This week, Blackjack (a division of ABM) hosted 18 liquor brands in their recently opened Centre of Excellence in Drayton. The brands joined forces to share their travel retail knowledge and messaging with the Blackjack Promotions brand ambassadors.

During the day, Blackjack staff had the opportunity to move around the brand spaces to learn more about the brands’ 2020 travel retail marketing plans and new products, as well as meet the people behind them.

More than 60 Blackjack delegates from airports across the country met with teams from Moet Hennessy, Accolade Wines, Bacardi, Proximo Spirits and Diageo, to mention just a few.

Claire Brockwitz, Travel Retail at Brown Forman, said: “We have worked with Blackjack for many years now with ambassadors placed across Heathrow, Gatwick and Stansted. We always look forward to the roadshow as it allows us to connect with these representatives, put names to faces and update them on new directives and products”.

Rupert Firbank, Commercial Director, Global Travel Retail for Accolade Wines, said: “With wine being a very fragmented category, Accolade Wines puts a lot of value on being able to inform passengers about what we have on offer and to make sure that we are recommending wines that will suit them. Being able to deliver training to our partner Blackjack is a key part of delivering that customer engagement. We know that the more people learn about wines the more engaged they become and consequently the more they buy. From the point of view of Blackjack brand ambassadors, the more they know, the more confident and convincing they can be when selling our wines.”

With their product line currently undergoing a rebrand set for completion in June, Millie Forster, UK Trade Marketing and Events Manager at  The Lakes Distillery’s says:  “As a growing brand, we don’t always have the capacity to get around to all of the airports and retail sites where our products are stocked as often as we would like. This roadshow makes it much easier to get everyone together, and I think this consistency has a knock-on effect with staff retention, as brand ambassadors know they are trusted, invested in through training, and are an integral part to our success.”

Florencia Schuab has been a Blackjack brand ambassador at Heathrow for almost a year, attending the previous liquor roadshow at the company’s head office. Speaking about the opportunity to attend the training event in its new home she said, “In the Centre you have the space to sit down with brands without interruption. As the customer-facing staff, it’s a great opportunity to feedback common questions we are asked on the shop floor so that we can offer even better service and product knowledge. It’s also a nice opportunity to catch up with my brand ambassador colleagues!”

Oli Perl at Jose Cuervo, part of the Proximo Spirits group, called the roadshow a “Genius idea, especially as the new building offers us a dedicated training space where brand ambassadors can circulate in small groups and get quality time with the liquor brands. Ambassadors get such a brief time with customers in the airport, we want to make sure they have lots of interesting points they can share to keep them engaged – especially for a category like tequila that shoppers tend to know less about. Customers are increasingly concerned about a brand’s origin, authenticity and ethics, so backing up product knowledge with brand context is an important thing for us to discuss.”

Blackjack’s Centre of Excellence houses five rooms of flexible training space, as well as housing a 15,000 sq/ft distribution centre. Halewood Wines and Spirits was one of the liquor brands present at the roadshow that also use the centre in their travel retail logistics.  Halewood Wines & Spirits, Head of Global Travel Retail Europe, Eamon Prunty said “I have worked with Blackjack for nearly three years and we have integrated bespoke ambassador training during that time, so I am not a newcomer to this initiative. However, today I have been extremely encouraged by the enthusiasm of these people who on a day-to-day basis are out there representing my brand. This is also an amazing opportunity to introduce them to the two new Whitley Neill flavours we are launching across Dufry UK in the coming months. One of which, Whitley Neill Gooseberry is a Dufry UK Exclusive in GTR.”

The Centre of Excellence will have an official ‘digital’ launch event on March 4th. Blackjack will release a video giving an in-depth and guided tour of the training spaces and facilities, and the logistics warehouse. If you would like to be sent the link to view this on launch day, please register your name with Lucy, lucy@klpr.biz

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Blackjack Promotions, which specialises in airport staffing, travel retail and experiential marketing, has seen massive growth in demand for market research services during 2017, as clients focus on understanding how passengers use airports and their feelings about the service they receive.

In recent months, Blackjack has been awarded new contracts or had existing contracts extended with a number of airports, including Stansted, London Luton Airport and Dubai – the world’s busiest international passenger airport.

Fiona Tindall, Head of Domestic Retail at Blackjack Promotions, says: “Airports can be incredibly challenging locations to carry out face-to-face research. Travellers can be tired, distracted and stressed, while there may be restrictions on how and where staff can deliver marketing activities and what they can say to people, particularly when you’re working air-side, beyond the security barriers.”

Blackjack has a large database of experienced brand ambassadors who are security cleared to work ‘airside’, in the areas beyond the security gates and passport control.

Tindall adds: “It’s vital that brand ambassadors working within the airport environment understand how travellers think and how to approach them in a way that reduces stress levels, rather than adding to them. Staff need much higher levels of diplomacy and general customer service skills than they would need, say, in a traditional retail environment, public space or festival or event.”

At Stansted, Blackjack staff worked over the summer (the airport’s busiest period), monitoring the quality of user experience, including queue lengths, passenger traffic flow, congestion points and other issues relevant to the journey through the terminal. This is the second year running Blackjack has delivered face-to-face research services at Stansted.

At Luton, Blackjack was appointed in 2016 to provide field agents to support an airport quality survey programme. London Luton Airport (LLA) constantly monitors all aspects of the passenger experience and was also keen to understand how passengers feel about its redevelopment programme, launched in 2016. That contract has now been extended for three years.

At Dubai, Blackjack was appointed to deliver research services during 2016 to understand more about the passenger experience and how they could improve passenger satisfaction. The data delivered by this initial programme was so useful that Dubai has extended it to run until May 2018, and has also added a ‘mystery shopping’ function.

For Dubai, Blackjack had to source multilingual research staff to cover 32 passenger interaction points across four terminals, 365 days a year. Staff have to have airside access. They input questionnaire responses onto tablets and upload the data in real time for Dubai Airports to access.

Blackjack Promotions is a leading staffing solutions, travel retail and experiential specialist. A subsidiary of US company ABM Industries, a global provider of facilities management services, Blackjack is based at Heathrow, where it employs approximately 1,000 staff, in addition to its database of 8,000+ field staff. Blackjack is a member of the IPM agency.

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Tiffany is marking the launch of its new signature fragrance to the UK market with experiential activity in one of the busiest areas of Heathrow’s Terminal 5.

The campaign will allow passengers to personally experience the brand-new Tiffany perfume, crafted to reflect the diamonds for which the legendary jeweller is famous. The scent itself is described as ‘elegant and light’, with a bottle designed to reflect light and a cap showcasing a ring displaying the Tiffany & Co. hallmark.

Passengers will be able to test the fragrance at the stand. The diamond-inspired perfume bottle comes nestled in the famous Tiffany blue box and passengers will exclusively be able to have theirs engraved before it is then beautifully gift wrapped.

The site is located in Terminal 5 Departures, home to a range of prestigious and premium retailers, which means it should attract passengers actively seeking entertainment from high end brands such as Tiffany.

Tiffany designed the stand, which was manufactured and installed by Emerald House Associates. BlackJack Promotions is providing the staff.

With over 3,400 fragrances available to buy at Heathrow Airport and £122 million spent on scent alone in 2016, the experiential stand provides a unique and effective way for Tiffany to cut through and ensure the brand is front of mind when passengers are considering their fragrance purchases.

Tiffany’s campaign was booked by JCDecaux OneWorld through JCDecaux Airport and will run for one month at Heathrow Terminal 5. The experiential campaign is supported by bookings across digital screens in Terminal 5, Terminal 2 and across the Digital Totems in T5.

Steve Cox, Marketing Director for JCDecaux Airport, says: “An experiential site such as this provides the perfect platform to launch a new fragrance.  Tiffany has recreated the essence of their brand, and can both engage a highly receptive audience keen to spend on the product, and propagate their message far beyond the airport environment.”

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Former Managing Director of specialist experiential and staffing agency Blackjack Promotions, Sally Alington, has launched a new global consultancy, Ethos Farm, which aims to help companies transform their approach to the customer experience.

“Business leaders across the globe undervalue service. Yet it can deliver real differentiation in an increasingly commoditised world,” said Sally Alington, Founder and CEO, Ethos Farm. “Companies talk about having a customer-facing workforce but what’s actually needed is staff who fully understand the corporate values and business objectives. Only then can they deliver exceptional service levels that meet both customer and company needs.”

The idea behind the Ethos Farm name is about positively transforming attitudes and corporate cultures, supporting the development of a successful company ethos in which workforces become advocates of the company.

“We help organisations to do this by combining best practice in employee learning and training with the latest communications technologies to transform workforces into brand custodians,” Alington explained.

Alington has brought together a team of globally-recognised experts with in-depth understanding of the latest management practice and training theories, coupled with years of real-world experience at rolling out service improvement programmes for some of the world’s best-known companies, brands and organisations, including Heathrow and Dubai Airport, the BBC and Westfield, to name a few.

She says that at Ethos Farm’s heart is a unique ‘Customer Service Architecture and Engineering’ concept.

Architecture refers to the company’s Consultancy team, headed by Alington, which helps companies develop a blueprint for customer service to align workforces with their values and aspirations.

Engineering relates to the Learning Development and Technology teams, led by Josie Barton and Mat Garner respectively. These provide the building blocks to make the new service blueprint a reality and transform the customer experience.

Alington is a former Director of Retail and Experiential Services at OmniServ and Managing Director of staffing solutions and experiential marketing agency Blackjack Promotions. She has a deep knowledge of designing and implementing customer services solutions and brand ambassador training.

Josie Barton is former Head of Operations, Finance and Planning at the BBC. From building competency frameworks for British Airways to playing a key role in relocating 2,000 BBC staff to BBC Media City in Salford, Barton has 25 years’ experience of people and corporate development, including designing and managing apprenticeship strategies. She also helped set up the BBC’s first ever joint venture outside of the UK – the Media City in Abu Dhabi.

Mat Garner is former Operations and Customer Services Director of a 2,000-strong operation at Heathrow, ex-Head of Commercial for Manchester Airport Group and Passenger Services Director at Stansted Airport, and is highly experienced at designing and developing technology solutions that are built with the end-user in mind.

Ethos Farm Learning and Development is designed to inspire the highest levels of performance from teams using a range of next-generation training tools and techniques. These include specially developed ‘Performance Rooms’, where the Ethos Farm team can deliver immersive training experiences.

The latest state-of-the-art technology will play a vital role in supporting the efficient and effective delivery of Ethos Farm’s customer service design and development concepts. This includes both bespoke and ‘templated’ solutions to drive enhanced service levels and colleague engagement from frontline workforces, as well as providing data analysis to drive insights into staff behaviours and avoid service problems.

“Using a range of tools, we will guide clients and their teams to develop the insights and approaches that will ensure they stay close to their customers and are able to adapt and thrive in an increasingly volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous world,” adds Alington. “Our role is simply to help clients find the unique formula that will inspire the highest levels of performance from their people.”

The fourth member of Ethos Farm’s founding team is Lauren Walsh, who heads up the company’s operation in the Americas, based out of New York. Walsh is former Global Head of Client Services at Blackjack Promotions, and was previously Travel Retail Regional Manager, L’Oréal Luxe UK for YSL and Biotherm.

The new venture has already secured backing from global facilities solutions provider ABM, with Andy Donnell, Group Managing Director of ABM UK, joining the company’s Board of Directors. ABM is the current parent company of Blackjack.

For UK clients, Ethos Farm is able to advise companies on the complexities of the new Apprenticeship Levy and will soon be accredited as an approved Apprentice Training Provider.

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Quirky personalised gift company Harrow & Green, which usually sells its products via its own website or ecommerce sites such as Notonthehighstreet.com, is again opening a present personalisation pop-up in iconic department store Selfridges on London’s Oxford Street.

Shoppers searching for the perfect bespoke Christmas present for their loved ones will be able to enlist the help of a crew of elves provided by staffing specialists Blackjack Promotions.

Harrow & Green mainly sells through websites, offering a range of customisable personalised products which includes special Christmas stockings and sacks. However, last year, in the run-up to the festive period, it set up a special pop-up personalised gift boutique in Selfridges’ Christmas Shop, with Blackjack’s help.

That experiment proved so popular that Harrow & Green is doing it again this year, with its pop-up set open from early September. Blackjack has recruited and trained a team of four staff, who will be on hand to guide shoppers through the mysteries of Christmas wrapping and help them select personalised gifts for friends and family.

The brand ambassadors, wearing Harrow & Green-branded aprons, will also make the bespoke items, which can carry shopper-selected messaging, including children’s names and dates of birth.

Philip Taylor, who co-founded Harrow & Green with his wife Tanya, says: “Our Christmas pop-up in Selfridges offers the perfect opportunity for us to share our passion for all things beautiful. We’re inspired by modern typography, old-style fonts, and the way text can be combined with original design to produce high quality, great-looking personalised Christmas gifts, stockings and sacks. We need intelligent, engaging staff who share our passion for the beautiful and who can articulate our vision and our brand values – and Blackjack has already shown it’s more than capable of recruiting and training just the right people.”

Fiona Tindall, Head of Domestic Retail at Blackjack Promotions, says: “Blackjack needs fully-trained brand ambassadors who understand the brand inside out, can operate the printing process and embody the Harrow & Green charm. Fundamentally, it’s moving the relationship from being a purely transactional, product-based one to being an emotional, experiential one.”

The Harrow & Green Christmas pop-up will be open in Selfridges until December 24th, 2017.

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Blackjack Promotions, one of Europe’s leading airport staffing, travel retail and experiential marketing agencies, has promoted two members of its team to senior positions – both within a year of joining the business.

Andy DeVito has been appointed Head of Experiential while Fiona Tindall becomes Head of Domestic Retail.

DeVito returned to Blackjack last year as Account Director. He has extensive experience in travel retail marketing, having joined Blackjack initially in 2010, leaving four years later, but returning to the fold to focus on the integration of creative, design, planning and logistics, along with the agency’s award-winning staffing service. In his new role as Head of Experiential, DeVito will continue to oversee this work, while also managing Blackjack’s entire experiential operation.

“Experiential activations are a key part of the overall marketing mix and with more and more new exciting technology coming to market, the potential for brands is incredible,” said DeVito. “This is a fantastic opportunity and I’m truly relishing the challenge to drive our experiential activity forward.”

Previously working on the expansion of Local Market Retail at Blackjack in her role as Account Director, Tindall also joined the business in 2016 from World Duty Free, where she was Customer Service Manager at Heathrow Terminal 5.

In her newly-created role as Head of Domestic Retail, Tindall will draw on her considerable retail expertise, which includes working for leading fashion retailer Gap, to oversee the growth of Blackjack’s Domestic Retail division.

Tindall was recently accepted on the IPM’s 30 under 30 scheme, a year-long programme designed and delivered to enable personal and career development for the best emerging talent in the promotional marketing industry.

“Retail is my passion and being promoted to head up our domestic team is a dream come true,” said Tindall. “Using my extensive experience in this space, the new division will focus on securing new retail contracts and working in collaboration with Andy and the experiential team to deliver exceptional events and experiences for our clients.”

Sally Alington, Managing Director, Blackjack Promotions, said: “I’m delighted to be able to acknowledge Andy and Fiona for their fine work since joining Blackjack. The appointments show the depth of talent we enjoy across the business. I wish them both every success in their new roles.”

Blackjack Promotions is the leading staffing solutions, travel retail and experiential specialist, with operations in the UK and the Middle East. Its core service offering falls under three headings: travel retail, experiential and logistics. It also works hand-in-hand with agency partners and media owners using its experiential expertise to bring brands and briefs to life.

The company was founded in 1995 and acquired by OmniServ Limited, the European division of Air Serv Corporation, owned by ABM, in 2013. Blackjack is a member of the Airport Promotion Agencies (APA), of which Blackjack MD Sally Alington is joint-chairman, and the Institute of Promotional Marketing (IPM).

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Blackjack Promotions, a leading UK and European provider of brand ambassadors and travel retail and customer service specialists in airports, has acquired Irish company Casey Recruitment, based just outside Dublin.

Founded in 1998 by Managing Director Mary Kelly, Casey Recruitment is Ireland’s leading provider of temporary and permanent staff to Ireland’s retail industry, with a particular focus on luxury brands and the travel retail sector. Current clients include L’Oréal, William Grant & Sons and Estee Lauder.

Following the completion of the deal on December 31st 2016, Casey Recruitment is undergoing a rebrand to Blackjack Ireland and will be led by Norma Murphy as Head of Blackjack Ireland.

The acquisition marks a significant step in Blackjack’s European expansion plans by extending its reach into Dublin, Shannon and Cork airports.

“We are a dynamic and ambitious business, constantly focused on growth and expansion by providing elevated service levels and innovation for our clients,” said Sally Alington, Managing Director, Blackjack Promotions and Director of Retail & Experiential Services for Blackjack’s parent, OmniServ, an ABM Company. “This latest acquisition presents a really exciting opportunity for us to develop ABM and Blackjack’s presence in Ireland, as well continue to build upon existing excellent relationships with Aer Rianta, DAA and Heinemann.”

Mary Kelly, Managing Director, Casey Recruitment, says: “It was very important to me that the business we built up over the years with our wonderful staff and premium clients would continue to develop and flourish. I have known Sally and Blackjack for many years and am confident of great things to come. My staff are looking forward to a bright future ahead with lots of opportunities. Our clients can be assured of continued excellent results with Blackjack offering their vast expertise in the customer services industry.”

Casey Recruitment was the sole Irish member of the Airport Promotions Agencies network (of which Blackjack is also a member), an association of retail solutions companies which collectively provide staffing to over 80 Airports across Europe, North Africa and the Middle East. Blackjack MD Sally Alington is joint-chairman of the APA. Blackjack is also a member of UK marketing industry trade body, the Institute of Promotional Marketing (IPM).

The Casey Recruitment acquisition comes on the back of a hugely successful year for Blackjack in 2016, which has seen its travel retail sector income increase by +40% YOY.

The terms of the transaction were not disclosed.

Blackjack Promotions is the leading staffing solutions, travel retail and experiential specialist, with operations in the UK and the Middle East. Its core service offering falls under three headings: travel retail, experiential and logistics. It also works hand-in-hand with agency partners and media owners using its experiential expertise to bring brands and briefs to life.

The company was founded in 1995 and acquired by OmniServ Limited, the European division of Air Serv Corporation, owned by ABM, in 2013. Blackjack is a member of the Airport Promotion Agencies (APA), of which Blackjack MD Sally Alington is joint-chairman, and the Institute of Promotional Marketing (IPM).

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Andy DeVito of Blackjack Promotions has some timely advice on Christmas-related marketing

The Christmas period is all about tradition. The supermarket aisles filled with gifts and decorations, the Christmas TV ad battle and the traditional headlines about this year’s ‘Winter Blunderland’ Christmas-themed event.

Muddy fields rather than pristine snow; elves who are drunk, abusive or smoking; a ‘Polar Express’ which costs more, mile for mile, than the Orient Express; and a Santa experience which is more grotty than Grotto.

Year in, year out, the media reports on the heartbreak of those punters who have forked out £150 for a family ticket to feed carrots to a sad donkey wearing fake antlers before their 30 seconds with a Bad Santa. It seems like no matter how many disastrous Christmas theme parks are exposed every year, some people never learn.

I’m not just talking about consumers here: there are lessons that all of us who work in the experiential industry could do with taking to heart.

Here are just a few of them…

Location, Location, Location

There are very good reasons why the best Christmas experiential activations tend to take place in big department stores, shopping malls and transit hubs, not muddy fields outside Milton Keynes.

For one thing, it makes commercial sense, particularly for big brands. If you set up your extravaganza in a location which is going to see major footfall, particularly consumers in a shopping frame of mind, then it will directly impact sales.

It’s not just about how people get there or what state of mind they’ll be in when they arrive; it’s also about having enough space and resources on hand to deliver a great activation. Take shopping malls – they are already effectively retail theatres, with the infrastructure to allow you to deploy giant sleighs and chorus lines of dancing teddy bears.

Train stations and airports are other excellent places to run Christmas-themed events. Again, they have great facilities, good theatre-like spaces, doors and lifts which can handle large items of equipment, and lots of people who are going to spend the time waiting for their train or flight browsing the retail outlets.

Santa’s Little Helpers

Elves are supposed to be magical creatures who sing and dance as they make toys for good children. They’re not supposed to reek of cigarettes and booze, and they’re expected to be happy and cheerful no matter what the situation – not surly and abusive. The same applies to Santa himself, only more so.

If you think about it, though, professional, well-trained brand ambassadors are a key ingredient in the success of any activation, whether it’s a Christmas special, a Halloween Fright Night, an Easter Egg Hunt or sampling in a supermarket carpark.

The clue is in the job title: Brand Ambassadors. They represent the brand, which means they have to exemplify its values. Make sure the staff you deploy have been fully trained in all aspects of the brand and the product they will be promoting.

Check any requirements for staff with special skills – tech people, gymnasts and the like. And if there is going to be any contact with children, then make sure your ambassadors are CRB checked.

The true meaning of Christmas

One final point. Christmas is now a massive commercial opportunity and the biggest sales period of the year. But there are still plenty of people for whom Christmas has obvious religious overtones. That includes Christians but also people of other faiths.

Do not offend people by misusing religious symbols, by appearing to hijack the story of the Nativity to drive profit or by assuming that everyone you have contact with will be familiar with the story of Jesus’s birth.

You can still tap-in to the general feelings of goodwill that Christmas evokes in most people – just look at the current crop of Christmas ads. But whatever you do needs to be on-brand and genuine, not tawdry tat.

Andy DeVito is Account Director – Experiential at Blackjack Promotions, which provides leading staffing solutions, travel retail and specialist experiential services in the UK and the Middle East. Its core service offering falls under three headings: travel retail, experiential and logistics. It also works hand-in-hand with agency partners and media owners using its experiential expertise to bring brands and briefs to life. Blackjack is a member of the Airport Promotion Agencies (APA), of which Blackjack MD Sally Alington is joint-chairman, and the Institute of Promotional Marketing (IPM).

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Blackjack Promotions, a leader in retail-focused experiential marketing, has delivered a complete package for the launch activity of Michael Kors’ new perfume, Wonderlust, in Manchester’s Trafford Centre, with the activation culminating at Birmingham’s Bull Ring today (October 4, 2016).

Working from an initial brief and a 30’ TV ad, Blackjack developed the creative, designed the stand, created a social sharing mechanism, recruited and provided brand ambassadors, as well as full build and installation. Specialist outdoor media agency Talon also worked on the project.

The end product is an aspirational and luxurious space featuring images of the High Life as backdrops plus a luxury ‘boat’ which passers-by are invited to sit in and have their own personal GIF created. From here, consumers can immediately choose to have their GIF emailed to them or can share directly to any social media platform of their choosing, using the hashtag #wonderlust.

The name of the new perfume, Wonderlust, is a play on words, marrying ‘wonder’ with ‘wanderlust (the desire to travel and to escape). The concept of ‘escape’ is central to the Wonderlust story, according to Michael Kors. The advertising campaign includes a TV commercial and video, developed by Mario Testino, featuring the ‘face’ of the scent, a gold sequined-dress-clad Lily Aldridge, in an unknown far-flung locale. She escapes from a yacht in a small speedboat with her lover, Dutch model Wouter Peelen, and they head off into a rose-fueled sunset.

The stand was live at Manchester Trafford Centre on Saturday 24^th and Sunday 25^th September 2016, with shoppers being directed into Boots to buy. It then moved to Birmingham’s Bull Ring shopping centre from October 1^st to 4^th, driving shoppers into Debenhams.

The Michael Kors #wonderlust project is the first to be delivered by Blackjack Promotions new Account Director—Experiential, Andy DeVito, who recently joined with the brief of delivering ‘end to end’ services for clients.

DeVito moved to Blackjack from specialist events, experiential and retail production house Bluedog Productions, where he was Airport Specialist and Head of Global Travel Retail, delivering event and experiential activations and retail builds in numerous international territories for clients including Bacardi, Remy Martin and Stolichnaya.

Blackjack Promotions is the leading staffing solutions, travel retail and experiential specialist with operations in the UK and the Middle East. Its core service offering falls under three headings: travel retail, experiential and logistics. It also works hand-in-hand with agency partners and media owners using its experiential expertise to bring brands and briefs to life.

Blackjack is a member of the Airport Promotion Agencies (APA), of which Blackjack MD Sally Alington is joint-chairman, and the Institute of Promotional Marketing (IPM).

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Blackjack Promotions, which specialises in airport staffing, travel retail and experiential marketing, has appointed Andy DeVito as Account Director to help the agency drive forward its plans to offer clients an ‘end-to-end’ service encompassing strategy and planning, creative, production, logistics, staffing and post-campaign analytics.

DeVito, 33, returns to Blackjack from specialist events, experiential and retail production house Bluedog Productions, where, since 2014, he has been Airport Specialist and Head of Global Travel Retail, delivering event and experiential activations and retail builds in numerous international territories for clients including Bacardi, Remy Martin and Stolichnaya.

Prior to Bluedog, he spent four years working at Blackjack, where he ended up spending a year as Bacardi Brand Ambassador, helping switch the brand from short term tactical activations in global duty free to a rolling ‘always on’ strategy.

In his newly-created role at Blackjack, DeVito will focus on improving the integration of the creative, design, planning and logistics services that the agency provides in addition to its award-winning staffing service. He will report to Ian Priestman, Blackjack’s Head of Experiential.

Priestman added that many larger clients are increasingly looking to consolidate their marketing spend with full service agencies which also have international reach. Blackjack already delivers campaigns across Europe and the Middle East, with an established operation out of Dubai Airport.

Blackjack Promotions is a leading staffing solutions, travel retail and experiential specialist, with operations in the UK and the Middle East. The company was founded in 1995 and acquired by OmniServ Limited, the European division of Air Serv Corporation, owned by ABM, in 2013. Blackjack also has an office in Dubai where it operates under the trading name Air Serv Hospitality Services MENA.

Blackjack is a member of the Airport Promotion Agencies (APA), of which Blackjack MD Sally Alington is joint-chairman, and the Institute of Promotional Marketing (IPM).

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