The exceptional Jubilee year of 2012 is coming to its end and it is time to look back and go through these past months of intense activity.
The year was opened, as usual, with our New Years Drinks Reception in January. This hallmarked the start of a year of renewed focus in delivering events, training and commercial agendas for the benefit of our members.
It’s that time of the year in London, when Christmas comes crackling into life with fireworks and miles of decorative lights.
In April, we named the winner of our Annual Golden Award as being MAPFRE, a Spanish company recognised as making a significant impact within the UK market over the previous year. Not long after, we held our Annual General Meeting , which was devoted to providing our members with an open account of the Chamber’s activities & statistics, in order to contrast its successes with the year before. What followed was a formal dinner, presided by the Ambassador of Spain, and with our Guest of Honor being Ms. Tamara Rojo, the internationally acclaimed ballerina who had just been appointed as the Artistic Director of the English National Ballet.
To round off the year was the largest event of our calendar, the Annual Gala Dinner which this year counted on the presence of Mr. José Manuel Soria, Spanish Minister for Trade, Energy & Tourism. All of these landmark formal events speak of the ability of which the Chamber is able to bring its members together on a diverse, inclusive and grande scale. But this isn’t the whole story.
Our Annual Golden Award was hosted at the Spanish Embassy.
The Chamber has run over 50 events in the past year, from training workshops and networking seminars, to collaborative member events and informal parties. All, we hope, have been thoroughly enjoyed by our members, as their continually high levels of demand suggests. We have also worked with LSE Enterprise, Patrons of the Chamber, to provide a series of talks with high profile speakers, including Mr. Antonio Vázquez, Chairman of Iberia, Mr. Álex Cruz, CEO of Vueling, and Mr. Pedro J. Ramírez, Editorial Director of Unidad Editorial.
We have also laid on exclusive events with our Patrons, for which we have created the Patrons’ Club which this year has included different activities with high-profile speakers such as Mr. Varel Freeman, Vice-President of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development; Mr. John Cridland, Director-General of the CBI; and Mr. Jaime García-Legaz, Secretary of State for Foreign Trade.
We have nurtured new talent, too. The XIV Edition of our Graduate European Programme took off in September and welcomed 14 participants that will be carrying out work-experience at London-based companies for 6 months. At the same time, they will be attending different commercial workshops and English lessons on business to help compliment their professional placements.
One of our many informative seminars to have taken place at the Spanish Chamber premises this year.
To end our calendar, it was our great pleasure to celebrate this fantastic year with our ever-popular Informal Christmas Party, which took place on the King’s Road, last week. The event was kindly sponsored by Beefeater 24, meaning that the G&T’s were being enjoyed by our enthusiastic guests long into the night – saying fairwell to an active past year in style.
As a final remark, we’d like to thank all of our members and attendees which have made the events over the last year such a success. With more in-depth news on the various trade partnerships and commercial opportunities which were successfully cultivated over the past year, please do have a browse of our earlier blog posts. Beyond that, we only wish to say that we are looking forward to working with you, and new companies on the scene, next year!