James Melville, director of event planning at London’s Grosvenor House, a JW Marriott hotel, talks to Sara Turner
7.30am I’m at my desk. I don’t like getting in at 9am – to me that’s a bad start to the day. The first thing I do is have a cup of tea and check my emails, and then I’ll look at my diary and prepare for any meetings – sometimes I can have them back-to-back for three or four hours.
9am If I have an event on, the client might arrive now, and I will stay with them for most of the day. I’m there to make sure everyone’s happy – in effect, I become part of the client’s team. I have seven people reporting to me in the event planning team, and we do anything from a four-day conference for 400 to a VIP dinner for 20. We take the booking on from the contract stage, which our sales team does, and plan all the details – menu and wine tastings, function sheets, liaising with the other hotel departments, and ordering flowers, lighting and entertainment.
Each event is different, but for an evening awards, for example, the morning is spent building the set, then at 1pm we put the tables in and lay them, then carry out rehearsals ready for a 7pm start. It’s a military machine – it has to be. Last year, our Great room was turned into an English country garden with trees, pagodas and huge flower displays.
Our new video-conferencing suite, which opened in September, is also part of my remit. It’s amazing technology – it’s like you’re sitting opposite someone even though they’re in New York. We treat it like a regular event – we meet and greet the client at the front desk and show them how it works. I also look after 86 Park Lane, our smaller meetings wing, which reopened after a big refurbishment last year.
10am If I have no event, I might have a pre-conference meeting now. I’ll sit down with the client, our general manager, the food and beverage director, and director of rooms, and go through the programme. That’s about reassuring the client.
11.45am Lunchtime is about being visible to our clients, so I normally eat early before spot-checking and making sure everything looks good. At least once a week I will have a menu tasting. Clients love them and for me it’s an opportunity to get to know them better. You get three or four starters, main courses and desserts, and it takes about two hours.
2.30pm Every day we have an operations meeting for everyone in the events team. We go through events for that evening and the next day, and communicate changes or late requests. We do sometimes get odd ones, such as bringing wild animals into the Great room.
In the afternoon I might have a post-conference meeting with a client so they can give their feedback, good or bad. You’re only as good as the last event you did. For me, making sure an event is successful is about quality of delivery. It also depends on what the client’s objective is. Some events are highly budget conscious, some need to communicate a message, while others are about putting on an amazing dinner that everyone will talk about afterwards. It’s really about finding out what the client is looking for.
I might also spend an hour contacting suppliers for future events. I’ve got a little black book of contacts for all sorts of things, from belly dancers to wigwam builders and chocolate makers.
5pm Sometimes we will need to change the Great room from a conference setting to a dinner. We’ll all dive in, clearing tables, stacking chairs and sweeping the floor. We might even need to take down the chandeliers – that’s a hefty job that takes five people. I love that buzz when you see a room half an hour before guests arrive. The lights are on, the flowers are done, the silver is on the tables – it looks stunning. That’s probably my favourite moment.
6.30pm An average day for me is about ten hours. I never leave before 6pm. If I’ve got an evening event I stay later, which could be 10.30pm or even 1am. Events is a lifestyle. I don’t look on it as a job.
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