Mojo Flooring Protects Pitch for World Title Boxing and International Football
Mojo Barriers UK division installed the first Terratrak Plus® pitch protection system of a busy 2018 summer season onto the Leeds United Elland Road pitch for the IBF World Featherweight Title fight, 19th May 2018, keeping the pitch in pristine condition ready for England International football 17 days later. Stadium floor TIMELAPSE. It simultaneously covered three other stadium pitches.
First onto the Elland Road pitch was the Mojo Barriers team early on Thursday morning, installing their Terratrak Plus® stadium flooring system. Project Manager Kevin Thorborn oversaw twenty crew who installed 9,200 sqm of pitch protection, which was well within schedule ready for the other suppliers to come in on the Friday morning and install the ring, canopy and seating.
Director Kevin Thorborn says: “This Terratrak Plus® gave a fully driveable pitch protection that can take loads of up to 100 tonnes. The fact that it is translucent makes it pitch friendly as it lets light through to the grass. The floor tiles are easy to handle, so we deployed a crew of twenty to install and remove the system, which was off the pitch by 1pm on the Sunday following the Saturday evening fight.”
The Mojo crew also installed 70m of Mojo Barriers to create a safe fighters entrance ring walk. Across that same timeframe Mojo crew’s also installed 9,500 sqm of the company’s Terratrak Plus® pitch protection into Manchester’s Ethiad Stadium for a series of concerts, starting with sold-out Ed Sheeran shows and remaining there for JayZee & Beyonce, Foo Fighters and Taylor Swift until mid June. Mojo also installed 9,500 sqm of Terratrak Plus® into Old Trafford for a Billy Joel concert and installed a fourth system of Terratrak Plus® into Wembley Stadium for Ed Sheeran, Taylor Swift and Capital’s Summertime Ball.
Frank Warren and Queensbury Promotions promoted the IBF World Title Fight, which was witnessed by 30,000 fans in Elland Road stadium who enjoyed local Leeds favourite, Josh Warrington, beating World Champion, Lee Selby, taking the title to the delight of a packed stadium.
Leeds United FC was doubly honoured to host two international level events within the space of two and a half weeks. Elland Road’s Facilities Manager, Mark Broadley, project managed the transformation from a football stadium into a boxing arena and back again, leaving the stadium as if the boxing had never been in.
Mark Broadley explains: “It’s great that Elland Road was selected to host both World Title Boxing and the last England football friendly before the World Cup. Of course a key consideration was that we had to install all of the boxing production and have temporary seating for six and a half thousand fans on the pitch, whilst still ensuring that seventeen days later it remained in prime condition for the country’s finest footballers.
“Our groundsman and all of the key production suppliers (Mojo Barriers, Arena Seating, Ringcraft Boxing and Prysm) liaised very closely through multiple planning meetings to minimise the time-span for which the pitch had to be covered. It required a very well co-ordinated build and de-rig, incorporating overnight shifts, which they all co-operated on and executed brilliantly.”
The England football team played on the pitch on June 7th, which evidently suited them as they secured a 2-0 win over Costa Rica.
ENDS
Evago Group Acquires Terraplas rental business
Evago Group has become the world’s exclusive rental partner for all Terraplas turf protection products since taking over the American rentals branch for Terraplas USA, March 2018.
German event supply and industrial services company Evago Group (“Evago”) and the Anglo-American Checkers Safety Group, who purchased Terraplas in 2015, have agreed a long-term partnership for Terraplas rentals internationally. Having acquired Mojo Barriers in 2017, Evago then bought the UK Terraplas rental business, and immediately fulfilled demand for the specialist stadium pitch protection for concerts. This new deal will see the Terraplas range be available throughout the Evago Group and Mojo’s trusted global network.
With over 27 years of experience in the quality turf protection market, Terraplas has unrivalled experience and leadership in the business of temporary flooring for stadiums and arenas hosting concerts and other non-grass events. The partnership Terraplas USA, part of the Checkers Safety Group, means Evago companies (Mojo Barriers, BÜMO, IEP) have an expanded ground protection rental portfolio of stock exceeding 400,000 m².
With the completion of this transaction Evago sets another milestone in its international growth and diversification strategy, significantly extending its position in the global event flooring market.
Goran Marincic, CEO, Evago AG states:
“Terraplas products are unique in the market and complement our existing product portfolio perfectly. They have become highly trusted to protect valuable stadium turf and sport pitches from heavy vehicles to pedestrians. With this acquisition we significantly strengthen our position in global events, adding significant synergy with our existing brands and companies. Our goal now is to very quickly increase the rental stock of pitch protection with additional new material in order to be able to respond immediately to customer requirements.”
Robert Else, Chairman of Terraplas comments:
“In our partnership with the EVAGO Group, we are pleased to further consolidate and expand the market leadership of the Terraplas brand worldwide.”
Mojo Barriers UK Supplies Red Carpet Season
This red carpet season, Mojo Barriers was called upon to supply just short of 1km of barriers to many of the season’s biggest awards ceremonies.
Kicking off the season in style, Mojo supplied the 2017 MTV EMAs and went on to supply the National Television Awards 2018, the 71st British Academy Film Awards (BAFTA), the 2018 Brit Awards and the inaugural Global Radio Awards.
Along with stage barriers, Mojo also supplied almost 250m of its specially designed High Fence which created 2.4m of height to section off secure and private VIP areas. Mojo also supplied heras fencing, channel barriers, met barriers and T Shield to ensure safety for both artists and attendees.
Mojo Barriers UK director Kevin Thorborn comments: “We’re proud to have worked on such a roll-call of prestigious events, and with the eyes of the media world on these prestigious award shows it was vital we supplied barriers that not only provided optimum security, but that also looked great.
“It’s been great to not only be working to strengthen our relationships with our existing awards clients, but to also forging new relationships as we work on new events introduced throughout 2018.”
Mojo Barriers Australia’s Sensational Installation at Spotless Stadium
Mojo Barriers Australia recently undertook one of the country’s largest stadium field cover installations, with over 15,000m₂ being installed for Sensation at Spotless Stadium, Sydney Showground, November 2017.
Sensation, the biggest open-air festival in Australia this year, was a great success, and protecting the valuable sports surface was of critical importance as Spotless Stadium is the home of Sydney’s professional cricket team Sydney Thunder and the Greater Western Sydney (GWS) Giants, part of the Australian Football League. Mojo installed a complete Supatrac system to ensure the best possible pitch protection. It took 34 truck movements to freight the equipment in and out of the stadium and over 850 man hours to install and remove.
The Mojo team installed over 15,000m₂ of 100% white Supatrac, along with over 500m of aluminium Mojo Barrier in a ‘D’ configuration. Since launching as a supplier of Supatrac in January of this year, Mojo Barriers is now able to provide both barrier and stadium floor covering as a combined offering. To further protect the stadium pitch at Sydney Showground, the team installed a layer of Enkamat under the flooring to provide additional protection at the areas with the highest footfall and crowd density.
As well as being on-site during the event, the Mojo team managed the daily installation and removal of the aluminium ground protection products during the stage build, and worked closely with the festival organisers and stadium groundskeeper to ensure optimum crowd barrier configurations and pitch protection.
Craig Edwards, General Manager of Mojo Barriers Australia comments: “It was great to be able to showcase our logistical capabilities installing Supatrac and barrier as a combined service, and to be instrumental in one of the largest stadium field covers in Australia makes us particularly proud. Pitch covers are usually a combination of a variety of products; however we supplied 100% white Supatrac to Sensation to ensure the same high quality product throughout the entire stadium.
“Not only did our team need to ensure the products were installed to the highest standard for the biggest festival Australia has seen in three years, but due to it being hosted in such a busy stadium, the condition of the turf post-Sensation was critical with the upcoming sporting schedule.”
Joshua Green, Sensation Event Manager from Phoenix Entertainment Live said “The Supatrac product is the way of the future for stadiums, the product doesn’t leave indentations on the turf and a sporting event can be held the next day. Supatrac is an efficient product to install and remove, with 15,000m2 installed in under eight hours there was minimum impact to production load-in – and it was even quicker on the load out. Coupling the supply of flooring and stage barrier products with Mojo delivered further efficiencies and made for a smooth and flexible operation.
“The aluminium and Enkamat combination was also highly effective. We managed to load in over 50 tonnes of steel for the stage and production build with four 135 foot boom lifts and two 60 tonne cranes operating for five days. With heavy production on the aluminium and 30,000 patrons on the Supatrac it is remarkable that none of the turf required replacing after the event – this is a great result for the Sydney Showground. Supatrac is the benchmark for stadium shows to minimise impact on the pitch.“
Mojo Barriers appoints New Budapest Distributor
A range of Mojo Barriers aluminium crowd safety barriers are now based in Budapest with the announcement of a new Mojo distributor giving convenient, cost effective barrier rental for festival organisers and tours coming to Eastern Europe, November 17th, 2017.
A stock of Mojo Barriers will be permanently located in Budapest for rental and it has already been hired out to create the front of stage barrier for the Gorillaz concert, 13th November in Budapest, Papp Laszlo Arena.
Mojo’s project and touring manager Stanley Jilesen states:
“With the expanding live events market in Hungary and Eastern Europe, Mojo Barriers is proud to support organisers with local resource to help keep their events safe. Having worked with Sziget Festival for several years we are delighted to work with the innovators in this region pushing for higher standards.”
The new Hungarian distributorship is the company’s 12th along with the international offices in Netherlands, UK, USA and Australia. Growing this global network strengthens the ability to support world tours with local resources whilst also making it easy for festivals and concerts in the region to hire the range of barriers.
Dániel Benis, Sziget production director, comments:
“We wanted to deliver our events to the highest of international production standards, particularly when it came to the safety of our audience, artists and crew. Our experience with Mojo Barriers has been very positive so we are delighted to be able to offer their products to other events in the region.”
Mojo Barriers Supplies Multiple Artists’ Tours Across The Globe
Mojo Barriers is supplying almost 2km of its specially designed touring barrier this Autumn to a range of this year’s most anticipated tours, November 2017.
With Mojo’s European office supplying tours including The Rolling Stones, Queens of the Stone Age and Queen & Adam Lambert, and the US office working with Katy Perry, Gorillaz, Guns N’ Roses, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Bruno Mars, 21 Pilots and Nick Cave, Mojo Barriers is in the midst of a busy touring season.
For Katy Perry’s Witness tour, the shape of the stage thrust required a carefully considered barrier configuration. The final design consisted of over 100m of barrier with many vario corners which enabled Mojo to create a flawless barrier set which followed the unusual contours of the stage perfectly. The system will be used for the remainder of the American leg and will continue to be used when the tour reaches Europe.
For The Rolling Stones’ European tour, No Filter, Mojo supplied a full front of stage set comprising of 200m of barrier. The creation of two VIP areas either side of the stage required a special configuration of barriers including six emergency exit gates. Mojo also provided a new product, Pipe & Drape, with 200m being used, along with two custom transport carts, to ensure the drape could be loaded and unloaded with ease.
Queen & Adam Lambert’s tour required full front of house and front of stage barrier sets. These comprised of 160m of barrier with a high number of fixed corners and a minimal amount of vario corners in order to create a continuous floor plate on the request of the project manager. The Mojo team are also continuing their longstanding relationship with production manager, Joel Stanley, by supplying a barrier set and heavy duty Diamond plates to the US and European legs of the Gorillaz Humanz tour.
Mojo Barriers’ European tour coordinator, Stanley Jilesen comments: “Being an international company with offices around the world means that when an artist embarks on a global tour, we can ensure that they get the same high standard of service and equipment time after time, no matter where they are on the planet.”
Mojo’s UK & European teams are also supplying barriers to Queens of the Stone Age and Royal Blood, whilst its Australian office is supplying Midnight Oil. Through Mojo’s partnership with Stageco, it is also securing an ever increasing amount of work from its French office utilising its local Parisian stock.
Mojo Barriers US appoints New Vice President
Mojo Barriers US office announces the appointment of Dan Gormley as Vice President, joining fellow US Vice President Jordi van Berkum.
Dan states:
“I am delighted to be joining Mojo Barriers as the company prepares to introduce new product ranges into the US market. I have the upmost respect for Mojo and relish the challenge to continue to evolve and improve our effectiveness and reach, expand the offering to clients, while developing and further strengthen our brand.”
Dan’s eight years experience working in live entertainment has given him a deep understanding of promoter cost containment requirements, along with the development of both new processes and new products to reduce overhead production costs. Previous roles have spanned festival site development to design and construction of new live event facilities.
Dan will be based in Mojo’s Los Angeles facility.
Mojo Barriers UK Summer Roundup
The introduction of temporary flooring for stadium pitch protection marked a significant addition to the services offered by Mojo Barriers’ UK office summer 2017, along with over 10km of front of stage barriers and crowd safety products installed to festivals, tours, one off stadium concerts and sporting events.
With the summer about to start Mojo Barriers became the exclusive supplier of Terraplas in the UK, with Director Kevin Thorborn taking on the installation of 8,000sqm of Terrafloor at Wembley Stadium, 29th April, for the Joshua v’s Klitschko world title fight. The pedestrian flooring protected the Wembley pitch from the 90,000 capacity crowd, so that the pitch was ready for FA Cup football the following week.
It was the heavier duty Terratrac plus system installed at the Manchester Etihad for the July 3rd Robbie Williams concert, and again two weeks later in the same venue for Take That. Mojo provided 9,500sqm of the heavy duty pitch protection system, which is suitable for the large vehicle movements required for touring load-ins.
Kevin states:
“Terraplas is a world renowned high quality product, being able to supply our clients with stadium pitch protection systems this summer has seen us add a great additional support service and we are looking to expand that service into 2018.”
With the additional temporary flooring inventory Mojo UK has also opened a second storage and logistics hub in Essex.
Festival Crowd Barriers
2017 was one of the busiest ever summers for the UK office with the return of Jim Gaffney and the addition of Kosta Chaparov to the Mojo team, who spearheaded the installation of barriers at festival sites across the UK. Their summers began with a familiar client in a venue not used for a large festival before, with the BBC Radio 1 Big Weekend taking place in Hull, closely followed by Download Festival, where it provided 2,000m of barrier across the site.
The next large festival for Mojo was Glastonbury, where 1,400m of stage barriers were installed. Having been a supplier for nearly a quarter of a century Jim’s experience has seen him at the core of developing barrier configurations at the festival. Mojo supplied barrier to the Pyramid and Other stages as well as introducing 15 new Line-up Gates and one Mega Gate in the southeast corner to reduce queuing at that bottleneck.
The first two weekends of July saw Mojo in London for Community and Wireless festivals, which both took place in Finsbury Park. The two events required 350m of stage barrier and 145m of bar barrier. Mojo’s original plan for the events was to divide the site in two with a line of stage barrier and Mega gates. After a discussion with site management, it was agreed that the configuration of the ground prevented this configuration. Instead, a 40m run off was built into the arena from the front barrier line and parallel to the fence line, which gave the security more access to the audience both physically and from an observational point of view.
After May’s terror attack in Manchester Arena, Mojo was called upon to provide barriers to the One Love Manchester gig. The event was planned at very short notice and the Mojo team had to quickly prepare their equipment from their European offices in order to provide the required 400m of barrier. Mojo also supplied 300m of crowd barrier at Radiohead’s Lancashire Cricket Ground concert, which was a replacement for their cancelled Manchester Arena show.
Scotland’s inaugural Trnsmt Festival took place from 7th to 9thof July. Mojo provided 500m of barrier including curved primary and secondary front of stage barriers and, as can often happen, the barrier configuration was varied from the original design once the experienced team looked at how the site was working.
Jim comments:
“Trnsmt’s site manager was John Wilson, who I have built up a strong working relationship with over the years. Once we were onsite we identified that the main stage would be heavily side loaded, and with very busy crowds expected on Saturday night for Kasabian and Catfish and the Bottlemen, we extended the right hand side of the stage barriers. This was in contrast to the original plan, however it helped ease the egress between the acts and kept the crowds safe.”
V Festival, which took place on 19th and 20th of August, used 700m of barrier from Mojo. Kosta was Mojo’s project supervisor for the festival, which this year saw a reconfiguration of the stages. As well as this new layout, the team were also required to design a specific barrier configuration for P!nk’s show, due to the extra thrust added to the stage for her performance, which involved being lowered onto the stage from a crane and then being flown above the audience in a harness.
The end of August saw the Mojo team heading to Reading and Leeds Festivals. At the Leeds site the team provided 900m of barrier, whereas the Reading location required 1,000m. An increased crowd density in the Dance Tent over the last two years led to Jim and his team creating a miniature version of their main stage configuration inside. This worked well, providing the security teams with much greater access to the audience.
Mojo also supplied stage barrier to Boomtown Fair, which grew once again to take 700m of Mojo, Latitude, Creamfields, Proms in the Park, Somerset House’s Summer Series, Parc Eiras, Ramblin Man, Ealing Jazz Festival, Southall Mela and finished the festival season at On Blackheath with a lively set from The Libertines.
Sports Crowd Control Systems
London Stadium hosted the IAAF World Athletics Championships, 4th to 17th August, with capacity crowds enjoying retirement races from Usain Bolt and Mo Farah. Mojo supplied 114m of High Fence deployed outside the stadium perimeter to manage crowd flow.
Mojo High Fence was also used for the Guns’n’Roses, Depeche Mode and Robbie Williams concerts at London Stadium and it continues to be used to segregate crowds at West Ham home games.
Kevin concludes:
“This fantastic year has been a great team effort, from the people on site to the office team, particularly Gordon Forrest and Andrea Iordache for their support and logistical skills.
“We’re looking forward to a busier 2018 as we introduce our new stadium floor protection service and continue to expand our barrier inventory.”
Photo credit: V Festival, Marc de Groot
Mojo Barriers celebrates 25 years with Lowlands Festival
2017 was a landmark celebration for the organisers and suppliers of Lowlands Festival, where Mojo Barriers has kept crowds and artists safe at all 25 editions, August 17th – 20th, 2017.
A 60,000 sell out crowd were in attendance for a wide range of artists including Mumford & Sons, Iggy Pop, The XX, Cyprus Hill and Bastille across six stages. This year the main two Alpha and Bravo stages were newly designed and manufactured, creating impressive focal points on the creatively designed Biddinghuizen site.
Mojo Barriers account manager Erwin Sprenger states:
“This year is really special to see with all of the innovations on the festival and the 25th celebrations. I have worked on 17 Lowlands Festivals and even with all of the site developments this year it is one of the easiest projects I manage, thanks to the efficiency of the festival management team and local crews. We supply 600m of equipment but only two Mojo co-ordinators are required to manage the installation.”
In addition to Mojo’s aluminium front-of-stage barrier, a range of special corner barriers, mega-gates, line-up-gates and Gatekeeper turnstiles were installed across the site. The company also supplies its plastic Bar Barrier system for concessions and cable ramps.
Mojo Barriers Australia Supplies Lorde on Cockatoo Island
As the exclusive agents in New South Wales for PRO-STAGE, Mojo Barriers Australia supplied staging and risers in addition to stage barriers to Nova’s Red Room Presents Lorde on Cockatoo Island, 7th July 2017.
Promoted by popular local radio station, Nova, 1,200 lucky fans were awarded tickets to Lorde’s concert which took place at a secret venue; Cockatoo Island’s Turbine Hall. The venue originally served as a ship building yard and dates back to the 1850’s, and is now a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
This was Mojo’s second event as distributors for Pro Stage in New South Wales for this client and at this location, following a Justin Bieber live performance where Mojo supplied media platforms and risers.
For Lorde’s performance, Mojo Barriers supplied barrier for front of stage and front of house, along with emergency exit doors. Mojo also supplied a Pro Stage System for main stage at 1.4M in height, with a large access ramp and a tired Front of House Podium.
Being on a small island in the middle of Sydney Harbour gave its own specific challenges as Mojo Barriers Australia’s project manager Sheena Edwards explains:
“The only way to reach Cockatoo Island is by catching a ferry across the harbour, which does present challenges when trying to get equipment to the site. All suppliers are ferried over from Sydney, however due to the size of the barge only one truck can fit at a time. Suppliers are ferried one by one and therefore a very tight production schedule had to be maintained to ensure we didn’t miss our scheduled time slot and create delays for on-site crew waiting for equipment to arrive.
“Cockatoo Island is a beautiful UNESCO World Heritage Site and as we were working inside a listed building, we were required to be extremely careful when loading and unloading to ensure the building was not damaged by equipment or crew.”
