Business Visits & Events Partnership (BVEP) have released the findings of the new Events are GREAT Britain report which states that the UK events industry is now worth £39.1bn.
BVEP Chairman Michael Hirst, OBE, introduced the report on day two of International Confex, commenting that the events industry now provided a major platform for Britain’s greatness.
“The report attempts to put a value on all events in the UK and shows they can be a key driver of economic policy,” said Hirst, who noted business visits and events now accounted for over 30 per cent of the whole UK visitor economy.
Hirst added that “Britain is onto a winner when it backs its events industry,” and that the new £39.1bn figure was “minimal”, pointing out “the contribution from business tourism also to GDP, employment, taxation and the input of unquantifiable knowledge”.
The new industry value figure represents a £3bn jump from the Britain For Events report in 2010. The latest report, produced and presented by Tony Rogers, showed the following breakdown of value across the broad events sector:
- Conferences and meetings - £19.9bn
- Exhibition and trade fairs - £11bn
- Incentive travel and performance improvement - £1.2bn
- Corporate hospitality and corporate events - £1.2bn
- Outdoor events - £1.1bn
- Sporting events - £2.3bn
- Music events - £1.3bn
- Festivals and cultural events - £1.1bn
Other key data from the research included:
- The top 10 leading event agencies in the UK having a turnover of more than £2bn
- The events sector now employing 530,000 people in 25,000 events businesses.
There are now around 1.3m meetings held in the UK each year. International business travellers spend £611 on average per visit.
Tony Rogers did note there were areas where the events sector was not realising its potential: “We’re not doing as well as we could for music tourism.”
Click here to view the full report which is available via the BVEP website.
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