The Security Event 2027 returns to the NEC Birmingham on Tuesday 27 to Thursday 29 April and the Lollies are looking forward to exhibiting for the fifth year in a row and our second on stand 5/A90.
As usual, the event will bring together manufacturers, distributors, monitoring stations, software developers and equipment specialists from right across the industry. Everyone hoping to catch the eye of the installers and end users who will be walking the floor to see what is new, meet suppliers and work out who they can trust. And it’s not just security! The Fire Safety Event runs next door at the same time, so the fire safety crowd come down the ramp to have a look too.
Which makes it one of the most important rooms in the sector to be visible in.
Our message for The Security Event 2027 is simple.
If you are third-party certified and still being judged on price, we should talk.
Because certification should not sit quietly in the background. It should be part of the reason a buyer trusts you, shortlists you and chooses you.
Why we changed our message
In previous years, our stand told people that Lollipop Local works specifically with fire and security companies. For 2027, we wanted to go further.
We wanted to speak directly to the companies that have already done the hard work. Third-party certified, technically competent, serious about standards, and still being compared mainly on cost.
That is why the message changed.
If you are third-party certified and still being judged on price, we should talk.
It says who we are for. It says what problem we understand. And it says who we are not trying to attract. We are not chasing the biggest budget in the room. We are looking for companies with real competence that buyers need to see more clearly.
Last year’s show sharpened the message we are taking into 2027. It was the thread running through our two biggest conversations there.
Two on-camera interviews. One conversation.
At The Security Event 2026, we were interviewed on camera by two groups. Umar from the Room Secured podcast. And Optex EMEA. Both conversations came back to the same point.
In fire and security, trust matters more than noise.
When Umar found out that we only work with third-party certified fire and security companies, he was surprised. He said most marketing agencies are more interested in budget.
That is exactly why our position matters.
We are not here to make just any company look credible. We make third-party certified companies easier to choose.
Because the stakes sit with the end user. When someone chooses a fire or security contractor, they are making a decision they may have to defend later. If the wrong choice is made and an insurance claim follows, someone has to show they did their due diligence. Third-party certification is one of the clearest ways to evidence that. So a certified company is not just a safer bet for the buyer. It is a safer bet the buyer can prove they made.
One other thing Umar and I talked about was the stand itself. When we were setting up, I told him I was disappointed. It felt like it was facing the wrong way. I was wrong. As Umar pointed out, people could walk straight up one of the main aisles towards us. It turned out to be a great position. Easy to find, easy to walk up to. Which is rather the whole point of everything we do.
With Optex, I got talking to Matthew about why we were so pleased to be at the show at all.
A few weeks before TSE 2026, someone called us out of the blue. They had seen us at The Security Event a few years earlier. Back then they were busy and did not need us. But things had gone a bit quiet and they remembered us. They remembered the stand. And they picked up the phone.
That is the hard thing about exhibiting. The ROI on a stand is difficult to measure because so much of it is intangible. You cannot always draw a straight line from a conversation to a contract. But when you get a call like that one, you write it down. Those are the moments you keep, because those are the ones you show your finance director when they ask why you were there.
The bigger conversation with Matthew was about how the industry is changing. It used to be about getting the job done. Now it is about getting the job done properly and having the evidence to prove it was done properly.
That shift is why we focus on third-party certified fire and security companies. They do the work to a standard, and they still get compared on price. What we help them do is show off that competence, so they get chosen with confidence, and so the end user can show they picked a competent contractor.
Manufacturers talk to installers. Engineers talk to engineers. We help installers translate that into language a responsible person or an end user can actually understand. Because it all comes back to the same thing. Being able to show that the right contractor was chosen, for the right reasons.
The certified companies we caught up with
Two of our own customers were exhibiting at the show, on their own stands.
Fenix Monitoring hold NSI certification for their monitoring. When a buyer asks whether the company watching their cameras is doing it to a recognised standard, that certification is the answer. It is competence a buyer can check.
CCTV Hire & Sales brought REG-0134 to the show. They are one of the few companies we work with that is not yet third-party certified and there is a good reason for that. The British Standard for their niche does not fully cover temporary and mobile CCTV towers yet. That standard is owned by BSI and the rewrite is being shaped by the people who know these towers best, which includes our friends at the BSIA, along with tower providers like Phil. As the standard catches up with how these towers are actually used, CCTV Hire & Sales intend to be one of the first in line for certification.
That is a company taking certification seriously before it is even required of them. It is exactly why they are the exception that proves our rule.
Last year’s show proved the point. When the message is specific, the right people walk up.
The messaging changed who walked up to the stand
Here is what we did not expect.
Changing our message did not just change the interviews. It changed the quality of the people who stopped to talk. The enquiries we had at the show were noticeably better qualified. Fewer people asking what we charge. More people already understanding what we do and why it might be for them.
One moment made the point better than any statistic.
Jon spotted an installer walking past the stand and tapped him on the shoulder for a chat. The installer said we were exactly what he had been looking for. A few weeks later he had a call with Jo and signed up straight away for Phase 1, our Find The Gaps and Who What Why work.
The reason was telling. He realised he had been employing salespeople without ever establishing why people should buy from him in the first place. The reason to choose him had never been made clear. So his sales team were selling into a gap.
He has now signed up to build that messaging into his marketing going forward.
One signup. The stand had paid for itself.
That is what the right message does. It does not just get you seen. It gets you seen by the right people. We wrote more about that pattern in if you are certified and still competing on price.
If you are third-party certified, use it properly
If your company has done the work to become third-party certified, that should be more than a badge on your website. It should shape how you explain your value. It should support your sales conversations. It should reduce price pressure. It should give buyers confidence that they are choosing a company that takes competence seriously.
Because in fire and security, being visible is not enough. You need to be visibly credible.
Come and find us at The Security Event 2027
We are back on the same stand as last year. Stand 5/A90. That good position Umar spotted is exactly why we booked it again for 2027.
There we are on The Security Event 2027 floorplan. Stand 5/A90, booked again.
If your certification is not helping buyers understand why you are worth choosing, it is not working hard enough.
We will be there talking to certified fire and security companies that want to turn their reputation into revenue and their competence into sales.
If you are third-party certified and still being judged on price, we should talk.
