How to plan a memorable corporate summer festival

If you want your guests to let loose this summer, a festival-themed party is sure to be a winner. To help you plan and get inspired, we’ve put together the latest trends in venues, food and entertainment so that you can be sure to throw a corporate summer festival event that wows your attendees.

Favourite corporate summer festival venues

To create your own festival, you need a venue that will provide just the right setting.

Corporate summer festival events can certainly be held indoors, but if you’re planning to celebrate summer and echo the vibes of famous celebrations, you’ll want to be setting up in a fabulous outdoor venue.

But this doesn’t mean you can’t create a hybrid set-up in your outdoor space. Tipis, marquees and big-top tents will add to your festival atmosphere while giving your corporate party a lot more flexibility should the weather become sizzling hot or soaking wet. They also offer up more space, which can be customised to showcase your chosen festival theme (more on that later!).

Popular venues for festival-styled corporate events include woodland locations, racecourses, farms, country homes and polo clubs. For a festival on a smaller scale, consider booking a picturesque walled garden.

Corporate summer festival ideas

Once you’ve found your dream venue, you can pick your festival party theme. Yes, a festival is a theme in and of itself, but if you really want your corporate festival event to stand out, you can take things up a notch.

For instance, popular corporate summer festival party ideas right now include:

Music festival: Recreate your very own Woodstock or Glastonbury with some fantastic live music and comedy acts.
Ibiza party: Create a vibrant and colourful event with this fun theme. Think glow-sticks, rave music and themed dancers, and you’ll have a corporate festival to remember!
60s hippie festival: If you’re looking for a more carefree and laid-back vibe, this theme could be the perfect fit for your festival. Aim for shabby-chic styling with vintage bunting and some wellness activities to channel that hippie spirit.
Fairground festival: Bring the fair to your corporate summer festival with merry-go-rounds, coconut shies and fortune-tellers.
Beer festival corporate day: Pair up beer with a fantastic BBQ to celebrate the warmer summer months. Add in local brews and popular beer games to pay homage to the UK’s best beer festivals.

Fabulous festival food

A festival theme party is the perfect excuse to ditch a stuffy sit-down dinner and encourage your guests to mingle and try new things!

For this reason, take a look at setting up different street food stalls or food trucks. This will also help you to cater for any dietary requirements set by your guests. Alternatively, a posh nosh BBQ or wood-fired pizzas can go down a storm.

When it comes to drinks, you can look at hiring mobile bars to serve up an enticing range of cocktails and mocktails. Stalls serving craft beer will prove popular too.

Festival party decorations

A corporate summer festival needs a fun and relaxed feel, so you’ll need to think carefully about your festival party decorations so that they fit in with your festival theme. This means you’ll need to consider what lighting, furniture, colours and materials you use. Whatever you choose, festival flags and bunting are absolute musts.

To cater for as many of your guests as possible, creating zoned areas is a great idea. This way you can provide energised spaces for party lovers and quieter, chill-out areas for those who would prefer something more low-key.

Zoned spaces also allow for more creativity: why not have each zone boast its own signature drink or activity? This will encourage your guests to wander around your corporate summer festival and soak up the sights.

Stay sustainable

Modern festival-goers have a sustainable conscience, as will your business. To tie in with your sustainability goals and showcase your commitments, make sure you choose green options wherever possible for your corporate summer festival.

For instance, you can encourage your guests to bring their own water bottles and then provide refill stations, and offer drinks and food in recycled and recyclable containers.

Festival activities

A festival thrives on good entertainment. Music needs to be a key part of this, so you’ll need to enlist the talents of live bands or DJs to keep energy levels high. If you’d like your festival to run from daytime into the evening, you may want to start with smaller, more acoustic sets while the sun is up before switching to larger bands and exciting DJs at night.

But music alone isn’t enough to ensure your corporate summer festival is a success. Here are some other festival entertainment ideas that can get your party started:

Silent discos: Want to keep everyone partying? Letting them choose their own music to dance to is a great option.
Wellness: To encourage your guests to kick back and relax, think about offering meditation groups, yoga classes or even massages.
Comedy: Get your guests in the mood to have a good time with some hilarious comedy acts or stand-up shows.
Competition: Build a bit of team-spirit and some healthy competition with sporting games. Gladiator-styled podium fights, bungee runs and inflatable obstacle courses will stoke some friendly rivalry.
Walkabout performers: Capture the attention of your guests with fire breathers, stilt walkers and acrobats.
Fairground games: Give attendees a dose of nostalgia with traditional fairground games, including hoopla and arm wrestling! Bouncy castles and mechanical bulls will also grab attention.

Talk to a corporate summer festival company about your event

If you’d like to throw a fabulous corporate festival this summer, why not discuss your vision with us? Here at MGN events, we can provide you with end-to-end festival planning and management. Whether you need help with festival party ideas or want assistance on the big day itself, we can give you the support you need.

Find out how we can help with your corporate festival party today. You can get in touch with one of our helpful team members by filling in the contact form below. Alternatively, email us at hello@mgnevents.co.uk or give us a call on 01932 223333.