Event management firms mushrooming in country

Ismail Hossain | Published: May 03, 2014 00:00:00 | Updated: November 30, 2024 06:01:00

Event management companies that help organise programmes professionally are mushrooming in the country, sources said. Â
Â There is no official record relating to how much the growth the sector has achieved, but the earliest companies are feeling the heat of competition now, they said.
"Event management companies are being opened in Dhaka at random capitalising on an easy way to start such a company with a small investment," Managing Director of BD Event Management Mainur Hossain Nehad said.
He said organising an event is not a child's play, as it requires a lot of effort and hard work to make a programme successful. So, professional companies are very few in number.
"But a company cannot complete a big programme properly if it does not have its own men and equipment. You cannot always hire men and equipment instantly," Nehad said.
BD Event Management is one of the earliest companies that started business in 2007. Now, there are some big corporate houses like Asiatic and international companies like CEMS Global Bangladesh working in the country. Â
According to Nehad, there are some 3,000 companies in Dhaka and some 1,000 in other big cities including Chittagong, Khulna and Sylhet.
The planners said there are various types of events that can be classified into four categories. The first one is of leisure events that include leisure sports, recreation, fashion events, media events, music etc. The second is of cultural events related to art, ceremonies, heritage, religious events, and folklore. The third category includes birthday events, anniversaries, weddings that are also called personal events. The last one is of corporate events which include commercial, expo, trade fairs, events for charity, politics, sales, and product launching etc.
Chief executive officer of FESTIVITY -- a one-year-old company -- Gazi Rahman said, "The trend is becoming popular day by day. Everybody wants to get his/her event managed perfectly. Most of the event managers start their business non-professionally. If they get work orders, they start doing them by hiring hands and equipment."
Abdullah Al Shafi, another event management professional who has been working for 15 years in a number of companies, told the FE: "Everybody needs money to organise an event. People are now busy and much self-centred. So nobody can gather much people to organise a programme whether it is personal, social, national or international."
The event managers are just taking this opportunity, he added.
He said there are very few companies working in the country that have 100 per cent professional attitude though the planners have been working here since 1995.
There is a marketing department, a design and concept-development department, and an operations department (which executes the programme) in an event planning company.
Event-management companies pursue the following methodology: identify the specific target group; organise an event for the group and maximise the exposure of the advantages of the products to this select segment.
At present, many big corporations invite firms to be included in their list to manage their programmes.
Abdullah Al Shafi said currently many public relations companies take full responsibility of organising a programme besides public relations.
"Maybe someday an event management company would organise a funeral also. It is not new at all in many western countries," he added.