The inaugural Mediaweek 100 Power Lunch was held on October 21, at the Crown Sydney’s Pearl Ballroom, where the most powerful people across the media industry and the most influential on-air talent were named.
Making sure that the day ran smoothly was event company Usual Suspects, who made visions of the sold-out event a reality.
Mediaweek spoke to Usual Suspects managing director Shani Langi, and event director Sharice Bellantonio about how the company began and what it is that makes a good event.
Langi and Bellantonio have worked together for 20 years, and started Usual Suspects after leaving their respective agencies.
At the time, the pair knew that they were taking a leap of faith, but with a team of eight women in their office today, the risk has well and truly paid off.
Langi: “Female founders – especially in the events world – weren’t really a thing. We knew that we had to tackle a big task there, but it works. We instinctively get each other, we knew that we could run a business together – and when I say that, I mean that we’ve got a bit of a telepathy thing going on that drives the rest of our team absolutely nuts!”
Once the pair had launched Usual Suspects, it was time to work out what the company’s niche was going to be.
Langi: “When we started our business, we knew that there were a lot of great activation and events businesses already in existence, so we thought okay, what can we do that’s a little bit different? We’d worked on a lot of businesses and a lot of amazing brands, but the things that really sparked joy for us were things that were trying to do good – we wanted to be able to be a purpose-driven events business. We tried to seek out clients with similar values to us. It was a bit hit-and-miss in the first few years, to be honest!”
Epitomising the work that the team look to do is their partnership with the Good Is The New Cool movement.
Langi: “We took on the partnership for Good Is The New Cool, which is a movement for purpose-driven businesses and culture creators. We became the Australian arm for that a few years ago. It’s not a money making thing, but we feel really good when we can shine a light on businesses and culture creators using business as a force for good.”
Bellantonio: “Going to and organising those events may not make us money, but it has opened doors for us to speak to some amazing brands, and they have now in turn become our clients.”
When asked the million dollar question about what makes a good event, the pair say that the audience is the centre of everything they do. Usual Suspects even has four major points that they take to every brief that they use to make sure of this.
Bellantonio: “For us, it’s all about the audience first. Ultimately, that will drive people back to come to those events and will get those audience members talking about the brand. They’re the ones that advocate, they’re the ones that ultimately get the word out there – not just the client doing amazing activation.”
Langi: “It needs to be inspiring. It needs to be interactive, so people need to be able to touch, feel, and engage. It needs to be informative, which isn’t just about getting across lots of information, it’s more about getting across the right information at the right time. It needs to be intriguing, which is the one that we start with – people need to be curious about it.”
It’s been a bumpy few years for live events – Usual Suspects had a million dollars worth of jobs wiped off the calendar within the first month of pandemic lockdowns. Since then, however, live events have come back with a bang, and Langi says that the industry is well and truly back on its feet.
Langi: “People are craving that face-to-face in-person time, and it is really valuable. People love connecting and networking more than they ever have before. Now, the difficult thing is making sure you’re not clashing with everyone else because there are so many things to go to! That means whatever you put on needs to be awesome, needs to be proved value, and again, needs to be centred around the audience.”
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Top Image: Shani Langi and Sharice Bellantonio