Excel London
24–25 June 2026
First event industry trade exhibition to provide an onsite crèche
Zero accidents or safeguarding incidents
Childcare planned for future events
In June 2026, The Meetings Show became the first event industry trade exhibition to provide a professional onsite crèche for attendees.
Recognising that many event professionals are also parents, the team at Northstar Travel Media wanted to explore how childcare could help remove barriers to attendance and create a more inclusive event experience.
Nipperbout was appointed to provide a fun, safe, welcoming and engaging environment at Excel London for children while their parents took part in the exhibition.
It felt a little like coming home as we were finally able to show our own industry exactly what we do after 34+ years!
We created a fully managed onsite crèche designed to support children from babies through to older children, accessible from the show floor including
- Age appropriate play areas with activities for different age groups from babies through to teens
- A dedicated baby sleep area
- A parental space for parents to feed, change and spend time with their babies
- A programme of supervised activities including arts and crafts, circus skills, music, games, pool, air hockey and more
- Pre-registration as well as walk up acceptance
- Our usual Nipperbout safeguarding standard
- Our experienced Purple People to support parents and entertain children throughout the two day exhibition
As this was the very first time that the team were including childcare, we worked with them to help plan the process. The creche was to be located at the back of the show meaning that children would need to be admitted at registration and then be escorted by their parents to the creche.
Our Director of Childcare, Janthea Brigden, consulted on safeguarding protocols and child-related procedures, staff training and risk assessment in the run up to the event and was available throughout open.
Uptake was anticipated to be low and last minute as it was the first year so we remained as flexible as possible keeping pre-registration open and planning additional staff to be on standby should more walk ups than anticipated arrive.
Due to the nature of the show and the interest of visitors, we also opened the creche to accompanied visitors in order for meetings and event organisers to see the provision in action as part of their experience of the event.
Many visitors discovered the crèche after arriving onsite, having seen the at show signage or spoken with other exhibitors and visitors. The opportunity to see the creche in action with a view to either attending with their child next year or including the service at their own events was an invaluable part of their visiting experience.
- Enabled attendees to focus on networking, meetings and content knowing their children were professionally cared for
- Demonstrated how onsite childcare can be successfully integrated into a trade exhibition environment
- Helped position The Meetings Show as an event that is actively exploring more inclusive ways to support its community
- Delivered a safe, engaging and seamless childcare experience for families attending the event
- Became a best practice example of how to offer childcare provision at events
- The introduction of childcare at The Meetings Show was a really important step for the events industry, a working example of accessibility and inclusion and, we hope, just the start!
The response from families who attended was extremely positive.
"Thank you so much for looking after my daughter. She was well entertained and perfectly looked after. My daughter is still breastfed, so it was great that I was able to take her to this event as it reduced her level of stress. Fantastic service.
And, actually the pure unadulterated joy of this comment from a child made our day -
“This is the best day ever”
The Meetings Show has confirmed its intention to offer childcare again in future years and we are looking forward to helping make it the industry standard so that parents do not have to chose between attending an event and caring for their children.
"Having childcare allowed me to come to the event and do my job. My boys had a great time."
“Nipperbout make our lives easier as organisers and are a great extension of our team, offering a wonderful service for our delegates to make their journey to the event a step easier.
The team are always very responsive and are very easy to work with. They share details early and communicate with the venue very well in advance.
We are grateful to have the ongoing partnership with Nipperbout!.”