This year’s Royal British Legion Poppy Appeal aims to raise an amazing £37 million. SW19 provided production requirements for both its launch at RAF Northholt on 24th October and Silence in the Square on 11thNovember.
The launch was hosted by television presenter Gethin Jones with music from The Saturdays, X Factor’s Union J, up and coming pop star Tich, Britain’s Got Talent finalists Luminites and The Poppy Girls – five girls aged between 10 and 17 who are daughters of serving armed forces men – who performed the official Poppy Appeal 2013 single, The Call (No Need to Say Goodbye).
SW19’s Charles Ellery has worked on a number of events for the Royal British Legion over the last few years and provides a service they have come to rely on.
“Charles and I first worked together on the launch of the Poppy Appeal in 2010, when it was staged at Colchester’s Melville Barracks,” says Becky Warren, PR Manager for the Royal British Legion. “The Appeal itself has developed since then and now we put on this style of ‘pop up’ Poppy Appeal pop concert for the armed forces and their families.”
RAF Northolt was chosen for this year’s concert as it is one of the locations the Legion delivers its welfare service, with 3,000 concert-goers coming from military bases as far afield as the Navy base in Portsmouth, and the Army’s barracks in London and Aldershot.
SW19 brought in Capital Sound to provide audio requirements, STL Lighting for lighting, Creative Technology for video hardware and Star Hire for the stage and grandstands. Raw Productions provided all the video content and Zest supplied cameras and recorded the show, which streamed live on the web and has been archived for future playback and internal use, whilst SFM Security ensured that all artists were well taken care of.
“We have to deal with the requirements of the different entities from The British Legion, as well as the contractors,” explains Squadron Leader Richard Willis, Station Media and Communications Officer and project officer for The Poppy Appeal launch, talking of the additional logistics involved for SW19. “And we needed to make the event happen on a secure, active, military base.”
“The Legion is a wonderful client,” says Charles. “They are patient and they trust me to put together what they want as a finished product. The time schedule this year was pretty tight, as I also handled the Remembrance Sunday event in Trafalgar Square on 11th November, so I cleared my desk of everything else for the duration.”
With the concert held in the hanger that used to house Winston Churchill’s personal aircraft, which is a Grade II listed building, particular care and attention was needed.
“The hangar is an empty structure, so we had to bring absolutely everything in,” Charles explains. “As it’s listed, we couldn’t hang anything from the building itself, so it all had to be free-standing. I needed a team I knew I could rely on, so I chose each company because of their experience and expertise.
Working alongside Charles was stage manager Jem Melluish, who Charles has worked with on previous Legion projects, production assistant Dina Van Der Elst who worked alongside Becky on artist and press liaison, and SW19’s Lisa Santos and Leila Farhangi-Farrell, who provided vital support back at the SW19 office.
“SW19 is a professional company that does things like this all the time. It’s been really good because they’ve scoped the site out, they know what’s required, they just get on with it and we don’t have to worry,” continues Squadron Leader Willis. “Working with Charles in particular, who has done this many times and knows exactly what he’s doing, has been really easy. The whole thing ran very smoothly. The military have a can-do attitude anyway; even when there are last minute requests we try to just make it happen. But our need to do that was very much the margins, as the bulk of it was done by SW19 and the contractors.”
Charles Ellery 