When the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus—back after a six-year absence—begins its 50-city tour of North America this September, it will include 75 highly trained performers and a litany of extravagant acts. Tightrope walkers will flit across a triangular rope, 30 feet in the air. Acrobats will launch themselves between four spinning wheels suspended from stadium ceilings. BMX bikers will spring off a giant trampoline. And a 360-degree set studded with massive video screens and enhanced with sonic spatial technology will envelop audiences in the spectacle. There won’t, however, be any lions, tigers, or bears. Oh my! “When you have a brand called ‘The Greatest Show on Earth,’ you can’t downscale,” says Juliette Feld Grossman, chief operating officer at Feld Entertainment, which acquired the iconic circus in 1984. “You really have to reimagine and reinvent.” Founded in 1871, the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey circus delighted American families … [Read more...] about The Greatest Show on Earth gets a second chance
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The 10 most innovative companies producing live events in 2023
Explore the full 2023 list of Fast Company’s Most Innovative Companies , 540 organizations that are reshaping industries and culture. We’ve selected the firms making the biggest impact across 54 categories, including advertising , beauty , design , and more. How do four septuagenarian Swedish pop stars pull off a dazzlingly energetic 20-song set list before thousands of fans in a custom-built stadium? Easy: They get their holograms to do it. ABBA Voyage , a stunning marriage of art and technology architected by the visual effects company Industrial Light & Magic (ILM), has been a critical and financial success. It’s also a symbol of how the live performance industry is being transformed by technology, as digital elements are deployed to deepen fan immersion while staying true to what makes a live music experience so irreplicable. With concerts becoming increasingly visual extravaganzas, artists have access to new mediums to explore their creative … [Read more...] about The 10 most innovative companies producing live events in 2023
These 6 brands are growing by letting fans pursue their passions
A good product will win you customers, but it takes a lot more to create, cultivate, and keep true, actual fans. The magic word for most is community, and the brands here, being honored as part of Brands That Matter 2022, have found ways to foster and excite growing communities around them. Decades-old brands, including Fender guitars and Magic: The Gathering, are using new content to stay relevant. For Fender, this past year was about building a content hub full of tools for the millions of new people who started to play over the past few years as a COVID-19-lockdown-induced new hobby. Magic: The Gathering has leaned into celebrating a more diverse set of players with its direct-to-consumer platform, Secret Lair. Meanwhile, three-year-old wrestling upstart All Elite Wrestling has taken on a Goliath by showing a different side of its diverse lineup of stars. Here are the brands making the most of fun and fandom: All Elite Wrestling As discussions around mental … [Read more...] about These 6 brands are growing by letting fans pursue their passions
This company is making expense reports way less of a hassle
Ramp is No. 9 on Fast Company’s list of the World’s 50 Most Innovative Companies of 2023 . Explore the full list of companies that are reshaping industries and culture. Ramp cofounder and CEO Eric Glyman may lead an enterprise software company, but he’s not the type of guy who relishes the hard sell. (Ramp’s first sales hire, he says, was focused on customer success, not deals.) Instead, he likes to let Ramp’s products, including a corporate card and spend-management platform, do the talking. “We try to show the value first and let customers come to their own views,” Glyman says. A free calculator on the company’s website, for instance, predicts the dollar amount that prospective customers can expect to save if they switch to Ramp, based on their recent financials. If last year is any indication, Ramp’s product-first, gimmick-free approach has struck a chord, especially with small-business owners. More than 13,000 businesses now use the platform, a threefold increase year … [Read more...] about This company is making expense reports way less of a hassle
India Records Highest Single-Day Rise in COVID-19 Cases in 5 Months
(CTN News) – In the previous day, 1,590 new cases of Covid-19 have been reported in India, the largest daily increase in over 5 months. On Saturday, 8,601 new cases were reported, making about 0.02 percent of the country’s overall number of new cases. India records 1,590 new COVID-19 cases, highest single-day rise in 5 months The number of deaths attributed to covid in India rose to 5,30,824 on Saturday as 6 more cases were confirmed, as stated by the Union Health Ministry. Three additional fatalities occurred in Maharashtra, and one occurred in Karnataka, Rajasthan, and Uttarakhand. The percentage of upbeat days was 1.33 percent, and the percentage of upbeat weeks was 1.23 percent. Overall, the United States had a Covid-19 recovery rate of 98.79%. With a case fatality rate of 1.19 percent, the total number of patients who have recovered from the COVID-19 virus has risen to 4,41,62,832. Delhi and Mumbai witness steady rise in COVID-19 cases … [Read more...] about India Records Highest Single-Day Rise in COVID-19 Cases in 5 Months