CGC Events (From York Press)

CGC Events

10:23am Wednesday 20th July 2011 in Profiles

CAN CGC Events, which trades as York Racecourse Hospitality, retain the title it earned last year as Tourism & Hospitality Business Of The Year?

The 130-employee organisation, whose latest figures show group sales at £18.5 million, is also targeting the Large Business Of The Year accolade.

Among its many contracts is the 29-year-old deal to provide the hospitality services for York Racecourse It’s massive. For instance, behind the scenes at the Ebor Festival, 60 chefs slave over stoves in ten different kitchens, 17,000 bottles of champagne are served, 6,000 punnets of strawberries prepared, 150 sirloins of local beef roasted, 350 lobsters boiled, 1,200 crabs dressed and 2,000 lbs of prawns peeled.

To celebrate the fact that York Racecourse uses more regional produce than any other, CGC Events recently commissioned a work from artist Caitlin Jones.

She created a 16 ft mural of horse and jockey entirely from local food, including 150 Yorkshire puddings, four crates of rhubarb, five kilos of Sand Hutton potatoes, 20 punnets of Vale of York strawberries, four crates of mushrooms from Thirsk and two huge sacks of freshly harvested Cawood wheat and barley.

The firm’s employees are local too, and during busy events numbers swell to more than 1,000.

In recent months York Racecourse has invested in opening the hugely popular Melrose Club Lounge, which allowed CGC Events to create a new menu, including Yorkshire tapas and treats like Whitby fish pie and Wensleydale risotto.

It also allowed the company to add a new Veuve Clicquot Bar, a Moet Lawn Bar near the Tote facilities and a further fast-flow bar.