Connect with ambitious founders investing in growth and visibility
The Festival of Entrepreneurs returns to the NEC, 3–4 November 2026.
5,000 founders, 200 speakers and 150 partners gathering to scale serious businesses.
If you provide marketing strategy, digital growth, content, brand, PR or performance services, this is where scaling founders look for partners to accelerate revenue.
A founder audience actively investing in growth
83% are founders or senior leaders. 35% run £1m+ revenue businesses.
The Festival attracts operators actively scaling customer acquisition, brand reach and revenue performance.
Across 2025, sessions covering:
• AI-driven marketing
• Personal brand building
• Growth strategy
• Content and community
• Sales enablement
drew strong attendance across both days.
Founders attend to refine positioning, improve conversion and strengthen their go-to-market execution.
Marketing and growth partners at the 2025 Festival included:
Brand strategists, PR specialists, digital agencies, fractional CMOs and growth consultants joined the Festival to connect with ambitious founders.
Visibility, positioning and revenue growth drive founder focus
63% of founders attend to meet new partners with expertise that can drive their growth.
As businesses move beyond early traction, marketing becomes a strategic lever.
Across the programme, themes include:
• Brand positioning and differentiation
• Performance marketing and acquisition strategy
• AI-enhanced marketing execution
• Personal brand and thought leadership
• Sales and marketing alignment
Founders attend to sharpen strategy and identify partners who can help them scale sustainably.
The Festival creates space for in-depth conversations that move beyond surface-level networking.
Exhibit within a high-density founder environment
• Stand options from 6sqm to 72sqm
• Positioned around high-traffic stages and networking hubs
• Premium shell scheme stands and turnkey options
• Access to pre-and post-event marketing exposure
The floorplan is designed to drive movement and maximise meaningful interaction.
Lead conversations around marketing, growth and brand
• Deliver experience-led sessions grounded in real cases
• Share frameworks for building brands and driving demand
• Align with content themes across marketing and growth
• Extend visibility through professionally recorded sessions
Marketing partners who demonstrate credibility and clarity resonate strongly with the audience.
“The Festival of Entrepreneurs was a great event, there was real interest in applied AI with established Founders who are scaling their businesses and we made valuable connections. We have rebooked for the next one!”
— Dominic Kos, Founder of Cleverfox AI“Festival of Entrepreneurs was a fantastic event for Strategus Consulting. It was great to meet so many entrepreneurs and founders and hear their ambitions. Follow up has also been excellent, with over 85,000 people viewing our FOE related episodes of the Leaders in Strategy Podcast. We will be back in 2026 with a much bigger stand”
— Mike Harris, CEO of Strategus"We exhibited at last year's Festival of Entrepreneurs and picked up many leads for our fractional c-suite services, so this is a highly recommended event"
— John Courtney CEO, BoardroomAdvisors.co “Our presence at the Festival of Entrepreneurs was a real standout this year. The energy around our stand was fantastic, engaging, inviting, and full of meaningful conversations with entrepreneurs, innovators, and partners who were genuinely excited about what we had to offer. Overall, the event was a brilliant platform for us.”
— Linsey Luke, Head of Business and Stakeholder Engagement, FSB“I had a fantastic experience at the Festival of Entrepreneurs. It’s a rare event that brings together such an open, ambitious and generous group of founders, and the energy across the day really reflected that. I left feeling inspired, with several valuable new connections and conversations that I’m confident will turn into long-term relationships.”
— Mark Rushmore, Co-founder of SURI“The scale and energy in Festival of Entrepreneurs was fantastic, and we really appreciated the opportunity to be part of it.”
— Jay Lad, Business Growth West Midlands
A national platform hosted at the NEC Birmingham
The Festival draws founders from across the UK, with strong representation from London and the South East alongside a growing Midlands base.
The 2026 event doubles in scale — expanding the exhibition, the content programme and the curated networking zones.
The Festival is becoming an essential knowledge exchange and marketplace for scaling founders and the partners who support them.
40% of exhibition space already allocated
Early movers get the advantages of prime exhibition stand locations and alignment with speaker topics.