Taxis line The Mall in ‘Royal Guard of Honour’
VeriFone taxis helped Delta Air Lines to launch the new Delta 360° Lounge at Stamford Bridge in a blaze of glory, glamour and glitz last month. The Delta 360° Lounge at The Millennium & Copthorne Hotel will host official airline partner’s VIP guests and provide a new venue for visitors. At the launch, an LED-lit ‘runway’ took visitors to a dedicated entrance where inside they enjoyed top-flight hospitality and met some of the Chelsea players, past and present.
DELTA TAXI FLEET STARS IN PR EVENT
A fleet of 30 liveried Delta taxis and their drivers provided a unique guard of honour for guests on the night, which was hosted by top stand-up comedian Jack Whitehall. Jools Holland & Squeeze and Sophie Ellis Bextor were also headlining. Mark Williams, VeriFone driver and experienced taxi PR stalwart, brought comedian Jack Whitehall to the event and ‘entertained him’ with his infamous repertoire of one-liners during the journey.
The PR booking for the VeriFone taxis involved a photo call with all the drivers at Stamford Bridge followed by a dramatic motorcade through central London before returning to Stamford Bridge to chauffeur VIP guests to and from the evening event.
“EVERY DRIVER WAS MAGNIFICENT”
Asher Moses and Lucie Smallwood from VeriFone paid tribute to all the drivers who helped to make the event such a success. “Every driver was magnificent and between us we managed to accommodate everything the client asked of us, even some tricky last-minute changes to the original plan”.
ROYAL GUARD OF HONOUR
In the hours before the event, the taxi motorcade turned heads as it weaved its way through the City and West End accompanied by a film crew. In an unscheduled twist, the taxis were pulled over by the Police in The Mall to allow another motorcade to pass through. The cabs dutifully lined up either side of The Mall as HM The Queen drove through the impromptu Royal Guard of Honour on her way back to Buckingham Palace.
The following morning Lucie Smallwood received an email from Zenith Optimedia, the ad agency who booked the taxi campaign, expressing their ‘greatest appreciation’ for all the hard work and effort that helped to make the event ‘such a success’. They said everything ‘turned out perfect’ and passed on a ‘big thank you’ on behalf of their client Delta Airlines.
SIGNIFICANT ADDITIONAL REVENUE
The Delta PR event is just the latest in a long list of taxi PR bookings that VeriFone have organised for clients in the past few months. During the Olympics they arranged over 350 separate bookings for Olympic sponsors and generated significant additional revenue for the drivers who took part.
