The organisers of five Monmouthshire festivals have received coveted awards in recognition of their success in marketing their events at a recent "Oscars style "ceremony. " Top honours - in the hotly contested category for Best Overall Use of a Marketing Strategy - were carried off by Charles Fountain, Robert Atkins and Shirley Hughes of Raglan Music Festival, for a strategy which succeeded in attracting a younger age group and in increasing out-of-county visitors to the event from 5% in 2006 to 20% in 2007. Their marketing activity included branded beer mats, car stickers and an advertising campaign with Valley's Radio. Charles Fountain, the Chairman of Raglan Music Festival, said they were absolutely delighted to receive such a prestigious award from adventa. "As a not for profit community event, operating within a very tight budget, the festival has introduced a number of innovative marketing ideas which saw audiences figures double from 2006 without compromising the unique atmostphere which the festival creates. "The award is a reflection of the hard work put in throughout the year by all the festival committee," he said. The Marketing Awards for Excellence and Innovation, spearheaded by adventa, Monmouthshire's LEADER+ rural development programme, attracted entries from the organising committees (paid-for and volunteer organisers) of a wide range of music, arts and community events held in the county. Two awards were given in the category for the Best Collaborative Marketing Strategy. One went to a joint initiative by Kay Spencer of Monmouthshire Agricultural Show, Fiona Jenkins of Usk Agricultural Show and Sheila Frost of Chepstow Agricultural Show. Sheila's award was made posthumously. Their marketing campaign, to promote the annual dates of all the shows, included a competition in Country Living Magazine, and the production of notelets depicting typical aspects of the shows. A joint marketing campaign run by Angie Sayer and Kerry Tanner of The South Wales Shire Horse Society and Ann Mansell of Usk Rural Life Museum also received this award. The award for Best Use of Digital Marketing went to Cathy Green Marketing Officer of Abergavenny Food Festival, for a successful and cost-effective marketing strategy which involved intensive use of the festival website to promote the event, including on-line ticketing and pre-and post-event on-line questionnaires. The award for Best Newcomer went to The Two Rivers Folk Festival in Chepstow, and to organisers Tim Ryan, Mike Lewis, John McConnacie. They thanked adventa for their "visionary" support for the summer festival. Winners received a decorative silver pin, specially designed by local jewellers Rosemary and Peter Williams. The awards were presented by Nick Ramsay AM, Welsh Assembly Member for Monmouth. More than 40 representatives of Monmouthshire's myriad of festivals and events attended the "Reward and Celebrate Evening" at the Glen-yr-Afon Hotel in Usk. Louise McGuinness, Festival and Events Co- ordinator with adventa said: "This is the first year we have run these awards, which set out to encourage marketing excellence and reward best practice. "We were delighted with the enthusiastic response to them, and the standard of the entries. The high impact campaigns delivered by so many of our festival organisers made judging very challenging."
