalists who have attended countless vehicle launches. To truly stand out, the agency needed to create something memorable, authentic and emotionally resonant.
Goose’s interpretation was simple: don’t present the product, prove it. The vehicle needed to be experienced in an environment that validated its capabilities while creating original stories that media and content creators would naturally want to share.
After 15 years of working with Bentley on these events, Goose Live Events knew that its interpretation had to go beyond creating another automotive press event. Sam Trevenna, co-founder and CXO of Goose Live Events said: “We believed the opportunity was to create genuine belief in the product through experience, not simply tell people about it. That became the foundation of everything that followed.”
The Execution:
The development process began with identifying the core strategic insight: in Luxury automotive, belief is created through experience rather than messaging.
From there, Goose Live Events developed three guiding principles:
- Prove, don’t present
- Weave the environment in as a fully integrated part of the storytelling.
- Design every touchpoint for amplification and content creation.
The guest journey was then carefully crafted over two days. Guests arrived in Bentley vehicles and stayed at Montage Big Sky.
Day one focused on experiencing the vehicle in Montana’s dramatic landscapes, culminating in a bespoke off-road course at Jumping Horse Ranch.
Day two combined deeper product immersion with opportunities for content creation, including access to Bentley’s ‘Toy Box’, a curated collection of vehicles from across the whole range. Every detail was considered, from hospitality and route from across the whole range. Every detail was considered, from hospitality and route design to styling touches that reflected the Western-inspired theme.
The inspiration for this event came from an unexpected cultural reference point – the Yellowstone television series. Trevenna explained: “A particular scene featuring Beth Dutton driving a Bentley through rugged ranch landscapes sparked the creative idea in our event director Sophie Treacher. She was fascinated by the tension between luxury and wilderness, refinement and raw nature. That became the central narrative for the launch.”
She added: “Montana offered the perfect setting to bring this story to life, allowing us to demonstrate that the Bentayga Speed is equally at home on dramatic terrain as it is outside a luxury hotel.”
The programme was built on a strong partnership between Goose and Bentley, a relationship that spans more than 16 years. Delivering an event of this scale required close collaboration across multiple teams, suppliers and local partners. Operationally, the agency were managing overlapping guest groups vehicle logistics, hospitality, venues and content opportunities simultaneously.
Trevenna said: “Success came from having a shared vision and maintaining close communication throughout planning and delivery. The client relationship was genuinely collaborative, enabling quick decision making and a collective focus on delivering the best possible experience for guests. We also experienced a true partnership working with the team at Montage Big Sky, every detail was taken care of, their team became our team, and it was a truly collaborative relationship. They even installed additional EV chargers for us.”
The biggest challenge of this event was the complexity. Not only were they hosting 120 international guests, but were also effectively delivering two Global Media Drives simultaneously across multiple waves. Maintaining a consistently premium experience for every attendee while managing vehicle movements, route timings and hospitality logistics required meticulous planning.
Technology played a crucial role. Live vehicle tracking through Tour Boss software enabled real-time visibility, dynamic route adjustments and seamless operational coordination throughout the programme. This allowed the team to remain agile while protecting the guest experience.
The Results:
The result was Bentley’s largest and most complex Global Media Drive to date, hosted in Montana, USA.
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Across six overlapping guest waves, they welcomed 120 leading journalists and influencers from more than 20 countries and deployed 36 vehicles. Trevenna said: “The experience combined breathtaking driving routes, authentic ranch experiences, luxury hospitality and hands-one access to the wider Bentley range.”
The event achieved the client’s objective of strengthening Bentayga Speed’s position as a category leader while reinforcing Bentley’s authority in luxury performance.
The programme exceeded expectations across media, social and brand metrics. Whilst Goose Live Event’s can’t share specific metrics. It generated:
- Strong message penetration around both performance and luxury.
- Significant influencer-driven amplification, accounting for 26% of total reach. Most importantly, it created authentic advocacy. Media and influencers experienced the product first-hand, producing content and coverage that carried far greater credibility than traditional launch communications alone.
The feedback from Bentley was particularly meaningful to the agency because they recognised both the creative ambition and operational achievement of the programme.
They said: “This was our slickest and most impressive Global Media Drive yet, despite the most complex.”
Learnings and Trends:
The biggest learning from this event was that audiences increasingly value authenticity over presentation. The most successful moments weren’t the most scripted, they were the moments where guests experienced the product naturally within its environment and formed their own conclusions. That reinforces our belief that experiential marketing works best when it creates genuine connection rather than carefully managed messaging.
We also learned that operational excellence and creativity are inseparable. The boldest ideas only succeed when they’re delivered flawlessly.
In terms, of trends Goose Live Events are seeing a continued shift from event-based experiences to content-driven experiences.
Brands increasingly need activations to work, not just for the people in attendance but for wider audiences consuming content afterwards. Trevenna said: “That’s why we designed every element of the programme with amplification in mind. The dramatic landscapes, golden hour driving routes and authentic experiences created highly shareable content that extended the event’s reach far beyond Montana.”
The agency are also seeing growing demand for experiences that feel authentic and celebrate the sense of place and culture at any given venue or location. Trevenna explains: “Audiences want something real, and this activation embraces that trend completely by connecting the vehicle to an environment that genuinely demonstrated its capabilities.”