Record year for arena after 'challenging' period

Nottingham's largest events venue is experiencing a record year for sales, its chief executive has said.

It follows a "challenging" period for the National Ice Centre and Motorpoint Arena, which was closed for 18 months during the Covid pandemic.

The 2024-25 financial year also saw a "disproportionately high number" of cancelled and postponed shows, some of which have been reorganised for the current year.

"When you have a postponement even of a few months, if that moves into a different financial year then that leaves a big hole," chief executive Martin Ingham told the BBC.

"It's very difficult for the rest of the business to be able to react to fill those gaps because ultimately those are our big revenue generators."

The venue, which is owned by Nottingham City Council, marked the 25th anniversary of its opening on Tuesday.

On the same day, Mr Ingham provided an update on its business performance to the council's Companies Governance Executive Committee.

He told councillors the company made 19 redundancies in the past year in an attempt to improve its financial position, and a further 10 vacancies were removed.

"That cost-cutting exercise enabled us to turn around the financial expectations of the year to the point where we are looking at a break-even or small loss for the year," he said.

The venue is also considering automating some roles to further mitigate costs, with "e-bars" at which customers pour their own drinks being explored.

Mr Ingham said sales for 2025-26 had been helped by events such as six Peter Kay shows and fixtures for the new Nottingham Forest netball team.

He added increases in ticket prices across the entertainment industry did not appear to be discouraging customers, despite concerns over the cost of living.

"We'd all like tickets to be cheaper, for sure. Is there a concern it's going to put people off? The evidence so far shows no, it's not," he said.

"I think what's happening is people are placing more value on the experience of going to see their favourite artist and maybe utilising that instead of having a weekend break somewhere."

He warned, however, that increases to employer National Insurance contributions and the minimum wage, both introduced by the government from 1 April, have created uncertainty for the business.

"The cost of employing people is going up. We employ a lot of casual staff on the National Minimum Wage," he said.

"We've modelled the impact, but I think until we get well into the financial year we won't fully understand the costs, but it's significant."

The council loaned the arena more than £7m to keep it afloat during the pandemic, which will be paid back in instalments from 2026-27.

Mr Ingham praised the authority for its financial backing, and said the arena had contributed more than £1bn to the local economy since it opened.

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