The second Conference News Creative Leaders Summit took place over the last two days (29-30 July), at East Sussex National.
The event bought together leading creative, production and c-sutie professionals from event agencies, to discuss key challenges and best practice when delivering creative visions for immersive live and brand experiences.
The two days sparked debate. connections and insightful conversation.
Day One
Fiery Chat: The Pitch is STILL broken, Now what?
The first panel of the day brought together Max Agostini (Mash Media), Natalie Glasgow (asembl.group) and Siri Brudevold (PwC) to debate why the agency pitch process remains slow, costly and, for many, unsustainable.
The discussion centred on whether pitching is a fixable industry problem or simply an inevitable feature of a competitive market. Key points from the session:
- Responsibility cuts both ways – corporates need to deliver clear, well-aligned briefs, while agencies should be transparent about how they work, including their use of AI.
- Chemistry and trust matter more than credentials – the right partner is often about confidence and working relationship, not just a strong track record.
- Multi-year partnerships build the trust needed for bolder, more creative ideas, in contrast to the drain of repeated one-off pitches.
- There’s room for independent and smaller agencies to compete on creativity rather than scale.
- AI can ease time pressure, but honesty about its use is essential.
The consensus: pitching isn’t disappearing, but transparency on both sides is key to making it work better.
The Art of Engineering Exceptional Events
Former Red Bull marketer and F1 specialist Oscar Cooper took to the stage for a keynote on delivering exceptional experiential events on a global scale, drawing on projects ranging from Red Bull F1 showruns to a world-first Tetris world final played on a drone screen inside the Dubai Frame.
Cooper’s core message: operations create the foundation, story creates emotion, and emotion creates memory. He challenged the audience to shift their thinking from “what will people see?” to “what will people remember?” when designing events.
Key points from the session:
- Creativity doesn’t happen in isolation – working globally demands close attention to cultural expectations, communication, trust, government support and local partners.
- Red Bull showruns demand meticulous groundwork – planning, budget, stakeholders, logistics and scheduling, run of show, and risk all have to align.
- Audiences remember emotions, not logistics – but creativity still depends on operational excellence, with small details building trust.
- Spectacle vs participation – the Red Bull Tetris World Finals showed how story creates emotion, and emotion creates memory.
The takeaway: change the question from “what are people going to see?” to “what are people going to remember?”
Relationships That Unlock Better Creativity
This panel panel brought together Chantal Mendes (HeadBox), James Hunter (Sterling Event Group), Lucy Nicholls (The PS Events Group) and Russell Goddard (Staging & Event Services Limited), moderated by Max Agostini (Mash Media), for an honest look at what makes agency-partner relationships actually work.
The panel’s verdict: strong, collaborative supplier partnerships are no longer a “nice to have” – they’re essential for delivering complex, high-impact events under real-world pressures.
Key points from the session:
- Trust and consistency underpin great long-term supplier relationships – built up over time rather than won on a single job.
- The best partners don’t just deliver – they challenge briefs, spot risks early, and suggest smarter ways to hit objectives.
- Transparency on budget, scope and risk matters – it allows suppliers to be honest about what’s feasible, and when to say no.
- Value isn’t just about lowest cost – it’s the mix of reliability, creativity, and going the extra mile when it counts.
The Reality Test: How to Decide Which Ideas Deserve to Be Brought to Life
Day one’s content programme closed with Max Agostini (Mash Media) chairing a discussion with Anna Robinson (EY), Richard Davies (DRPG) and Stacey-Rebekka Karlsson (Goho) on how to judge which creative concepts are worth pursuing.
The core message: aim for “intelligent creativity” – ideas that excite but also clearly serve the brief.
Key points from the session:
- Constraints shouldn’t kill ideas – budget, time and logistics should sharpen concepts rather than shut them down.
- Excitement alone isn’t enough – the best ideas combine creative ambition with a clear line back to the brief.
Day Two:
Day two of the summit opened with Zaf Kassam (Informa) speaking on 1st Party Data in a 3rd Party World.
Kassam addressed the growing challenge for brands and events businesses of building direct, owned relationships with audiences as reliance on third-party platforms and data comes under increasing pressure.
Delegates then moved into roundtables and a final round of pre-arranged sponsor meetings.
The content programme closed with a Mr & Mrs-style ‘Inside the Creative Department: Game Show Edition’, pitting Team Creatives (Anna Peters, Nicola Dietmann, Spencer Leven) against Team Agency Leaders (Matt Culverhouse, Charlotte Gough, David Ogiste), refereed by Max Agostini (Mash Media).
Conference News would like to thank every speaker, sponsor and delegate who made the summit happen.