Startle's Mid-Year Updates 2024

Can you believe we’re already over halfway through 2024? We’ve seen a general election, England in the Euros final and even a solar eclipse. It’s been a busy one. 

We’ve been pretty busy at Startle working to make big moves and make our customers happy - we wanted to take some time to blow our own trumpet (music pun intended), if that’s okay.

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We visited Ireland, and acquired our first Irish company

Every year, the Startle team embark on a retreat to bring everyone together. From Iceland to Amsterdam to Scotland, the annual event has taken us all over the world. 

This year, the location was - Ireland. 

Flying in from all over the world to Knock, the team came together for a week of workshops, Guinness, presentations and campfires. And, at the time, this may have seemed like a left field location choice. But we had a secret ready to share…

Since Startle launched in 2015, we’ve been focused on creating unique and impactful customer experiences. We’ve used music, data and behavioural science to help businesses achieve their brand objectives through perfectly curated playlists, digital signage and more. 

But, we are so excited to take the next step to continue to innovate and expand. 

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That’s why, in the first half of 2024, we announced our acquisition of Visual ID. 

Visual ID has built a strong reputation developing cloud applications for the retail and service industries. Specialising in digital signage, printed point-of-sale materials and social media asset creation, their marketing toolkit is utilised daily by over 3,000 businesses throughout Ireland and beyond. 

We like to think this acquisition will bring together the complementary strengths of Startle and Visual ID. We will bring our music expertise to Visual ID’s in-store radio offering, creating a synergy that will expand the existing product offerings. 

With both of our brands being focused on the power of tech and the importance of great customer experiences, the partnership looks to enhance both of our offerings, and allow us to exceed the expectations of our customers even further. 

So, the trip to Ireland was a time for both teams to meet each other and bond. We had a blast, and we’re so excited for what the future holds. 

Find out more about the acquisition here. 

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Event Sponsorships

We decided that 2024 would be a year of events for us. We love attending and sponsoring industry events, chatting to a range of people and having some fun. 

We’ve been part of many events in the first half of this year, but here are some highlights… 

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Retail Gazette Future Consumer Debate

In May, we were a sponsor at Retail Gazette’s Future Consumer Debate. We had the silly idea to sprinkle a bit of Startle on the toilets of the event.

A loo takeover was a first for us, but we had a lot of fun. We hope the attendees had a chuckle when reading the stickers, too (we know you WhatsApp on the loo too, be honest). 

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Nudgestock

Nudgestock is the world’s biggest festival of behavioural science and creativity, attracting all with a thirst for knowledge and an appetite to understand the human animal. So, of course, after our air guitar at the event last year, we had to be a sponsor again. 

As well as providing backing tracks for the speaker walk-ons throughout the day, we knew the event’s theme of ‘time’ would allow us to conduct our very own, very scientific behavioural science experiment.

And what’s more scientific than a giant buzzwire?

So, we split into Team Classical and Team Rock, armed them with headphones, and challenged attendees to show us their concentration skills and their steady hands to answer the question: what type of music is best for concentration?

The results? Led by full-time rockstar Tim “The Plectrum” Plester, Team Rock unfortunately (as we predicted) made more mistakes than Team Classical, setting off the buzzwire many more times and therefore receiving more 5 second penalties, bumping up their times.

The overall winning team was Team Classical (led by Mozart, aka our musical maestro James), who were more steady and precise, aside from one rock anomaly Antoine who achieved the fastest time of the day at 19 seconds, almost half the speed of the next quickest rocker. We believe he was a robot.

Find out more about the fun here.

We have many more events left this year, so we’re excited to have even more fun and chat to as many people as possible. 

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New Startle HQ

After having offices in London and New York, we thought it was time for Startle to get some fresh air. 

Earlier this year, we moved into our new head office in Ware, Hertfordshire. 

The move was exciting for us as it allows our team more opportunities to collaborate and catch up. The extra space allows us to take some of our fulfilment in-house, meaning even faster operational support for our customers. 

The office is also based on a huge farm, with a lovely area for summer barbecues, which we’re very excited to take full advantage of. For professional reasons, of course. 

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Supporting pubs with the Euros

One of the biggest events of the year so far has undoubtedly been the UEFA Euro 2024 tournament.  

Live sport has played a pivotal role in many pubs for decades; the friendly banter, the edge-of-your-seat moments, the roar of cheers and smug commiserations. And despite the many challenges the hospitality industry is facing, there is a clear appetite for live sport in pubs. 

An estimated 8.5 million British consumers have watched games while out in the last six months, and their average monthly spend on eating and drinking out is 36% higher than those who don’t visit pubs and bars to watch sport. Almost half (46%) of Londoners spent more time at pubs, bars and restaurants during Euro 2024. 

Aligned with the launch of the tournament, we asked pubs: are you ready to Up Your Game? 

Staying on top of promoting football fixtures - update assets, print, assemble, take down, repeat - and building the entertainment into more than a 90-minute match requires a lot of time and energy, and we all know pub managers are busy enough.

Startle Arena brings pubs and bars a digital signage platform that takes care of sport promotions, automatically updating with fresh, relevant content every day that’s customised to the pub’s location, so pub managers don’t have to lift a finger.

Find out more about Startle Arena here. 

We’re always here to chat to hospitality brands about how to make the most of events like the Euros in their venues.

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Looking Forward

We’ve had a busy year so far, and we’re even more excited for what’s coming up. 

As well as more fun events and welcoming new clients, we have some exciting product projects in the works. 

After acquiring Visual ID, who are very trusted by those in the grocery industry, we were inspired to work on an in-store radio product where customers can quickly and efficiently create amazing, AI generated radio content. We can’t share too much at this point, but keep an eye on our site and our social media to stay up to date on this exciting development. 

Expect even bigger and better things from Startle towards the end of 2024 and start of 2025!