I recently had the opportunity to watch the show Amaluna produced by Cirque du Soleil. In addition to being impressed with the numbers shown and the performance of the artists, the logistics needed to put a tour like this on its feet made me reflect and want to know more about the company, which I take the opportunity to share on this blog.
Cirque du Soleil is a privately held circus company, founded in 1984 in Canada. Recognized worldwide for the quality and grandeur of its shows, the company reinvented the world of circus by abolishing on-stage dialogue and animals, basing its shows on body language, the intellectual sophistication of theater and ballet, and the use of technology, ensuring that people all over the world would be able to understand what they are seeing.
In these more than 30 years of existence, there are more than 40 shows developed for an estimated audience of 160 million spectators in more than 400 cities, in 60 countries spread across six continents. Currently, Cirque du Soleil has 20 different shows around the world: 8 fixed shows (7 in Las Vegas and 1 in Cancún) and 12 traveling shows.
Figure 1 – All Cirque du Soleil shows currently running
Source: Cirque du Soleil
The show currently in Brazil is Amaluna, which debuted in Canada in 2012 and has been to more than 30 cities. A touring show usually averages out to seven weeks per city, featuring eight to ten shows a week. All traveling shows open in Montreal and tour North America for four to five years before moving to Europe for three years, Asia for 2 to 3 years, Australia for one year and South America for one year as well. On display in Montevideo (Uruguay) until September 15, 2017, the group went to São Paulo, from where it stayed between October 05 and December 17, 2017, until making its first presentation in Rio de Janeiro in December 28th and where it will remain until January 21st of this year. As of February 14th, it will be presented in Argentina, from where it will go to Chile and Peru. In other words, quite a bit of logistics is needed to ensure that the entire structure is dismantled from one location and arrives at the next one on time!
In 2014, DHL became the official logistics partner of Cirque du Soleil, being primarily responsible for the assembly and disassembly of the structure and transfer between tour locations, including the use of air, sea and land transport services and customs clearance ( in figure 2, more information about the operation carried out by the company in the year in which the partnership began). However, other companies are also used to facilitate the logistics operation. Here in Brazil, for example, Multilog was responsible for receiving materials, sets and structures from Cirque du Soleil in Brazil. The operation took place in Porto Seco de Jaguarão (RS) and the company operated from the entry of vehicles, parking, verification and release of cargo to the exit of vehicles.
Figure 2 – Data on Cirque du Soleil's logistics operation in 2014
Source: DHL
For the Amaluna show, around 65 vehicles are needed to transport the nearly 2.000 tons of equipment, using an estimated team of 120 people in total. The structure corresponds, in general, to the big tent (where the presentations take place), the entrance tent, the artistic tent, the kitchen, the offices and the storage places and it takes about 5 days to assemble and 3 days to disassembled. To erect the main canvas of the big top, with an approximate height of 19 meters and capacity for about 2.500 seats, it takes only 5 minutes, as shown in the following video.
Video 1 – Setting up the Cirque du Soleil tents
Source: Cirque du Soleil
Another major logistical challenge involves storing and transporting the items used in the show. In addition to the heavy structural elements, there are many items that require special care: around 1.000 different items of costume (only one dress used in Amaluna uses 6.500 Swarovski crystals), musical instruments, strings and cables used in the acts and essential for the safety of the artists , makeup that needs to be kept at a controlled temperature, delicate souvenirs like mugs, among many others. Therefore, in addition to the difficulty of dealing with items of different sizes, extra care must be taken to ensure that the cargo does not suffer damage, compromising the quality of the show and the safety of professionals.
Figure 3 – Dress with more than 6.500 Swarovski crystals used by the artist of Amaluna and that requires care for storage and transport
Source: Cirque du Soleil
The team that travels on the Amaluna tour is made up of 46 artists and 64 other professionals. Among the 110 people, there are 18 different nationalities, which demands greater complexity in the coordination of travel visas to ensure that people of different nationalities have valid documents to meet the requirements demanded by the different host countries of the shows. In addition, there is work to book accommodation in hotels for the entire team, in addition to hiring around 150 local professionals in each city, such as bartenders, store cashiers, bilingual cooks, waiters, receptionists, merchandising store salespeople, stockists and bilingual dressing room assistants, not to mention another 100 people dedicated only to helping with the assembly and disassembly of the structure.
For those who have the chance to watch a Cirque du Soleil show, be sure to go at least once. An opportunity to watch not only a fantastic artistic performance, but also the possibility to see up close the values of logistics and the importance it has for the success of a company.
References
<https://www.cirquedusoleil.com/>
<http://www.srzd.com/entretenimento/cirque-du-soleil-rio-de-janeiro/>
Fernanda Monteiro
More than 11 years of experience in training and consultancy projects, focusing on Logistics and Supply Chain. In consultancy, he carried out projects such as Transformational Logistics Plan, Diagnosis of logistics operations, Strategy and Calendarization of Transport Operations, Measuring the Cost of Serving, Market Study, Mapping of Inventory Reduction Opportunities, Review of the S&OP Process, Management Plan Training and Implementation of Commercial Processes in companies such as Nestlé, Raia Drogasil, Ipiranga, Lojas Americanas, B2W, Coca-Cola, Andina, Embraco, Martins Atacado, Loja do Mecânico, Santo Antônio Energia, Ecoporto and Silimed. She is currently one of the teachers of the Inventory Management Course taught every six months by ILOS. She worked on the development and management of Online Courses in Logistics and Supply Chain, Supply Processes, Demand Planning, Inventory Management and Industrial Management. Still in the training area, she was responsible for applying ILOS business games in companies such as Raia Drogasil, Fibria, NEC, Novartis and Moove.
