From a Singapore-focused exhibition contractor 55 years ago to a brand activation specialist with a global presence today, The Pico Group’s growth and transformation has been one made possible by foresight and courage
The story of The Pico Group could well be any budding entrepreneur’s motivational case study. From its founding days in 1969, when the Singapore company established itself as a trusty exhibition contractor for show owners and organisers, Pico is now a specialist in brand activation and experience with a global reach.
Reminiscing Pico’s rise through the past 55 years with TTGmice, chairman Lawrence Chia joked that it would be a challenge to capture the company’s milestones across almost six decades in a single conversation.
Yet, he delivered. He traced Pico’s evolution in the 70s and 80s, when it expanded from its home base Singapore to South-east Asia and then Hong Kong.
“That move was driven by the customer,” said Chia.
“We were servicing a couple of organisers in Singapore, and when they decided to expand their tradeshows into other countries, they asked if we would go with them. We have an open mindset, and with the Singapore market being so small compared to others, we welcomed the invitation.”
Pico’s expansion momentum was further fuelled by China’s opening to global trade in the early 80s.
“We saw that as China opened up, there would be a lot of MNCs from Europe and the US that would want to enter China. So, we sent out our international marketing team to those regions to talk to potential customers,” Chia recalled, adding that a boom in China’s telecommunications and automotive industries put wind in Pico’s sails.
This expansion triggered the start of a series of service evolutions. Instead of just servicing the event organiser, Pico invested in creative personnel and solutions for event participants and exhibitors.
As the 90s arrived, Pico found itself again riding on its customers’ continued global expansion.
“Our relationship with our customers clearly transformed in the 90s because many of them wanted us to help them with their events and establish their brand not only in Asia but also Europe, Africa, the Middle East and many other regions and countries. During this time, in the early 90s, we also set up our office in Dubai,” said Chia.
“Through such projects, we got to understand our customers’ brands better, and realised that we were only just touching a small part of their overall marketing budget. A lot of money was being spent on event marketing, such as roadshows and launches. That led us to look at opportunities to support our customers in marketing.”
In the 90s, Pico upped its game and transformed into an international company playing in the event marketing space. This allowed it to move beyond tradeshows and take on projects with showrooms, museums, theme parks and more.
With an ability to take on a new clientele, Pico was inspired to reassess its business in the early 2000s.
Chia told TTGmice: “We realised we had been doing a lot of things that were ultimately to assist our customers in creating an integrated brand experience. So, we decided that we should refresh the brand and reposition Pico as a brand activation agency and focus on everything that delivers an integrated brand experience on face-to-face platforms.”
Thus, he ushered his team into a new era that established the company’s brand positioning in “Total Brand Activation and Integrated Brand Experience”.
The move also meant greater attention being paid to new communications technology to allow it to better compete with “a whole new set of competitors that possessed a tech background”.
Chia said in the new digital age, Pico had to compete with firms like IBM, Cisco and Intel for certain projects.
A look through the company’s website discloses an impressive collection of project case studies that range from virtual art presentations to trade exhibitions.
Pico’s investment in digital transformation turned out to be a blessing when Covid-19 hit the events industry and forced face-to-face engagements to shift online.
“We were well prepared during the pandemic because we were three or four years ahead. We did projects that originated in China but were executed in Dubai and managed by the team in Singapore – and they were entirely virtual,” Chia recalled.
A good example was the Singapore Maritime Week 2021, which went hybrid for the first time to unite industry experts during the pandemic.
Pico Singapore was entrusted with hybrid event management, content creation, and media planning. The team helped raise event awareness and drove sign-ups, and most importantly, connected physical events with a virtual platform that facilitated face-to-face discussions and networking.
When asked if courage and foresight were Pico’s secret sauce to success, Chia said an “entrepreneurial spirit and a can-do attitude” were just as crucial.
“We never say no. We always look for ways to solve a problem. If the client asks us to do something that we had never tried before, we will make it our mission to provide a solution,” he remarked.
Chia told TTGmice that Pico’s success did not come without missteps.
He shared: “In life and in business, there is always failure. One has to maintain an entrepreneurship mindset and passion. We try, we fall, but we must always stand up and do it again.”
Looking ahead, Chia sees stability in Pico’s specialisation in integrated brand experience and face-to-face interaction, but pointed out that efforts are needed to stay abreast of new technology that can be applied online and offline.
“We have to keep embracing new technology, and new ways of interacting on social media. We have to be open to new products and platforms that will allow us to create the best brand experience activation for our customers,” he concluded.
Today, Pico employs 2,500 people full-time across 36 cities worldwide – or 3,500 including contract staff.
