When anything is possible, what will you create?

By Jen Duffy, Director, External Communications at Encore

That was the question asked this year at BREAK FREE, a journey of transformation, the immersive brand activation at IMEX America 2022 designed by Encore, the leading global event technology provider.

“Break Free was about challenging our limitations and coming together to discuss the challenges we all face as event planners that not only impact our organisations, but our communities and the world,” said Anthony Vade, Event Experience Strategy Director at Encore and the strategist behind the activation.

The issues of sustainability, DE&I, change management and audience engagement are important topics for Encore, as well as IMEX. Encore is a strategic partner of Events Industry Council and leveraged their best practices and standards for sustainability in the events industry for the experience.

The activation leveraged the end-to-end solutions provided by Encore including strategy, creative, production and technology.

Leaning into the event design process enabled Encore to deliver on key objectives not only for our partner, IMEX, but also for Encore, which included sustainability and participant engagement. Not only does the process illuminate the objectives and challenges to be overcome with creativity and partnership but allows for prioritisation of stakeholder desires.

“Design thinking is one of the most powerful ways that event professionals can approach their events. It allows us to navigate the complexities that exist in our stakeholder relationships to find the most elegant solution to create the change that events need to create,” added Vade. “When we begin with empathy, and designing for the humans involved, we’re able to elicit the outcomes that drive change. And we believe all events should drive change.”

Encore utilised its strategy process to map the attendee journey and design the experience.

• The Encore Strategy team used tools to unlock empathy and analyse stakeholder needs
• Once stakeholder needs were defined, the experience designed focused on how to fulfill them by making design choices that would elicit human emotion, drive interaction, and spark meaningful conversation while delivering on Encore and IMEX partnership goals to challenge participants to rethink the possibilities around sustainability, DE&I, engagement and change management.
• The booth space, divided into three rooms, took participants on an evocative journey where they faced challenges, connected with one another, discovered inspiration and ultimately found a space for collaboration and conversation.

“The experience for me was really about a conversation and how we break free from the surface-level conversations and get a lot deeper,” said Ashley Lawson, Vice President of Business Partnerships, Achieve Incentives & Meetings. “We have the power to make change and going through this experience, this exhibit, we can break through the surface-level conversations of sustainability, DE&I, and get a lot deeper to talk about the actions that we can take to actually make change.”