OUTFEST
Wow! - what a hit the Heineken Green Room was at Outfest 2008. It was by far and away the best "make over" that atrium has had in my tenure here at Outfest which stretches eight festivals. It became a real hub for the festival and the room had a lot of buzz around it during the festival.
Joe Moller did an incredible job of transforming the space and really branding the room as the Heineken space. One of the things that matters to our stakeholders is that they believe Outfest throws good parties. The atmosphere that Joe and his team were able to create really lent itself to people feeling good and happy to be in the space. The seating areas worked perfectly and created wonderful places for people to meet, discuss the movies they had just seen, and still people watch. The seating areas felt intimate and yet part of the collective experience. The bar on the back patio moved the chaos of the bar lines outside, while at the same time once outside the lines did not feel congested because of the open space. The lighting worked to create a party atmosphere without detracting from the main intention of the event which was to create a space for people to talk and meet one another.
We also always struggle with the lines for the theaters that are out on the back patio. The usage of the patio for the bar itself continued the Heineken branding beyond the space itself. The bar on the back patio made everyone, whether they were at the reception or not, feel like they were part of the Heineken Green Room. It was another point of contact for those hundreds people lining up for any of the screenings on the patio and that translated into ten of thousands of people over the course of the festival being exposed to how "cool" Heineken can be.
The Director of Operations at the Director's Guild of America also commented that the layout and decor of the atrium was the best he had seen for Outfest and was one of the best makeover he has seen of the space in general. Our Major Donors could not get enough of the room. We received a lot of feedback about what a wonderful space it was to hang out and meet up with people the room was. They also enjoyed the Major Donor Happy Hour we had during the second week and we look forward to looking for ways to capitalize on that even more next year. Finally the filmmakers, some of whom attend a number of festivals, loved using the space as a place to try and de-stress before and after their screenings. They also loved meeting other filmmakers there. Other festivals around the city and the country have a space for filmmakers. In LA the Los Angeles Film Festival has a room that Target does called the Red Room. It is know around town. It was a wonderful coupe this year to have a room that filmmakers felt rivaled the Red Room. Thank you for that. They also loved that is was Heineken!
I cannot say enough great things about Joe. He was attentive, easy to work with, wonderfully creative, able to roll with changes asked of him, immediately responsive if something wasn't working.
You all as always were a dream to work with and create a successful festival. We look forward to even bigger success and a stronger partnership next year!
-Kerri
Kerri Stoughton-Jackson
Director of Operations
Outfest