I arrived at the Mansion House on Dawson Street a bit too early; seems I must be a bit eager! This gave me some time to walk around the venue and collect my thoughts. As I strolled up the walkway to the entrance, the banners supplied by Michael Jeffrey of Expand-a-Sign made me feel confident that I was walking into something truly amazing. Expand-a-sign did an amazing job on the banners and it was great to be welcomed by such terrifically professional workmanship.

As Julie Mullane & Claire Brady from DIT's Event Management course put the finishing touches to the registration desk- thanks girls! - I got my first chance to admire the delegate packs in their entirety.

Bound to Impress lived up to their name yet again when it came to the delegate packs; needless to say I'll be singing their praises for a long time to come! For an event focusing on being different, they really outdid themselves and made us proud to have them on board as sponsors.

Aimée Tyrell, the Eventznet web misstress (!) [she likes to be called that, honest!] was our official photographer for the day and she started off with some amazing pictures of the showcase. Our own Fern Moore was running around making sure that the exhibitors were beinglooked after. I have to mention Lorna and Joe from Hire All Event & Party Hire for the trestle tables on the day, without you guys we really would have been stuck.

Pictured to the right is Mark Redmond from Fitzpatrick Killiney Castle - pure gentleman! We were delighted to see him and Emer Relihan at Events Day 07 - particularly since we'll be back in Killiney Castle on the 17th of May at the Irish Internet Association Annual Congress of which Eventznet is one of the sponors. Fergal O'Byrne told us that the availability of broadband (and parking!) is one of the main reasons they always use Killiney Castle.

We at NEO wanted to add to this conference a flavour of the very best of what is available to event organisers in Ireland. We really were not disappointed. A mixture of new, old, and even older NEO members got together and put on an exhibition the like of which has undoubtedly never been seen before. [editors note: Conor is not referring to anyone in particular when he uses the phrase "even older"... honestly!]

Deirdre Bounds, formerly of i-to-i Travel led a rip-roaring keynote address, which motivated many in the audience. What a presentation! All I wanted to do after hearing her speak was to go back to work and get started on the many ideas she had inspired in me. After a great Q&A session led by our very own Sarah Carroll, we were due a well-earned break. It was time to break out the tea and coffee, and start adding to my collection of business cards.

After this refreshing networking session, we all sat back down to dig into some of Tara Fay's (Xena Productions), case studies on really challenging corporate events. We were blown away. Having someone of Tara's calibre speaking at this conference was a real treat.

Not to be outdone, Kieran O'Byrne- Hill & Knowlton PR, was up afterwards taking us into the middle of the morning from the audience. Such insight into the launch of E-bay Ireland in aid of DEBRA Ireland was amazing and the sheer success has to be heard from the horses' mouth to be believed! Everyone in Ireland saw at least one piece of media nine times over the course of the PR campaign; such a claim should go down in the history books. [editors note: we also loved seeing video of Clyde bunjee jumping!]

Mark Duckenfield and Conor McCarthy of Emergent Events (Street Performance World Championships organisers) were up next and really showed us that passion and drive can really create something wonderful. With 26,000 people attending the world street performance championships that they organised last year, they truly succeeded in being different to the norm. This year's championships take place on June 15th + 16th - definitely two days for the diary!

Lastly, Martin McMullen of the Highpoint group took us up to lunch time with a fascinating presentation on ethics in events and fair trade. If you're looking for a team building day with a difference, Martin's the man to talk to.

[editors note: this is the page we call the Conor and Clyde Day Out page, as they've managed to get their faces into every second photograph taken!]

While I've been writing this review, I was struggling on whether or not to spend some time talking about the lunch. But I just couldn't leave out how simply delicious it was. Fair enough, myself and Elaine O'Connor, our Conference Manager, were the last to eat, but the service was excellent and the food sublime right to the very end. I'm sure everyone will join me in thanking Elayne & Eimear from the Mansion house and all the staff at FIRE for a great meal.

This was the session to end all sessions. Marc Thornton of DTA Marketing and the IHI, Tom Raftery of Tom Raftery IT and Ruan Kent of Premiere Global Systems inspired the crowd with their presentations on blogging, web conferencing and podcasting, igniting a healthy Q&A session that went fantastically. Such was the feedback, we at NEO are thinking about holding another event based around these topics, so if you have any ideas, please let us know.

More opportunities to mingle with the exhibitors were presented at another brief break. We were then back into our seats for our final presentations during the innovation section of the speakers sessions.

We were certainly treated to something special from Conor Kenny & Mary O'Rawe during their presentations. Conor (Conor Kenny & Associates) talked about being the key to your own creativity, while Mary(DIT- Lecturer in innovation) went a bit technological on her own giving us a taste of the internet sensation Second Life and illustrating how it is changing the world around us.

After some more fascinating and clarifying Q&A we all made our way back to the exhibitors for a final chance at networking with others in the group of delegates. I must say it was great to see that people were not staying in their groups and really embracing the essence of NEO by getting to know new people.

NEO Ireland would be nowhere without the support of our membership, and Events Day ‘07 would not have happened without the unending support that we have gotten from our sponsors, delegates and showcase exhibitors. A huge thank you to you all!