IMMEDIATE MEDIA CO ACQUIRES MAJORITY STAKE IN RIVER STREET

IMMEDIATE MEDIA CO ACQUIRES MAJORITY STAKE IN RIVER STREET TO FURTHER STRENGTHEN LIVE EVENTS CAPABILITIES

Immediate Media Co, the special interest content and platform company, today announces it has acquired a majority stake in River Street Events Ltd, one of the UK's leading producers of consumer food and gardening events and festivals. The deal sees Immediate acquire the remainder of the business in late 2020. 

Established in 2013, River Street Events produces some of the UK's most successful consumer events - including the live events for BBC Good Food Show and BBC Gardeners' World Live - attracting over 250,000 visitors a year.

This deal further strengthens Immediate's events capabilities, following the recent acquisition of Upper Street Events, providing exciting further potential growth opportunities in the live consumer events market.

River Street Events founder, Laura Biggs, will remain Group Managing Director until the end of 2020, working alongside Immediate's Managing Director of Live Events, Paul Byrom. 

Immediate Media CEO, Tom Bureau, says: “We've identified live consumer events as an important growth area for Immediate, focused around our high value special interest communities and aligned with our portfolio of market-leading brands. Our investment into River Street, who we know well through our partnerships with BBC Good Food Live and BBC Gardeners' World Live, fits perfectly with this strategy, as we continue to accelerate our multiplatform transformation across print, digital, TV and, now, live events. I'm delighted that we will be working with Laura and her team to continue to build this fantastic business.â€'

River Street Events founder, Laura Biggs, says: “River Street have always had an excellent long-term business relationship with Immediate, it makes perfect sense that they have invested in our business to allow us to take the events to the next level and give them the growth opportunities that they deserve. I look forward to working with Paul Byrom and all the team at Immediate to amplify these already amazing well-loved events ensuring that they continue to deliver incredible days out for thousands of food and gardening lovers across the UK.â€'

In January 2019 Immediate acquired Upper Street Events, producers of some of the UK's largest specialist consumer enthusiast events, including the Cycle Show, Festival of Quilts, Move It, London Art Fair and The London Cruise Show.

Immediate reaches over 26 million affluent and engaged UK consumers monthly across a range of special interest sectors, including Food, Cycling, Gardening, Parenting, Weddings and Craft, and is home to some of the UK's best-loved brands, including Radio Times, BBC Gardeners' World magazine, BBC Good Food, Mollie Makes and Hitched.

-ENDS-

For further details contact: Dominic.lobley@immediate.co.uk / 020 7150 5015

Notes to Editors:

About Immediate Media Co:

Immediate Media Co is the special interest content and platform company. Our fast-growing, multi-platform media business is home to over 1,400 people across eight divisions.

Immediate operates over 75 consumer brands and sell over 76 million magazines each year. With over 1.1 million active subscribers, our audiences are affluent and loyal to their favourite brands. And with more than 90 licensed editions globally, the universal appeal of our content and brands make us one of the largest licensors of magazine media brands in Europe.

Our wholly-owned brands include Radio Times, olive, Homes & Antiques, hitched, Cycling Plus, JewelleryMaker, Sewing Quarter, Bike Radar, MadeForMums, You&YourWedding and Mollie Makes. We publish BBC Good Food, BBC EasyCook BBC History, BBC Gardeners' World, BBC Focus and the CBeebies portfolio, under licence from the BBC and BBC Top Gear on behalf of BBC Studios. Immediate also publishes Lonely Planet Traveller magazine for LPGL.

Immediate acquired Upper Street Events, one of the UK's leading producers of consumer enthusiast events, including the Cycle Show, Festival of Quilts, London Art Fair and The London Cruise Show, in January 2019.

Immediate was named Media Company of the Year at the 2015 British Media Awards and Digital Publisher of the Year at the AOP Awards 2017.

Follow us on Twitter @Immediate_Media

About River Street Events Ltd:

River Street Events was established in 2013, following a management buyout led by Laura Biggs of BBC Haymarket Exhibitions which was established in 1990.  River Street Events holds the licence to organise BBC Good Food Shows and BBC Gardeners World Live and has an established a unique relationship with Historic Royal Palaces to organise their Food Festivals.  River Street Events employs 25 people at its Head Office in Kingston Upon Thames and prides itself on the quality of its events and its excellent reputation.  Laura Biggs has been in the industry for over 25 years and has worked on BBC Good Food Shows since 2000.