Montgomery Group - Purpose & History

Independent, family owned and proud of our heritage, we are Montgomery Group, a unique, data driven events business focussed on providing a long-term sustainable future for everyone that we connect with. Committed to delivering value to our teams, our communities and our partners, we work within sectors that we strongly identify with, find engaging and fundamentally enjoy being a part of.

With over 125 years’ experience, we are a purpose driven company, fully committed to our values and our vision. We continue to challenge ourselves to be open minded, innovative and unafraid to fail. With over 50 events across fifteen countries and with over 150 employees, we believe that we can make a difference.

To Serve

TO
SERVE

We work on the philosophy of Servant Leadership and look to create a set of practices that enrich the lives of individuals, help build a better organisation and ultimately create a more just and caring world.

Montgomery

OUR
WORLD

Our world is the communities we serve, the sectors we work in, the individuals we work with and our employees who make it happen – our world is important to us.

Montgomery

NURTURING RELATIONSHIPS

We work with our world to create deep relationships that establish and deliver growth and positive outcomes. Together, we want to ensure this is true for our exhibitors, our visitors, our partners and our staff.

Montgomery

DEVELOPING OPPORTUNITIES

We believe in creating a set of circumstances that make it possible to succeed. This represents not only delivering first class events – which create opportunities for our clients – but also designing our business around creating opportunities for our staff and partners to thrive.

"To be our communities’ long term strategic partner

throughout the year, creating opportunities for them to connect,

transact and engage with the right people to achieve success"

Ethically Commerical

We have ambition, a will to win, the desire to achieve success for our clients, partners and ourselves – but not at any cost. Our decisions go beyond profitability and are centred on respect, honesty, and a desire to have a positive impact on the world around us.

Growth Mindset

We challenge ourselves with courage and curiosity to discover our full potential. Through training and mentorship, pursuing innovation and recognising the need to expand our outlook, we embrace a culture of continuous development.

Embrace Collaboration

Our relationships with our clients, employees and suppliers are a partnership with no exceptions. We challenge and support one another, even when it may be uncomfortable. By actively seeking out diverse views, both internally and externally, we do all we can to ensure a resilient outcome.

Empowerment

We encourage our people to take responsibility. We understand that to find faster, better and more nimble ways to work we need to be open to ideas. Our employees are our greatest asset, and we encourage our teams to take these chances and challenge themselves without fear of failure.

Sustainability

We aspire to ensure sustainability runs throughout the Group.

Diversity & Inclusion

We have always been a company that values diversity and aspires to do more.

Our company is named after Henry Greville Montgomery, a pioneer in the brickwork business, who in 1895 staged a Building Trades Exhibition at the Royal Agricultural Hall and later Olympia in order to help the struggling West Country clay traders during a period of depression. Greville mobilised his political contacts as a Liberal Party member to highlight these workers’ needs by giving them space at the exhibition – an effort that impressed the public so much he went on to win a seat for the Liberals in the 1906 election in the Tory Bridgwater stronghold, becoming a popular MP. 125 years later, his values and legacy of helping others by providing the opportunities they needed to survive and prosper lives on through today’s Montgomery Group.

2023

Our new launch artfair in Singapore - ArtSG - wins best launch event Asia at the AEO Awards.
2021

Winner of the Organiser of the Century Award.
2019

Independent Hotel Show Amsterdam is launched.
2018

Montgomery acquires FIT Show – the leading event for the window, door and flat glass sector and Montgomery Group Managing Director Damion Angus is 2018 Chair of the Association of Event Organisers (AEO).
2017

The recently-launched Montgomery Asia launched their first events; Speciality & Fine Food Fair Asia and Restaurant, Pub & Bar Asia.
2016

Acquired the full ownership of the Independent Hotel Show and Montgomery wins most Memorable Event Moment for our 120th Birthday Celebrations – which was a new award for the AEO Award.
2015

Ran our first humanitarian aid event when Montgomery purchased AidEx, and Montgomery Aid & Development was born. We also celebrated our 120th birthday in style in the Manchester Square Gardens.
2014

Delivered the first Festival of Business in Liverpool in conjunction with the UK Government. Launched the Africa Rising event as part of the festival.
2013

The launch edition of Electra Mining Botswana was attended by 0.1% of the entire population of Botswana and made headline news that night.
2011

Montgomery purchased Reed Exhibitions share of Fresh RM and Fresh Montgomery now Montgomery Events was born.
2007

The launch of the World Photography Awards in Cannes sponsored by Sony – this has gone on to become a global platform for photography around the world followed a year later by the launch of ArtHK which went on to become Art Basel Hong Kong.
2006

Our first show in Libya was launched to tackle the oil & gas and infrastructure sectors.
1999

Fresh RM is launched as a joint venture company between Montgomery and Reed Exhibitions and Speciality & Fine Food Fair was launched.
1996

Nelson Mandela visited Electra Mining Africa.
1992

Chef Gordon Ramsey wins National Chef of the Year at Salon Culinaire.
1990

Hotelympia was visited by Princess Diana – Olympia had suffered some damage to the roof that year from a particularly bad storm and attendees had to evacuate, mostly to the pub!
1989

Prince Charles visited IFE (twice over the years!)
1986

David Hockney provides the design for the poster for Art LA.
1984

The Liverpool Garden Festival attracted 3.4m visitors – the largest event in the UK since the Great Exhibition of 1851.
1979

IFE was launched and still runs today as the leading food & drink trade event.
1968

Sandy Angus, Montgomery Groups past Chairman, joins the company.
1967

Molly and Bryan Montgomery founded Specialised Exhibitions (Pty) Ltd in South Africa, which is still part of The Montgomery Group and is one of South Africa’s leading exhibition organisers.
1937

One of the only public duties of King Edward VIII in 1937 was visiting the Building Exhibition at Olympia.
1935

Hotel, Restaurant & Catering (later called Hotelympia) was launched and is the longest running Trade Show in the UK.
1930

The only architectural work ever carried out in Britain by Le Corbusier was a stand at the 1930 Building show for Venesta. This marked the arrival of ‘modernism’ to the UK.
1909

The Building Exhibition was visited by the Prince & Princess of Wales shortly before their accession, on the death of King Edward VII, as King George V and Queen Mary.
1903

We launched our first mining show known as the Colliery Show.
1897

The First Building Show then became the world’s first biennial show.
1895

Greville Montgomery MP launched the First Building Show at Westminster in 1895 to support the ailing clay workers whose Institute of Clayworkers he had founded that year.
1895

Montgomery’s Founder; Greville Montgomery MP launched the company.
1789

Our Manchester Square buildings (which is still Montgomery Group Headquarters today) were completed and first occupied by aristocrats fleeing the French Revolution.

Purpose & History

Who we are