AV Concepts and Touch recently produced the largest and most comprehensive show to date for Starbucks at their Leadership Conference in New Orleans. Igniting the general session, rock singer Bono gave a surprise speech announcing a partnership between Starbucks and (RED), a private organization that benefits AIDS programs in Africa. Starbucks will donate 5 cents to the Global Fund for each holiday beverage it sells from Nov 27 through Jan 2. After the holiday season, Starbucks will then continue to designate certain products as (RED), which will also benefit the Global Fund.
This show for Starbucks Management had all the impact and more of a premier corporate event. The general session was held in the New Orleans Arena to inform and entertain 10,000+ attendees with a spectacular set consisting of 20’ x 66’ ultra wide screen, flanked by two 18’ x 32’ screens. The AV Concepts team utilized 5 cameras, 2 long lenses, 2 hand-helds and a jib, with audio consisting of 62 Meyer MICA speakers with a DiGiCo FOH Console. Entertainment for the general session included a 75 member choir and a reggae band that were both supported by a Yamaha M7 digital console.
An elaborate exhibit area in the The Morial Convention Center housed four separate museum-style Galleries, all containing highly impactful audio-visual experiences such as a 360° video screen and a 30 monitor video “chandelier.” The chandelier had a specially designed 8-track audio source that drew attention to particular images on the multi-layered video monitors. Several LCD and Plasma monitor video walls and ultra-wide screen displays were distributed throughout the exhibit space. Unique features in the Galleries included specially designed Starbucks coffee cup speakers developed for attendees to listen to Starbucks’ customer comments in the “Customer Gallery”, and the “Coffee Gallery” hosted a seminar demonstrating how Starbucks coffee is made, from drying to roasting, by utilizing 24’ tall cylindrical walk-under structures loaded with audio-visual stimulation. In the “Partners Gallery” there was an HD theater consisting of an 18’ x 32’ screen with converged Christie HD18K video projectors. Large Starbucks shipping crates were decked-out with elaborate audio-visual “shows” demonstrating the value of teamwork in a myriad of applications such as surgery, dance and a jazz band, all depicted on monitor displays inside the shipping crates. Full sound studios were also set up in shipping crates to record the thoughts of the Leadership Team.
For more pictures and more information on this show click here.
