04.08.2020

HAE award ceremony goes virtual

The UK rental association Hire Association Europe - HAE EHA - has decided to abandon plans to hold a physical Hire Awards of Excellence event this year, and will replace it with an online awards event next month..

The event will now be streamed at 16:00 on Wednesday 16th September following the association’s Annual General Meeting. All shortlisted companies will be asked to film an acceptance speech with only the winners making the final edit. Until that point, they will remain secret in the same way as are at a physical award ceremony.

The awards were originally planned to take place at London’s Grosvenor House Hotel on Saturday 4th April.
Chief executive Graham Arundell said: “As the ongoing situation and uncertainty surrounding Covid-19 continues, we have taken the sensible decision to move this year’s Hire Awards of Excellence to a virtual platform. The safety and wellbeing of our guests, finalists and sponsors is paramount and as it stands, holding a physical event still remains challenging.”

“The awards ceremony has always been a stand out event in the hire industry’s calendar, delivering it virtually presents a fantastic opportunity for us to come together and collectively celebrate the amazing achievements of hire and supply companies, and individual successes, across the UK's plant, tool, equipment and event hire industry, in a safe way.”

“By keeping the winners tightly under wraps until the 16th September we hope that we can maintain the element of mystery that usually surrounds the event and encourage the industry to get involved. It would be great if people donned their finery and raised a glass to those shortlisted and of course the winners.”
The full list of finalists for the Hire Awards of Excellence 2020 can be found here www.awards.hae.org.uk/finalists/

Here are the finalists for a few relevant categories

Supplier of the year

• Garic
• MCS Rental Software
• MHM Plant
• Niftylift
• Point of Rental Software
• Snorkel UK
• Trime UK

Hire product of the year

BISAF for the Particulator
GAP Group for the AutoHybrid ZERO Welfare Unit
JCB for the 19C-1E Mini Excavator
MHM Plant for the MGTP 6000 Solar Hybrid Generator
Morris Site Machinery for the SMC TL60 Solar
Niftylift for the HR17NE
Uni-Prop International for the Uni-Prop

Rental company of the year

• A-Plant
• AFI-Uplift
• Vp Brandon Hire Station
• GAP Group
• Smiths Hire
• Travis Perkins