The International Wine Challenge is an annual event organised by William Reed Business Media and attracts over 10,000 entries making it the biggest and best blind tasting in the world. Over 45,000 bottles arrived at the Barbican for tasting over a two week period, with each judge tasting up to 90 bottles per day and the Co-Chairman around 300 a day!  

This year the gala dinner was held at The Hilton Park Lane on 7th September, a sold-out, black tie affair, for which EFX made the glittering trophies.  The award design in metal has become iconic and their image can be seen on many retailers promotions and winning bottles.

The Champion Wine gold award winners for 2010 are from across the wine-producing world and include Marks & Spencers for its Puligny Montrachet 1er Crus Les Chalumeaux 2007 - one to look out for, when shopping for that special dinner.

www.internationalwinechallenge.com

The Great Taste Awards is one of those events which generates huge consumer interest, and Special EFX was delighted to be asked, once again, to design and make the awards. This year the awards aptly featured The Guild of Fine Food’s full colour logo balanced on the end of a gold plated fork, and the awards were presented, amidst huge anticipation, at Fortnum & Mason on 6 September.

Despite what the French say, we have become a “foodie” nation with a huge appetite for celebrity chefs, fine dining and locally-made, speciality foods and drinks. These awards attracted over 6,000 entries from a myriad of small producers, across a huge variety of categories, from air dried ham to white chocolate, and took two months of blind tasting by 350 judges to reach the final decisions.  A job made in heaven!  And the winners? Well, there were 95 gold awards given, and the Supreme Champion was Hurstwood Farm for its virgin cold-pressed 100% cobnut oil.

www.greattasteawards.co.uk

Alitalia invited over 150 guests to its second annual corporate go-karting event, at the impressive Raceway at Docklands on July 8th.  An informal and fun day, the event proved to be a huge success with Alitalia’s invited travel trade customers and attending journalists, who competed in 24 teams.

The Special EFX awards were a big hit.  Designed to reinforce the Alitalia brand and to reflect the go-kart racing theme of the event, they are made from solid, nickel plated aluminium, screen-printed in Alitalia red and green, and come complete with rotating wheels. The awards were so much admired that there were numerous guests, winners and non winners alike, who posed with them on the podium, and the staff of The Raceway gave them the ultimate accolade of being, “proper racing awards”.

www.alitalia.it

It is always a nice pat on the back, when customers repeat buy; it happens frequently, but we are all human, and like our bit of glory!  That was why our sales team were pleased to see an email in from Restoration Hardware, a multi million dollar home decorating business in the USA, which prides itself on the premium quality of its products and service, which had previously bought awards for its recognition programme, back in 2007. 

This time they requested 45 engraved awards, and the order was duly input to our production schedule. Due to a cross cultural interpretation of date, we had to turn them around in record breaking time, having read 08-10-2010 in American speak, as 8th October when they were actually needed by 10th August… so despite summer holidays, the EFX team in the factory rose to the challenge and did a brilliant job on time!

EFX has recently taken delivery of the latest technology in waterjet cutting equipment, which is now producing some impressive results.

Tony Darby, Workshop Manager, has been putting the new machine through its paces, and reports that the 55,000 psi pump will cut metal at speeds of up to ten meters per minute and with exacting precision. The cutter is automated and able to cut on five axis, with up to 60 degrees of articulation, including bevel edges: the EFX Design Studio is already taxing it with more intricately pierced, aluminium designs, and has some exciting new shapes in the pipeline.

Do get in touch if you would like us to create some free of charge designs for your next Event