CAA buys into Entertainment Benefits Group

Creative Artists Agency (CAA) has invested an undisclosed sum in corporate entertainment provider Entertainment Benefits Group (EBG), bringing the agency’s Premium Experience hospitality division under the EBG umbrella.

EBG is one of the US’s largely privately held travel and entertainment providers, with more than 40,000 corporate clients with a combined 50m+ employees. It provides participating companies’ staff with entertainment and travel offers as part of their employee perks programmes.

Other EBG investors include Broadway theatre owner/operator Shubert Organization and EBG’s founder and CEO, Brett Reizen.

Reizen (pictured) says the deal will see his company work with CAA to “assist artists, sports teams, venues and others in the live entertainment space to sell more inventory from the back of the venue to the front, ultimately generating incremental revenue for these stakeholders through our private corporate perks programmes and distribution opportunities.”

“EBG has built a remarkable business that is unlike anything else in the marketplace”

EBG’s existing management team, led by Reizen, will continue to lead the company, which has around 470 employees based in offices in Miami, New York, Orlando and Las Vegas.

“Brett Reizen and his team at EBG have built a remarkable business that is unlike anything else in the marketplace,” says Richard Lovett, CAA’s president.

“Providing its entertainment partners with unique access to its significant distribution pipeline, EBG’s state-of-the-art technology integration with major ticketing and travel providers, combined with its direct-to-consumer relationships and data-driven approach, truly differentiates it from other organisations. We look forward to working with EBG to further solidify its position as a leading industry solution.”

The EBG investment is CAA’s first of 2018, following a 2017 in which it partnered with Chinese private-equity firm CMC Capital Partners, Singaporean sovereign wealth fund Temasek and podcasting business ART19.

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