Just ask Glenn Forster, sales academy and training manager of Hyundai Motor Company Australia (HMCA), who together with the car-maker’s media agency Innocean, specialist technology events company The Event Activation Resource (the EAR) and event production consultant Dee Cameron, changed the way Hyundai’s franchise viewed the new i30.
Innocean and the EAR last week filled an empty Darling Harbour convention room, dividing it into six sections and installing a 5.5-tonne sliding and curved LED screen, three specialised “hubs” for intensive training of guests, a central “business-class” lounge with restaurant-quality cuisine and access to a tight inner-city Sydney route for test drives.
It required a big budget – HMCA wouldn’t say how big – with 23 cars on hand for testing and 40 staff to man the event, not including the 50 people who built the inside of the empty hall three days before the event started. It reached about 1200 people in Sydney and will extend via a roadshow to 500 people in regional centres.
“This was the fourth time that Hyundai Australia has held an event of this type and of this size,” said Mr Forster.
“The last was 2015 with the launch of the Tucson SUV. We have also used the same type of program for the Genesis and Elantra and are likely to do it again for the Kona SUV in about September.”
Glen Forster
The centralisation of the launches reduces costs and personnel time, even though most need to be flown to the central point and some need accommodation.
“Previously, most launches to dealers and staff was done of a regional and capital city basis but there was difficulty in getting all the information to those centres at the same time,” Mr Forster said.
“The Tucson launch was a turning point because when we held it, there were only 10 vehicles available to us. It would take too long to move those vehicles around Australia and present them to the dealers.
“So we invited all the staff to come to one place. It took one week to do this and normally it would be much longer.”
For last week’s i30 launch, dealer principals gathered in Sydney for one day and then followed by four days of dealer staff, including those from administration to technician, sales and after sales, fleet customers, customer care and HMCA staff.
“On a cost per person basis, it’s a very cost and time effective way of introducing a new model to a wide audience,” Mr Forster said.
“We pay for accommodation and flights and generally the guests are here for one day and home the same evening.
“Regional events still have to be run for people that cannot make the main event either because of time or location. We then take the program to them with a condensed version that runs after work for two hours, including a scaled-down presentation screen.”
Mr Forster said the program works well but given its complexity and cost, “It is something we can do with all-new models, but not for facelift models”.
“It takes serious planning. We started work on this one in July last year and then started serious planning in October. We decided on the venue in December,” Mr Forster said.
“The drive module proved to be challenging because we had to have it close to the venue but then came up against the closure in George Street.”
Dave Marshall, director of the EAR (the Event Activation Resource), said the i30 launch contract evolved from previous work with Hyundai’s national dealer conference. His company has also worked for IT, urban planning and telecommunications clients.
Together with event producer Dee Cameron of CompanyDee and under guidance by Innocean, Mr Marshall created a lavish production with a story-themed presentation video on the large screen, roll-on car display and laid out the introduction program with HMCA chief operating officer Scott Grant.
“We have put the i30 in a ‘classroom’ with its main rivals, a Toyota Corolla and a Mazda3, so attendees can physically see the cars and visually compare them,” Mr Marshall said.
”There are also two other areas for sales consulting (introduced by national product training manager Garry Jones) with themes such as the car matching the buyer, and technology introductions with technical training manager Peter Quinn and technical trainer George Callas.”
“We started 6am on Saturday morning with an open room, added 50 people to set up the equipment – including a 5.5-tonne LED curved screen with sliding section, with auditorium and breakout rooms called hubs,” Mr Marshall said.
“We then wanted to make the central meeting point like a business-class lounge,” Ms Cameron said.
The collaboration is expected to work again at the launch of Hyundai’s new compact SUV, the Kona, in September
By Neil Dowling
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