The UK's major exhibition venues - the NEC in Birmingham, ExCeL in London's Docklands, Manchester Central, the SEC in Glasgow, the ICC - host the trade shows where most of our exhibition game hire ends up. In short: the NEC and the ICC serve Birmingham, ExCeL serves London, Manchester Central and the SEC serve the north-west and Scotland, and hiring a game onto a stand at any of them comes down to three things - venue access, a 13 amp socket, and an operational area of roughly 14ft by 4ft for the smaller kit. We've been supplying that circuit from our warehouse in Rotherham since 1999, and in that time we've supplied Batak Pro units to the NEC Birmingham, Leeds First Direct Arena and Old Trafford, along with Wembley and the Bull Ring in Birmingham. This guide runs through the venues themselves and, more usefully, what getting a game onto a stand involves.
The venues that matter
The NEC just outside Birmingham is still the one most people mean when they say "the NEC", and it's where a lot of the big consumer shows happen - motor shows, home shows, trade expos. ExCeL in London sits in the Docklands and pulls in the big corporate and international exhibitions. Manchester Central is the former railway station with the great arched roof, now an exhibition and conference hall in the middle of the city. Glasgow's SEC serves Scotland, the ICC Birmingham sits next door to the NEC, and the Royal Highland Centre outside Edinburgh does the Scottish agricultural and caravan shows. Each of them runs its own rules on vehicle access, unloading and on-site working, which matters more to us than anything on the floor plan.
We won't pretend to quote hall sizes or capacities for venues we're not standing in - the organisers publish that and it changes. What we can say from twenty-odd years of specialising in this circuit is what it's like to work in them: venue marshals control the doors, unloading windows are booked in advance, and you get in and out with trolleys and flight cases long before the show opens to visitors.
What hiring a game onto a stand involves
The first question is access. Most exhibition games are built to be moved - our shuffleboard travels on a wheeled flight case, for example - but a flight case is heavy, and we can't take one up or down stairs, so if your stand or breakout space is on an upper floor we need to know the lift dimensions before we book. The same question applies to door widths and corridor turns. It's a boring question that saves an awful lot on the morning.
The second is power. Machine games like the Batak Pro or the prize crane need a standard 13 amp socket, which a shell scheme stand usually has. The shuffleboard needs none at all, which is why it turns up in breakout rooms and hospitality areas where nobody wants to be negotiating for a socket. As a guide on cost, the shuffleboard hires from £495 a day delivered and set up, and machine games start from a similar bracket depending on the hire length and staffing; we quote per event, so there's no price list here to go stale. The third is space: the shuffleboard needs an operational area of about 14ft by 4ft, the Batak Pro about the footprint of a door plus standing room for the queue. We'll ask you for the stand dimensions when you enquire, and we'll tell you honestly if something won't fit.
The games that work on a stand
The Batak Pro is the one most exhibition coordinators already know - twelve light-up targets, two LED score displays, and people queuing up to beat each other's score. There's a Batak Lite for the tighter stands. The prize crane is the other exhibition staple: fill it with your own branded merchandise or vouchers, set the claw strength from "prize every time" upwards, and brand the panels to match the stand. It's the sort of game that keeps going until the hall shuts for the night when the prizes are worth having.
For the rest of the range, there's the giant buzz wire, Grab A Grand cash grabber, retro arcade machines and the Vault - see the full exhibition game hire category for the lot. All of it is kept at our 25,000 sq ft warehouse in Rotherham, so anything you see on the site is kit we own and maintain ourselves - around 95% of what we hire out is in-house stock.
Paperwork and insurance
Corporate venues and procurement teams need documents before the event, not on the day, so you get the risk assessments and method statements before you commit. Cover is insured to £5m, and when our own staff run the games that cover extends to you as the client - indemnity to principal, which is the phrase your H&S team will be looking for. If you want the games run for you, we can supply trained attendants so your own people stay free to work the stand.
Planning the load-in
Exhibition venues don't let you wander a van onto the loading bay when you fancy it. Access windows are booked with the venue in advance, marshals time the unload, and once the show is open there's no moving stock on or off the floor. We plan around that: the game arrives set up before visitors are let in, and it comes out after the hall clears on the final evening. For multi-day shows we leave the kit in place overnight, and for the big Birmingham and London venues we schedule the collection slot the same way as the delivery one. It's worth you asking the organisers the same questions early - what time is the load-in, is there a lift for stands on a balcony, and who signs the vehicle in - because the answers shape which games fit the plan.
One thing we get asked a fair bit is whether an attendant is worth having. On a busy stand, yes: someone to run the queue, restart the score and hand out prizes means your own people stay on the stand doing the actual work. It also keeps the game running to a rhythm rather than stalling whenever a score needs resetting.
Where we cover
Sheffield, Rotherham and Doncaster are local runs for us, and we deliver nationwide for larger bookings - London, Birmingham, Manchester and Leeds happen every season. If you're exhibiting and want a straight answer about whether a game will fit your stand, give the office a ring on 0114 345 0135 and we'll talk the dimensions through, or send the details over on our delivery page and a quote comes back to you.
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