Cirque du Soleil and Cirque Éloize Part Ways

(Translated from French using Google Translate)

“This partnership no longer fit the business strategy of Cirque du Soleil, confirmed the spokesperson of the circus, Renée-Claude Ménard. We are no longer in the diversification of our business, it no longer matches our business reality. We want to focus on our own shows and not be distracted in other companies. ”

The contribution of the Circus was essentially to share his contact book Éloize and help in organizing international tours. From 2010 Éloize said taking advantage of “business expertise” of Cirque du Soleil. This was done in the wake of the creation of his show iD .

“It was a partnership that aimed to create synergies, says René-Claude Ménard. Éloize was always regarded as a little brother. They even accommodated them at home while they are remodeling Dalhousie Station. We put them in contact with our network of promoters, we helped them in terms of business and marketing. ”

Cirque Éloize, which has 35 permanent employees, the news was not well received, quite the contrary.

“After more than five years, he [the general and artistic director Jeannot Painchaud] wanted to take full control of the Circus, although artistically, it has always been independent, there were more or fewer projects that came to the Cirque Éloize … “says Maxime Charbonneau, Director of business development and communications Cirque Éloize.

Still, Maxime Charbonneau positively evaluates Cirque’s participation, which has enabled to Éloize, he said, to “put in place a functioning system for booking , finance, accounting.” “By being the responsibility of Cirque du Soleil, we could establish best practices in the management of our company.”

Specifically, Éloize has first and foremost had access to the Cirque contact. “It is thanks to them we were able to organize our tour of 98 performances in Russia – the largest ever by a Western company says Maxime Charbonneau. There was also a six-week tour in Japan led by producer Fuji, partner of Cirque. ”

Does the withdrawal of the Cirque du Soleil mean a shortfall for Éloize?

The business development and communications manager of Éloize does not believe so. “Cirque has never injected funds in the operation of Éloize, he said. He helped us, for example, to provide loans for the purchase of equipment. Today, there are lots of very promising projects, especially for special events. ”

Éloize, which announced just a few days touring China, now looks to the future with optimism. Their two touring shows, iD and Cirkopolis, are always popular. So much so that two new teams iD and Cirkopolis will be established in the coming months. A new creation also will be launched this year in August.

The choice of Cirque du Soleil

Cirque du Soleil’s new sales manager – chaired by businessman Mitch Garber as a result of the sale of Cirque du Soleil to the consortium led by US investment firm TPG Capital – seeks to undo all activities of Cirque that are not related to the live shows.

For example, the project Heart, created with the Catalan chefs Albert and Ferran Adrià in the Spanish island of Ibiza, was taken over by Guy Laliberté (and his company Red Moon). All investment projects in bars – as the Las Vegas Light – were also abandoned. Cirque’s participation in Sid Lee had also been removed.

Despite the withdrawal of Cirque with some community organizations Saint-Michel as the popular Carrefour, Renee-Claude Menard said Cirque continues to contribute in the neighborhood, but differently.

“We no longer create Circus sites in the world. Today, we support social circus instructors, but we do more selling. ”

It also gives the example of nomadic Arts, established in the schools of St. Michael 10 years ago.

“This is a project that we initiated. It was developed, it works well and has been supported by the school system. We continue to support financially, but not in the same way. My restaurant Saint-Michel, Vivre Saint-Michel in health are also organizations that help, but we do not invest in the same way it was 30 years, for sure. ”

{ SOURCE: La Presse | http://goo.gl/6Pzxom }