Mediatel Group takes majority stake in Glug Events

Mediatel Group has today announced a significant investment in Glug Events to accelerate growth in the innovative creative networking business.

Glug, founded in 2007 in an East End pub by Nick Clement and Ian Hambleton, now operates in over 40 cities worldwide and offers the creative community the opportunity to network, learn and share ideas. It is famed for injecting fun into professional networking and currently around 50,000 ‘Gluggers’ attend its events globally each year.

In the last 18 months Glug has seen the launch of 12 new city chapters and new event formats covering both its heartland in design and a variety of new creative disciplines including architecture, music, fine art, film and dance.

Since it launched, Glug has also drawn names such as the artist David Shrigley, designer Anthony Burrill, ad legend Sir John Hegarty, author and broadcaster Emma Gannon, art director Kate Moross and Creative Review editor Eliza Williams.

Alongside its regular ‘Glugs’, the business has also run events in conjunction with BIMA, Cannes Lions, Microsoft Surface, D&AD, Adobe and charities such as Shelter.

Meanwhile, Mediatel Group works with every major advertising holding company, offering data, tech, and trading solutions, as well publishing Mediatel News and running global events across five markets.

The deal, which will see Glug retain its independence operating as a unique brand, will allow the business to expand into new territories, while building a larger team in the UK under the continued leadership of CEO Pete Bowker.

The news comes after Mediatel Group invested in MAD//Fest London to create the UK’s largest marketing, advertising and disruptive tech festival in 2018. The festival attracted more than 4,000 attendees to its 2019 show and drew significant sponsorship from the tech and media worlds.

Commenting on today’s deal, Pete Bowker, Glug Events CEO said: “This deal will allow us to fulfil our ambition to expand our audience into new cities, from famous creative hubs to some unexpected destinations – for example Lahore in Pakistan, Nantes in France and Lagos in Nigeria, which are all bursting with creativity.

“We’d love to have one million Gluggers worldwide within the next five years so this deal will help us towards that goal, increasing and expanding our global reach, augmenting and expanding our digital and social channels and continuing to serve up support for and celebration of new creativity everywhere. It’s an extremely exciting time.”

Ian Hambleton, Glug Events co-founder and CEO at Maze Theory, said: “It’s been an incredible journey from a small back room in a pub in Shoreditch to where we are now. With 40 cities around the word hosting Glug Chapters and hundreds of events happening each year.

“The deal with Mediatel allows us to take Glug to the next level, to invest in the network and community, to bring new event formats and offerings for the creative communities and to hire new roles at Glug Global.

“Mediatel bring a wealth of expertise within the advertising, marketing and media events business so from the first meeting it felt like a great fit for Glug. We have ambitious plans to grow the network to 300 cities within three years so this helps us to do that.”

Nicola Mullett, Director, Mediatel Group, added: “Glug events are exceptional fun. There is really nothing quite like them. The team behind it all have great energy and drive and we are very excited by the growth potential. Our investment and the support of Mediatel Group will help the team fulfil that by expanding on what they have built so impressively: a series of entertaining shows that connect a growing and global community of creative people.”

The terms of the deal were not disclosed.