After some deep consideration of the planned rail strikes next week, the Products of Change and Max Publishing teams have made the call to postpone this month’s Sustainability in Licensing Conference until 18 October 2022.
The Conference was planned to make its in-person debut at the Royal Geographical Society in London next week on 22 June. However, as word of a planned rail strike across national rail and London tube services started to grow last week, concerns began to flood in around issues of transport from both ticket holders and conference speakers.
In what has been threatened as ‘the biggest outbreak of industrial action in the UK since 1989’ with as many as 50,000 railway workers expected to strike – affecting services across Network Rail and the London Underground – on Tuesday 21 June, and as many as 40,000 workers striking on Thursday 23 June, the team has decided the fairest option for all ticket holders, speakers and sponsors is to postpone the event.
The Sustainability in Licensing Conference will now be held on Tuesday 18 October and will remain at its selected London venue, the Royal Geographical Society as well as being streamed live digitally.
“Having navigated two years of a pandemic we had waited so long and were so excited to be bringing the conference to you all in-person for the first time this year. The decision to postpone the event due to forces outside our control, therefore, has been nothing short of heart-breaking,” said Helena Mansell-Stopher, ceo and founder of Products of Change.
“However, we know this is the right decision to make. It wouldn’t be fair to our wonderful delegates, amazing speakers, or incredible sponsors to go ahead with an event that lands right in the middle of these railway strikes. The issues it would cause everyone travelling to our central London venue would be untold.
“We have always set out to deliver the very best for the industry and that includes the very best Sustainability in Licensing Conference. And that means a conference we can all get to, in-person, and share our progression and ideas around the most important conversation within the industry right now.
“That’s why we have moved the Conference to its new Tuesday 18 October date where we will deliver a line-up of inspirational speakers, discussions, and panel sessions just as strong as we had planned for you next week.”
All booked tickets (both physical and digital) will be automatically moved to the new date. For any ticket enquiries contact Clare Hollick at Createvents on clare@createvents.co.uk or 01183 340085.
Please note that the Brand & Licensing Innovation Summit, organised by Informa Markets, will also not take place next week and the planned conference sessions will now be held as part of Brand Licensing Europe this September. Further details can be found at www.brandlicensinginnovationsummit.com.
