As in the last three years, the 2010 BETT Show played host to the Maths boffins of Whizz Education and this year the Awards committee saw fit to nominate us in two categories.The dust has settled, the leads collected and the awards show hangover a distant memory – so, how did we do?
(BETT Show 2010 Maths Whizz team)
The Show
BETT got a hammering from Mother Nature this year with thick snow and icy conditions for the first half of the run and torrential winter rain for its final – busiest – day. Despite this we’re pretty pleased with how we fared at our little 6×1m gallery stand, overlooking some considerably larger marketing budgets and teams of rictus-grinned reps in the main hall below.
The team picture above shows the stand in all its mend-and-make-do glory, but omits three Whizz VIPs – Natalie (who organised our presence at the show), Manesh (master of Teachers’ Resource and many others) and Nic (fantastically overworked Systems Architect).
Having living and breathing product, customer service, curriculum, design and sales experts on the stand was something of a change from some of our larger competitors’ stands – together we know more about our products than anyone else. It would be nice to think we got that interest and expertise across to the hundreds of passersby we mugged for Maths-Whizz.
We had to improvise a little to make the most of our narrow spot with the excellent view – spray painting company letters in an abandoned stand up the corridor, frantically cutting and glueing on the carpet on Tuesday and Wednesday. But we proudly showed off our BETT Award nominations and mounted them alongside product images and charts demonstrating the efficacy of our online maths tutor.
A highlight of the show was the presence of the gloriously-coiffed Whizz Prof (below, accosting Product Manager Nat). Some of our international guests even demanded photos from the man himself. We’re wondering how best to monetize him for BETT 2011 – win a date with the Prof?
(The Maths-Whizz Prof at BETT Show 2010)
The Awards
London’s Park Lane Hilton was the venue for Wednesday’s BETT awards ceremony. The God of Whizz admits he was a bit impressed at the array of fine DJs and dresses for what is, basically, a trade show jolly – albeit one with a great reputation.
We had a table all to ourselves and we had dragged along two guests to join in the fun – Pat Workman of Hackney LEA and Anna Evans of Harvington School.
(Maths-Whizz Team at the BETT Awards table)
The show kicked off with some fantastically dull introductory words from the BETT organiser and one of the show’s sponsors. It can be difficult to jazz up an educational technology awards show, I’ll admit, but the thumping dance music that accompanied the speakers to the podium – and drained the will to live during the (excellent) meal – only served to make them seem less interesting.
Even so, wine was poured, drunk, poured again, re-ordered with the financial director’s credit card, and poured again for good measure. A good time was had by all.
The comedian-host managed to split the difference between sarcastic flippancy about an industry awards gig and sincerity about the achievements of which we were all – justly – proud, and he rattled through the categories in good time.
(Maths-Whizzers Natalie, Richard, Natalie and Ray)
Whizz Education was nominated in two categories – ICT Exporter of the Year, and ICT Education Partnership – an achievement matched by just one other company, I believe.
We failed to take home a gong in either case, but we were extremely happy to be there, and to have been recognised for the work we’ve done selling Maths-Whizz into the UAE, USA and India (Exporter of the year) and the development work with Worksop college and John Turner. We can only applaud Learning Possibilities and Manic Monkey, winners in the Partnership and Exporter categories, respectively, for their successes.
(The Proud BETT Awards 2010 winners)
The awards finished with an exhortation to get dancing in a narrow area below the stage set aside for such shindiggery. Whizzers mostly avoided cutting a rug, but promised to return to BETT 2011 with something to dance about…