Have you decided to take on a new challenge in 2025? Marcus Lawry, who is joint founder of Cardiff-based events agency Arena Projects, details his own experiences and advice below to help others at the beginning of their journey; just like he was in 2021 when Arena Projects was formed. 

Arena Projects delivers events across the spectrum, including specialisms in entertainment and sport, delivering fan engagement and matchday event management for the Welsh national football squads, as well as working across Europe on fan facing events and gala dinners for UEFA. In its first 3 years, Arena Projects has provided event management services across the UK, Qatar, Russia, Turkey, Finland, Italy, Greece, Hungary and Poland, with current projects running in Germany and Slovenia.

If you’re reading this, chances are that you’re a fellow small business owner or entrepreneur who is at the beginning of their new chapter. Congratulations, you’ve taken your own destiny into your hands – but also commiserations, for I know your pain.

The company I am joint founder of, Arena Projects, delivers ‘events’ – a vague description of a huge and varied global industry. This means one minute we are battling with mundane tasks and the next the amazing. We handle issues such as how long will it take for the waiting staff to clear the dessert dishes all the way too – will the country I’m delivering an event in be under martial law by midnight?

We are a Welsh company with Welsh people which others seem to like about us. As a nation we’re pretty laid back, cheerful and friendly, all natural qualities which arm us well in an inherently stressful industry. Sometimes your sense of humour is your last remaining leverage, and no matter the mountain before us, we try to climb it with a smile on our faces.

Now you know what we do and our approach to doing it, here’s a few things we’ve learned as new company delivering projects big and small, at home and internationally.

Children and animals

Working with such unpredictable clientele can be daunting. Both have the potential to upstage you or cause havoc, but when it works (and sometimes it does), it can bring incredible value to an event. One of Arena Projects’ proudest events is delivering pre-match ceremonies before Wales’s international football matches. These events are on an internationally televised stage before tens of thousands of fans, and we frequently have children playing a big part in this spectacle acting as mascots. 

Working with children in these situations means we must be at our most supportive and enthusiastic as we welcome them, wide eyed and overexcited, to cavernous stadiums soon to be filled with incredible colour and noise – not to mention live TV cameras. Patience is a must, so is empathy, as we rehearse the ceremony over and over. Nerves are ever present, but to this day, not once has a child gotten it wrong when the cameras start rolling. Pride fills their faces, ceremony straightens their backs, and as young ambassadors for their country, their presence offers wonderful balance to the formal nature of the ceremony. 

As for animals, it’s a little trickier. We’ve watched playful wild dogs stealing tools from event site managers in Istanbul – comical for us, but not for the poor guy who needed that wrench to fix the burst water pipe which was flooding the site. Sure, we laughed then, but karma watches always – just ask my business partner Dave who found himself challenged with integrating an actual eagle into a pre-dinner entertainment performance in Poland this year. Need to clean eagle droppings from a sound desk? He’s your man.

Our biggest takeaways from these experiences are that resilience and patience are always needed, but learning how to roll with the punches is what makes your business stand out against those that struggle to adapt. 

Big is beautiful but small is good for the soul

We have found that the search for connection with the audience is the same regardless of size. Be it a 4-day festival across central London attracting over 400,000 visitors, or a few hundred people on a torchlit march through Newport city centre to remember a historic event, we seek to communicate with and connect to our audiences of all sizes.

There is reward in working with some of the world’s most recognisable brands, inspiring awe and working with large audiences. Yet, smaller local events often engage and inspire participation at community level, strengthening our social fabric, and that’s good for the soul. A balance of the two is rewarding and exciting, keeping us on our toes no matter what. 

“Surround yourself with experts” – the best piece of event advice I’ve been given

This is a foundational principle in what we do – events are machines and people are the cogs – each with a role based on a system of interlocking skill sets and specialisms. “No man is an island” when it comes to what we do, and you need to lean heavily on your comrades. 

Being a startup is challenging and often seen as a glamourous and exciting place to be, which unfortunately attracts its fair share of opportunists, masking a lack of experience and knowledge with a lexicon of vague creative doublespeak and marketing buzzwords. We have found that wisely choosing who you lean on for the sake of the work you do, and your sanity is essential to success. If you can’t find an expert, try to become the expert, and find yourself a workhorse to help.

Build rapport and grasp all opportunities

Just as in life, delivering projects is about forging relationships and learning from experiences. This is particularly true when working in new countries and cultures where you’re guaranteed to find things delivered with differing approaches. Everyone can teach you something, and there are learnings and friendships waiting to be made at every turn. So, seek to build relationships which take you on new professional and personal journeys. You’ll never know where you might end up! 

It is a daunting prospect finding your way with your new business venture, but with determination, resilience and meticulous planning ahead, your goals will become your reality. 

For more startup news, check out the other articles on the website, and subscribe to the magazine for free. Listen to The Cereal Entrepreneur podcast for more interviews with entrepreneurs and big-hitters in the startup ecosystem.