The views expressed in this article are not necessarily those of the FIA. The commentary below was supplied by 2018 FIA partner, ITOO Special Risks.
The annual FIA awards took place at the Sandton Convention Centre on Thursday, 28 June 2018.The night was abuzz with over 900 guests all in attendance to honour key industry players, intermediaries and exceptional brands in the financial services sector.
The theme of the evening was #FIAsenses playing on the idea of the five senses. The FIA would like to send a big thank you to our 2018 sponsors of the event who ensured that guests were entertained and also gave away some amazing prizes.
Winners of the 2018 FIA underwriting manager of the year award ITOO Special Risks, took guests’ taste buds on a tricky journey. Guests were testing if they too are ITOO wine Experts as a wine was secretly poured into a black glass. By removing the sense of sight, taste buds were not allowed to make a preconceived idea of what the wine should taste like. Guests were asked to guess whether the contents of their glass was red or white wine. Guests were at loggerheads about the colour and taste of the wine, Ultimately, the colour was neither red or white, but rather a Rose wine.
“This could have been any wine tasting anywhere but the ITOO people were the differentiator- wow!” Comments Lizelle van der Merwe, FIA CEO.
Guests were then asked to enter a competition for VIP tickets to the Kyalami Festival of Motoring, happening in August. Two VIP tickets per day, with the winner of the Sunday tickets receiving the opportunity to ride in a Ferrari around the Kyalami race track with multiple national race champion, Sarel van der Merwe.
“It means so much to ITOO to win the FIA Underwriting Manager of the year Award and to be recognised by our brokers. We are now more committed than ever before to work together with brokers and to continue in the ITOO Way. The theme of the FIA conference gave us a great opportunity to portray our #Expert brand message in a fun and innovative way. Our ITOO Wine Expert stand was a hit with brokers who became “wine experts” for the night! This was certainly the best FIA awards ever” says Justin Naylor, MD of ITOO Special Risks.
The FIA would like to thank ITOO Special Risks for their support.