Award winning venue management and events company Sheffield International Venues (SIV) has been shortlisted for a prestigious industry accolade after bringing one of the nation’s biggest televised sporting events to Yorkshire.
SIV has been selected as a finalist in the Tourism Event of the Year category at the 2010 White Rose Awards after the Sheffield Arena and iceSheffield staged the BBC’s 2009 Sports Personality of the Year, which attracted a star-studded crowd of more than 11,500 to the city.
The company has also been shortlisted in the Business Tourism Award for its Conferencing and Events provision.
The glittering Sports Personality of the Year ceremony, which attracted hundreds of sporting and entertainment celebrities and a television audience of millions, saw Manchester United star Ryan Giggs take the top award ahead of Jenson Button and Sheffield’s Jess Ennis.
It is estimated the value for Sheffield of staging Sports Personality of the Year is in the region of £2m and that the event triggered business in the city worth £1m.
Dominic Stokes, general manager of SIV Conferencing and Events and Yorkshire Business Insider’s Personality of the Year 2010, said: “This is excellent news for SIV. The Sports Personality of the Year awards well and truly put Sheffield on the map and attracted some of the world’s top sporting stars.
“Hosting an event of that scale and calibre gave SIV the chance to showcase what we and the city of Sheffield are capable of achieving, so to be announced as finalists in these awards is fantastic recognition from the industry.
“Being shortlisted for the Business Tourism award for our entire Conferencing and Events provision is fantastic, having won the award for Sheffield City Hall last year. At SIV we pride ourselves on ensuring that we deliver high quality, innovative conferences and events across all our venues to bring people from across the region and beyond to the city.”
These latest shortlists follow a string of recent award successes for SIV. The leisure operator recently scooped two awards at the prestigious Fitness Industry Association’s FLAME Awards 2010.
The English Institute of Sport – Sheffield took the Club of the Year (under 1,000 members) title and Concord Sports Centre was named Centre of Year, narrowly beating SIV’s Hillsborough Leisure Centre, which was also shortlisted in the same category.
It was recently announced that SIV has been shortlisted as a finalist in the BlackBerry Customer Focus category at the 2010 National Business Awards. The company also won the Excellence in Customer Service award at the 2009 Sheffield Business Awards.
