MELBOURNE, Australia – Prime Creative Media is excited to announce the appointment of Siobhan Rocks as the new General Manager of its Melbourne International Coffee Expo. Siobhan is an experienced events executive, having spent many years in senior roles at Diversified Communications.
Her experience managing Fine Food Australia, Foodpro, Naturally Good and FoodTech make her an especially strong candidate to lead the events team and support the redevelopment of the Melbourne International Coffee Expo (MICE).
“I have long admired the work that Prime Creative Media has done, watching MICE grow into a staple event for the global coffee industry,” says Ms. Siobhan Rocks. “I look forward to joining such a great team and supporting the ongoing growth of their events.”
Following industry consultations held across the country led by MICE Show Director Lauren Chartres, Prime Creative Media has been redeveloping MICE to continue to support the industry.
A new feature launching this year is the Café Owner Education Sessions. These sessions have already proven a hit, with ticket pre-sales at their highest point in MICE’s 10-year history, and more than 50 per cent of ticket purchasers identifying as café owners.
This follows the investment last year the MICE made launching the Australia’s Richest Barista Competition, that gave a $40,000 prize pool in cash to three Australian baristas. The winner Rawirat Techasitthanet, also known as Jibbi Little, was crowned the inaugural winner and took home $25,000 in prize money.
“With my winnings, I hope to open my own coffee shop in Sydney,” says Ms. Little. “Winning the Australia’s Richest Barista competition was a source of great pride for me. Given that it demanded a fusion of skills from multiple coffee competitions, including the barista, latte art, and cup tasters competitions, with formats quite similar to those on the global stage.”
Ms. Rocks and the team at MICE intend to continue to listen to the industry and are planning to invest more people and resources to support coffee professionals like Ms. Little around the country.
“MICE is such an impressive offering for the coffee industry, with its specific focus on café owners, you can’t access that at any other event in Australia,” says Ms. Siobhan Rocks. “We’re going to continue to build on that at MICE, creating these fantastic opportunities to grow individuals, organisations and industries.”
Prime Creative Media CEO John Murphy says the industry should look forward to seeing future iterations of MICE under Ms. Rocks’s leadership.
“We are confident that in Ms. Rocks we have found great leadership and events’ industry expertise that will bring MICE to the next level,” says Mr. Murphy.
