Business evenings: a plus one who reads the room
The Thames Valley runs on evenings like this. A supplier dinner at the end of a conference day, an awards night in a hotel ballroom, a leaving do for somebody two grades above you, a table of eight where everyone has brought somebody and you have not. This booking covers the woman on the other side of that table and nothing more complicated than that.
Two hours at £500 covers a drinks reception. A seated dinner with speeches in it is four hours and closer to the dinner date figure of £900, because those evenings always run longer than the invitation claims. The ladder is on rates.
Who suits business evenings
What she is actually doing there
Being good company at a table of people she has never met, which is harder than it sounds and is the entire skill. She will talk to the person on her other side, she will not ask what anybody earns, and she will not leave you stranded while you are being cornered by a regional director. If you need twenty minutes with somebody, she takes herself to the bar without being asked.
She is introduced however you want to introduce her, and nobody at that table has ever needed an explanation. The arrangement stays between you, the desk and her.
The rooms out here
Slough Central and the trading estate keep the corporate hotels busy from September onwards, and the ballrooms off the A4 do a great deal of this trade. West Drayton and Stockley Park empty at six and the hotel on Stockley Road fills again by half seven with people who have driven from a business park half a mile away.
Further west there are the Maidenhead country houses, which take the awards nights and the anniversaries, and Windsor, which takes anything that wants a castle in the photographs. Any of them can be reached inside half an hour from this desk.
Brief her properly and she will be excellent
Four lines is plenty. Your company and roughly what it does. Who else is at the table and which of them matters. What you would rather not be asked about. And the dress code as written on the invitation, since black tie out here means black tie and a lounge suit usually means a dark dress.
Send that to Etta with the booking and it reaches her before she sets off. She will not repeat any of it to anyone, including to the desk after the evening is done.
Notice, and why a week helps
Award season out here is autumn and the diaries thin out fast. A week gives you a choice of names, a day gives you whoever is free, and an afternoon gives you an apology. If the evening is already in your calendar there is nothing lost by telling Etta now and confirming the details later, and booking explains how that is held.
A seated dinner, hour by hour
Take a typical awards night in a ballroom off the A4. Drinks begin at seven and she meets you in the lobby ten minutes before, and the pair of you arrive at the reception together rather than one after the other. The reception runs about forty minutes, dinner is called at eight, and the speeches arrive with the dessert. The awards themselves always take longer than anybody promises. By half ten the tables break towards the bar, and that is the moment to decide whether to stay or leave, which is why four hours is the honest length for this kind of night.
When the date moves
Company evenings get rescheduled more than any other kind. Tell Etta the moment the new date is fixed. Three clear hours of warning means nothing is owed, and a week of warning usually keeps the same companion for the new night, which matters when she has already been briefed about your table.
Who does this well
Samanta is the calmest half of any evening she is in, which is worth a great deal in a room full of people performing. Karolina is careful with words and quietly funny with them, and she listens properly, which in this setting is almost a trick. Sonya knows the business parks after everybody has gone home and is unbothered by a hotel that exists for conferences.
Liana notices what other people miss and never once makes a point of it, and Violetta is used to being looked at and does not mind it in the least. Check who is on for the week your invitation falls in.
Two markers worth reading first
Business evenings, line by line
01How should I introduce her?
However you like. A friend is the usual answer, and nobody at a table of eight has ever needed more than that. Agree the story in the first ten minutes and she will keep to it all night.
02Will she mind talk about work?
Not at all. Send her four lines about the company beforehand and she will follow a conversation about procurement for as long as it lasts.
03Is her seat at the event included?
No. The fee is for her time. The ticket, the dinner and anything at the bar are arranged by you, as they would be for any guest.
04What if the dinner runs past the booking?
She leaves quietly at the agreed time unless you have extended it with the desk. Message Etta during the evening if you can see it running long.
Other shapes
Flag her down
Give a town and give an hour. What comes back has a name in it, the minute she can knock and the figure for those hours, all three in the one reply.