Event and travel management company The Appointment Group (TAG) has acquired the travel management division of Satellite Office Services (SOS), a provider of logistical support for large-scale international events.
SOS specialises in services such as travel management, entertainment visa coordination and production support for concert tours, festivals and special events. The company was founded by partners Lori Tierney, Wendy Stephenson and Charles Zimmer in 2006.
TAG, which specialises in providing travel services for the entertainment industry, says that combining its global reach with SOS’s experience in managing crew travel will allow it to offer a comprehensive service for artists, bands and their full touring production teams.
The combined business will operate as TAG Global Touring and will be managed from TAG’s Los Angeles office. Visa services will continue to be provided by SOS under its own brand and will not be part of the combined business.
Byron Carr, director of TAG Global Touring, said: “We have admired SOS as a business for a number of years and at times enjoyed working alongside them for mutual clients. We are delighted that Lori, Wendy and Charles have agreed to sell their travel division to TAG so we can mutually work together to create a stronger Global Touring offering to the entertainment industry. We look forward to working alongside them to the benefit of all our clients.”
Wendy Stephenson, founding partner of SOS, added: “SOS has worked in parallel with TAG on a number of the highest grossing tours of the past few years, where TAG has managed the A&B Parties and SOS has looked after the crew, and we mutually recognised that our operations would be more efficient if we combined our business. TAG has the resources and global presence to help expand our capacity and keep up with the demand for highly specialised production travel management – we feel this will be a natural integration and provide substantial benefit to all our clients.”
appointmentgroup.com; sostouring.com