Prep, prep and more prep!

It's that time of year when you wonder why on earth you thought working in the pantomime industry was a good idea! There's 2 weeks to go until our first show goes into rehearsal (which is the Belgrade, Coventry), and then another 5 go into rehearsal in 3 weeks time... and that means deadlines are looming, or upon us. The office is working flat out and at full steam ahead... which means all the desks are full, and we're running out of mugs for the tea again...

• Ian and Phil are prepping all the sets in our Redditch stores either for our own productions or for our hires. This year just 3 of our 28 sets will remain un-hired, so it will also be a great opportunity for us to clean and paint the whole unit while everything is out.
• Chris is in the Coventry offices working on the panto technicals, which means lighting hires, sound hires, pyros etc etc etc.
• Dawn and Karen are beavering away in York preparing the thousands of costumes which are due out this year. They've also been at every one of our panto launches this year, fitting costumes, meeting cast and generally making everyone look magnificent.
• Louise and Hayley have been working on kids licensing. The postal strikes have proved challenging this year when trying to get all the relevant paperwork in for the babes, but they're really getting there and some of the first licenses are through already.
• Ray is working on seven different panto programmes and all the company accounts.
• Sarah has had flu for the last week and so is only just back on her feet again... but when she's back, she'll be working on health and safety on the shows, as well as working with the venue marketing teams on sales.
• Steve and Iain Lauchlan are busy finalising the creatives on all the shows. Scripts are done, music is done and its now all the final touches that will make everything flow so well... we hope!