Picture this – lights, music, games, food and beautiful people to hang out with – that was the mood at the Untamed Empire at Spintex Road on Saturday February 18, 2023 where Axxel Entertainment, held its first and Love Edition of Starry Nights.
Axxel Entertainment is a relatively new agency that is focused on organizing events that leave long lasting memories in the minds of their patrons. The Love Edition of Starry Nights is the second event the agency has organized since its Nicki Minaj Tribute Night in November last year.
The Love Edition of Starry Nights was held in the month of February to add to the spice of love that the month brings. However, February is not only about valentines and sweethearts; instead it can also be a month for self-love and self-care, fostering relationships with family and friends, and loving others.
The Love Edition of Starry Nights was organized purposely for this and with just GHC 50 for single tickets and GHC 90 for double, patrons were treated to an experience of a lifetime.
Here are some crucial factors regarding the organization of the event.
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Venue
In organizing an event that will create lasting memories in the the minds of people, the venue is one of the most important factors to consider. The venue for the Love Edition of Starry Nights was the Untamed Empire Event Venue. The Untamed Empire is located behind the Accra Mall on the Spintex Road.
It has an open space and clean environment and is very suitable for holding outdoor events like arts and fashion exhibitions, picnics, etc.
Choosing this venue for the Love Edition of Starry Nights was good. It was an easy place to find and the environment was conducive for the event.
The 2019 Detty Rave that saw performances from Mr. Eazi, Sarkodie, Kidi, Kwesi Arthur, Simi, Joeboy and Rick Ross was also held at the Untamed Empire Event Venue.
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Lights and Decorations
Decorations are important because they set the ambiance of an event. They accentuate the venue and give it the look fit for the occasion. This also makes the space more aesthetically pleasing and functionally useful to the occupants.
Axxel Entertainment made use of balloons, outdoor string lights, pennant banners etc. in decorating the venue for the event. Inasmuch as the Untamed Empire is an already-beautiful event venue, more decorations could have been added to increase the ambiance of the environment.
Preferably more Axxel Entertainment or Starry Nights customized decorations. This would help these customized decorations appear in the pictures and videos of patrons and add to their long lasting experience.
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Music
What is a party without music!? Music sets the tone for every event. It instantly establishes the energy in a space and influences the emotions of attendees. Well-chosen music builds feelings of excitement, happiness, and anticipation.
The song choices for the Love Edition of Starry Nights were greatly diverse and that was very commendable. There were several genres of songs ranging from Hip Hop, RnB, Afro Pop, Rap and many others.
It was almost questionable to hear Nicki Minaj’s songs play continuously for several minutes but also understandable regarding the fact that a Nicki Minaj Tribute Night was held by the same agency last year. But nonetheless, the music was on point.
@thisisaxxel #StarryNights 😍✨ pic.twitter.com/aqosqI2PxF
— Univers TV (@univers1057fm) February 18, 2023
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Food
One of the most important factors of an event is food. The food is what your patrons may arguably remember most aside all the fun.
Having the opportunity to meet vendors in-person and patronize their goods is one of the most exciting parts of any carnival event. Having many vendors and their products in one place allows you to compare options side-by-side and explore different delicacies.
At the Love Edition of Starry Nights, there were cocktails, ice creams, waffles, kebabs, noodles, Jollof rice, etc.
All these were very affordable and very tasty.
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Games
Coming up with a carnival is not easy. The aim of such an event is to get people to have the best time in their lives. It is crucial that they have fun. That is the whole point of having a carnival in the first place.
One of the things you will have to deal with as the event organizer is the carnival games rental. If you are expecting to pull crowds, you may have no option but to have the best games lined up.
Carnival games are among the most popular fun activities in the world. They have been used for ages to bring teams together and to just give people a good time. Games add life to the event.
Axxel Entertainment did a good job by making provisions for a lot of games at the Love Edition of Starry Nights. The games centers were almost always filled with people trying to win their games while also having fun.
There were games like target paintball, scrabble, ludu, video games, jenga and many more.
If you were not a fan of games, then Starry Nights may not have been the perfect place for you.
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Movie
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Publicity
Publicity of this event could have been better than it was. Axxel Entertainment did a fantastic job with always bringing out new flyers with detailed information about the event, tickets, etc.
However, publicity is not a one-way street. As the organizers of the event are putting out more information and graphics, the ‘foot soldiers’ must spread the word as well.
Axxel Entertainment partnered with Radio Univers, who helped greatly to make the event a success.
The use of the agency’s social media however was not efficiently done. Promoting your event on social media and having good public relations is one way to get people to talk about your event and one way for your event to trend.
Despite all these setbacks, the organizers of the event were greatly content with the turnout of the attendees.
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Patrons’ remarks
Interaction with some of the patrons at the Love Edition of Starry Nights was an insightful experience. Many shared their excitement with the turnout of events.
“I think it’s a pretty cool idea. It’s a vibe, it’s better than I actually thought it was going to be. I think they should definitely do it again. It makes more sense. Maybe they should just work on their marketing, advertising so that next time people know something like this is going on so that the turnout can be bigger than it is now,” one patron said.
“I’m actually glad I came around for this. It’s fun, I don’t have any criticism for this because, I’d say this is like more or less a new sort of thing so, I don’t really have to say anything bad about it. I enjoyed the movies, the foods were nice, I think [everything] was perfect,” another said.
Others also expressed their excitement over how low the pricing of the tickets were considering the endless fun they had at the event.
“But so far I’m liking what I’m seeing. It actually looks interesting here. The activities, I’m just still waiting to have fun. [The fee] is quite affordable, it’s okay. Everything looks nice,” a patron said.
“For the first edition, I think it’s a very fun programme. I really liked the setup, the lights, the people around look friendly. It looked like a really friendly environment, it’s a really nice event. I think everything is on point. [There’s] good activities before the movie, security is fine, the checking is good. I think [the rate] is fair,” another said.
“With the tickets, I think it is a little low. Considering the things that are here, the price is really low,” another said.
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Organizers’ remarks
Owner and Project Manager of Axxel Entertainment, Davis Adu Gyamfi Fordjour was exhilarated about the turnout of events that day.
According to him, the good reviews from the patrons and vendors proved that he and his team had done a good job.
He also hinted at four more events that Axxel Entertainment plans to organize before the end of the year.
“It’s been an experience because I haven’t experienced a lot. I can see that there’s a lot of smiles on people’s faces. I’m getting good reviews from the vendors as well. I can say we’ve done a seven over ten job. It is the first event we are holding this year. We have a lot coming up and I wouldn’t want to disclose now but I can assure you Axxel Entertainment has fun packed activities coming up. We have four more till the year ends,” he said.
Davis Fordjour however bemoaned the lateness of some vendors to the venue of the event. According to him, the lack of respect for the agreed-upon time affects the organization of the whole event.
“The biggest challenge has to do with timing, a lot of Ghanaians don’t use time and it’s very bad because you can have an event at 2:00pm, give 11:00am as reporting time for vendors and other rental companies and then they get here at 1:00pm. And also, disappointment from space managers [is another challenge]. The culture around events in Ghana is very bad from the timing to the agreement. People agree on [things] but don’t honor it,” he added.
Facilitator and Accountant at Axxel Entertainment, Gabriel Ekele and Dennis Koranteng expressed their hope of seeing Starry Nights surpass African Music Festival, AfroFuture, formally known as Afrochella.
“So far we have seen how their [AfroFuture] events have turned out and we hope to meet their standards and even surpass it because we don’t want to despise small beginners even though we are an organization that started recently with our first event in November, we hope to surpass it or event meet the standards at least,” they said.
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Conclusion
Looking at all the crucial factors and taking into consideration that Axxel Entertainment is relatively new, despite all the setbacks, the organizers really did a fantastic job at giving their patrons a wonderful experience.
Being the first of its kind, the Love Edition of Starry Nights was very affordable, very entertaining and very artistically memorable.
Since patrons have been thrilled with this edition of the event, the bar has been raised for other editions. Something bigger and better is expected from Axxel Entertainment for the other four events they have left to organize before the end of the year.
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Author: Kelly Adjetey Boye | Editor, Radio Univers | kellyadjeteyboye@gmail.com
