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What has been the highlight of 2007 for the company and why?
Our figures for 2007 trebled year-on-year, which was an incredible achievement given that some see a slowdown in online poker. But to see nearly 500 players, guests and media gather in glorious Portuguese sunshine for the Everest Poker European Cup (EPEC) is hard to beat.
What has been the worst moment of 2007 for the company and why?
Organising flights, accommodation and two days of poker for 500 people from all over the world during a dealers strike in Portugal.
What has been the biggest tournament of the year on Everest Poker?
In online terms, Avalanche has become so popular we are going to do two in 2008 but the EPEC gets more and more established each year—the atmosphere is unique and friendly. The players really enjoyed not only being able to play poker and meet other players but the event also came with a free holiday in Portugal and the weather was superb. Both the media and our players and their guests had a long weekend to remember. But 2007 was the second EPEC and a second Swedish winner.
How do you try to make your tournaments more appealing compared with those available on other sites?
Our approach is always to enhance the poker experience for our players rather than the elite professionals, and the figures show how popular that has been in the poker community. All our ambassadors for next year will be winners from our site, not famous names that we have thrown money at. They say that copying is the best form of flattery and when we launched “Live The Dream” in October, there were a few large grins when another poker room hatched a similar promotion six weeks later called, er, Live The Dream.
How many staff does the company employ and where?
We are XXX strong now, mainly based in Montreal but obviously we have country-specific employees all over Europe.
What do you have planned for 2008?
Early in the year our focus will be on Live The Dream and then when we have our 10 ambassadors, we move onto the more familiar tournaments, the EPEC and the Avalanche. We also have some very exciting promotions bespoke to each country that we will be revealed in time.
We are also seeing plenty of emerging markets that have not been properly communicated with yet. Eastern Europe is an obvious example of an area where internet penetration is growing very quickly, and there is a whole raft of smaller staking players who are cautious but still want to play without risking too much financially. That said, it’s inevitable the meteoric growth seen over the last few years cannot continue, but the early signs in 2008 are showing record numbers for many of us so I think the doom mongers will have to wait a while yet.
Ed Pownall, PR and events manager, Everest Poker and Casino
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