Media Articles - Creative Occasions

Convention and Incentive Marketing Magazine - March 2005

Nelson and the "WOW" factor

If a conference doesn't already have a set theme, in Nelson the scenic beauty and ambience are subtly injected. That is the view of Nelson Convention Bureau manager Astrid Fisher, who says Nelsonians like to put something of their area into a conference to make it memorable. "Seafood, art and culture, and food and wine typify the region."

Conference venues in and around Nelson are diverse and interesting. In the centre of Nelson, the Rutherford Hotel Nelson - A Heritage Hotel regularly hosts themed gala dinners. Conference manager Glen Thompson says that about 80 per cent of conference groups theme their gala dinner. "If they're looking for ideas we suggest involving the WOW aspect and a sea/seafood theme." Nelson company Creative Occasions is used by the hotel to do its theming work. "They have been working with us for quite a few years and know the hotel well." says Thompson.

The Leader - November 2003

Ball may raise up to $30,000 for hospice

Hospice Trust chairwoman Elspeth Kennedy, left, and Glenys Johnston, style

co ordinator from Creative Occasions during preparations on the eve of the ball.

Up to $30,000 has been raised for the Nelson Hospice as a result of the New Zealand Army Band Ball held at the Trafalgar Centre on Friday night, Hospice Trust chairwoman Elspeth Kennedy says.

She says the trust committee had "put in some long hours" working on the event for the last four months.

She says a huge range of volunteers offered their services for nothing to help make the event a success.

"Volunteers started erecting the canopy (within the Trafalgar Centre) at 10pm on Thursday night and worked through the night until 6am.

Then the next lot came to put in the tables and chairs and then the florists and chefs came."

She says the ball was a particularly impressive sight. "The Trafalgar Centre was swathed in black and champagne silk."

The Nelson Mail - April 2002

Stylish decorations set the scene

Photos are one way of providing a lasting memory of your wedding day. Another is to create a feeling of ambience which, studies prove, guests recall long after they have forgotten what the food was like or which wine was served, says Glenys Johnston, of Creative Occasions.

When it comes to planning weddings, she and her husband Kevin have many years experience. It's nothing for them to arrange an entire wedding for an overseas couple, although more frequently it's their ability to transform a sterile venue into an appealing wedding venue.
They will be showing some of what they can do when they decorate Nelson's Premier Bridal Show at the Rutherford Hotel this Sunday.

Glenys says wedding decorating styles are now virtually endless but the three main styles they are being asked for are firstly - simple and elegant eg. candelabra and fairylighting; secondly - themes eg. the sea and thirdly - innovative eg. balloon sculpture. The days of margarine tub posy bowl centrepieces are virtually over, she says.

The important thing is to select a style and make sure all of the decorations are co-ordinated. Inexperienced people tend to incorporate too much in the wrong areas and the end result is disappointing.

Often less is best and indeed it sometimes has to be when you are working to a budget. And let's face it, she says, everybody is and it has a long way to stretch for a wedding.

Creative Occasions' hire service is one way to keep expenses down. They have a range of decorations to buy or hire from their retail outlet at 87 Nile Street (opposite Central School) for those who want to DIY or you can commission a design and have Creative Occasions do the decorating for you.

Recently they had 13 wedding venues to decorate in one weekend! With keys to most buildings, the couple could well be compared to elves in the night. The decorations went up in the middle of the night and disappeared just as mysteriously the next. But the memories they helped create for the bridal couple and their guests are guaranteed to last a lot longer.

 The Nelson Mail - October 1997

About 300 enjoy party in the street

Up to 300 people partied in a Nelson street yesterday to mark the first birthday of Nelson firm Creative Occasions.

The Halloween-theme party at Alton St, which is to become an annual event, included a children's fancy dress competition fire engine and surrey rides, face painting, music and a clown.

Sarah Kerby, of Nelson, dressed as witch to win the fancy dress competition.

Her mother Carrie said all the materials for the costume had been lying around the house.

Sarah got into character by not brushing her teeth before the party.

Creative Occasions co-owner Kevin Johnston said the children had put a lot of effort into their fancy dress costumes.

He said the party was aimed at thanking local people for their support and to put something back into the community.

Creative Occasions stocks party supplies, as well as organising and decorating events such as weddings.

Mr Johnston said he and his wife Glenys started the business because many people found themselves too busy to organise their own events.

The Nelson Mail - June 1997

Mystery surrounds fairytale ball

Shhh... don't tell, but there was this absolutely fabulous ball at The Rutherford in Nelson on Saturday.

Only nobody is supposed to know about it, darling. It's a secret!

Apparently it's been that way for decades.

The chairman of the ball committee (his identity is hush-hush) says you have to be in the know to get an invitation.

"It's a private function and we want to keep it that way because we can't handle any more people."

All he would reveal was that a committee of six couples organised the ball and they all had a wonderful time.

The Rutherford's conference manager, Kim Roebuck, said 170 attended The Fairytale Ball with cocktails, a sit-down dinner and band.

They came as Puss in Boots, Little Red Riding Hood and other fairytale characters.

As they walked into the hotel they were greeted by two footmen with Cinderella's glassed in carriage and two cream ponies.

Glenys Johnston of Creative Occasions, which organised the carriage and ponies, said they did not know who they are working for.

"It's very mysterious," she said. "We were asked to come up with a concept for the ball but the organisers are anonymous. All I know is a man is coming to pay us today."

The Nelson Mail - November 1996
Offender not hanging around

By Vanessa Phillips  

Holy holdup, Batman! ...The city's finest are scouring the metropolis in the search for Nelson's mysterious masked man.

Police investigating an attempted armed robbery on Thursday have laid their hands on a rubber Batman mask similar to the one used during the holdup.

A man with a full-facial black Batman mask walked into Creative Occasions in Alton St early on Thursday afernoon, and demanded money after brandishing a silver pistol.

He walked out of the shop empty-handed after the owners simply stared at him in stunned silence, making his getaway on a mountainbike.

Detective Rick Lowe said a person matching the offender's description bought a Batman mask from a toy store on Thursday morning, hours before the holdup.

Mr Lowe said police wanted to hear from anyone who had found a Batman mask or pistol, as the items may have been discarded after the incident.

Today, police had no other leads to help with catching the Batman bandit, descrived as having an olive complexion, aged between 18 and 20, with short straight black hair.

The Nelson Mail - November 1996

Batman bandit 'not joking'

Masked man pulls gun on shop owners

By Vanessa Phillips 

The owners of a new Nelson party shop "froze in fear" yesterday when they realised a man wearing a Batman mask standing before them brandishing a gun was no practical joker.

A man with a full-facial black Batman mask walked into Creative Occasions in Alton St, at 12.55pm, and demanded money after pulling out a silver pistol from behind himself.

He walked out of the shop again, empty-handed, after co-owners Kevin and Glenys Johnston simply stared open-mouthed in silence.

Creative Occasions has only been open a week. It hires and sells party decorations and also decorates events such as weddings and Christmas celebrations.

"I started walking toward him, thinking 'he's got a Batman mask, he just wants to buy some party decorations'," Mr Johnston said.

"He pulled the slide on the gun and said 'get the money out of your till and stand away form me'," he said.

"In a party shop where theme parties are part of what we do it was just like 'someone's really getting into the swing of things'," Mrs Johnston said.

"The mask had pointy ears and everything. Then the pistol came out and we thought again. We just froze in fear," she said.

But the couple foiled the masked man by just staring at him, too stunned and scared to follow instructions.

He said 'oh, forget it then'," Mr Johnston said.

The man walked out of the shop and despite having a painful broken toe, Mr Johnston chased him. The culprit hesitated outside the shop next door before running up to the corner, along Nile St, and sprinting down an alleyway to the back of a fish and chip shop in the block - where he had left a mountain bike. The man pulled off his mask and made his getaway on the bicycle through the Nelson Polytechnic campus.

Nelson police describe the man as having an olive complexion, aged between 18 and 20, of medium build, 1.7m tall, with short straight black hair, pimples on his face and wearing a checked blue and white shirt, faded light blue jeans and black shiny basketball-type boots.

The pistol was silver, similar in shape to a Luger, with a form of workable action. Police said there was nothing to suggest it was a toy gun, although it did have some plastic parts on it.

The mountain bike was light in colour and had a helmet on the right side handle bar.

The man was probably in the shop for about a minute, Mrs Johnston said, although it felt "like and eternity".

"His eyes looked incredibly intense. You feel fear and then you get the shakes," she said.

"I'm still in shock but this is a minor setback, we're here to stay and looking forward to serving the people of this district in a slightly different manner than yesterday," Mr Johnston said.

Other shopkeepers had noticed the man before the attempted armed robbery, hanging around the block of shops, Mrs Johnston said. He had been yelling and swearing, which caused two of the shopkeepers to lock their doors in suspicion, she said.

Police wanted to hear from anyone who could help identify the man or who was near the Alton St - Nile St intersection at the time of the holdup.