Corporate Disaster For Venues

The pandemic has had a profound effect on many businesses, with the more forward thinking now taking advantage of improved technology to allow virtual meetings.

The technology is not new of course, Messenger, Google and WhatsApp allow video calls for multiple users free of charge. However the audio and video quality is often poor and document sharing is not available in a live format.

Step forward Zoom, GoToWebinar and Cisco Webex who control more than 75% off the global market for Virtual Meeting Platforms.

Zoom US in particular is responsible for nearly 40% of the global share, and offer quite reasonable pricing plans that allow for up to 300 participants for just £20 a month. For smaller businesses, meetings for up to 40 minutes duration are free. Our own team uses Zoom for our weekly meeting.

With the added bonus of no venue hire fees, catering costs, travel costs or parking fees , it’s an option that many businesses have embraced and are unlikely to change, even when the pandemic restrictions allow face to face meetings again. Virtual Meeting Platforms are very versatile and most are simple to use, we reported on the Virtual Tea Dance last week (read it here).

However, this trend will have quite severe financial implications for Hamptons. The closure of the bars, the removal of the sitting tenants and now the potential loss of many corporate bookings will rip a huge hole in the income of the venue.

At a time when the Chelmsford Muslim Society are rumoured to be gearing up to begin building work to install ritual ablution facilities, it’s just another virtual nail in the coffin.