Customer Spotlight – Pirate & Queen

Today we’re looking at one of our customers who are responsible for elevating the arts and culture scene in Wellington to new heights.

Directors Claire Mabey and Andrew Laking formed the production company, Pirate & Queen, in 2014.

In a nutshell, they organise festivals in Wellington and around New Zealand.

The reality is they do a whole lot more.

They also manage other people’s events, do publicity, marketing, and create events for organisations and the public. They’ve also put together tours for international artists.

The inspiration for starting Pirate & Queen stemmed from Claire and Andrew’s love of creating and managing events – something they had been doing their whole lives. After a while it only felt natural that they go out on their own and start their own event business.

Unsurprisingly, their favourite part of the job is getting to create exciting events and working with top artists around New Zealand.

What is their secret to consistently putting people in seats?

Claire and Andrew say it comes down to the fact that all of their events are brand new experiences for the audiences.

“We spend a lot of time making them as fun and interesting as possible so that people will want to come back next time round.”

Claire and Andrew’s business ambitions go beyond Pirate & Queen.

In 2014 they created the LitCrawl festival in Wellington – a festival of literature set in local bars, cafes, venues, book stores, and public spaces. It began as 14 events and has since grown to over 50 events, with 150 artists and over 5,000 people in attendance.

Extremely proud of their accomplishments, Andrew remarked that “the event began with very little budget or infrastructure but has now grown to become Wellington’s leading annual literary festival.”

As for any advice Claire and Andre have to offer to aspiring business owners, they had this to offer: “Either find something that you really enjoy doing and be prepared to spend a lot of time working at it!”. Thanks for buying your insurance with us!

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