snow business ( company )
darcey crownshaw launches snow business. the company invents the first eco - friendly artificial snow, made from recycled paper
in 1997 a third snow business company, snow business deutschland was conceived. it took two years to work through all the german legislation and company law. trading started in 1999 and the german film community have made snow business deutschland very welcome with trading exceeding all our expectations .
staff from snow business celebrating the year' s success. the company is the world' s biggest supplier of snow for hollywood films
snow business international ltd. free business summary taken from official companies house information. free alerts. registered as 03188135
snow business hollywood is a special - effects company that makes camera - ready snow. here, roland hathaway, an owner, talks about his star turns .
snow business also works on advertisements and live events. pictured is a mercedes advertisement
snow business can give any event a touch of magic using our huge range of artificial snow and winter effects .
a well - known company in stroud supplied the snow for the seventh star wars film .
‘snowcel artificial snow’ quickly emerged as the main product line and a range of artificial snow was developed and refined. a new company, snow business, was incorporated with the sole aim of supplying ‘snow and winter effects’ to the motion picture industry .
snow business, which is based in ebley, is a world leader in snow and winter effects and provided the snow in the highly anticipated new movie .
the innovative company has over 200 different types of snow at its snow mill including a wide range of ash, soot and burnt effects .
the company quickly earned the trust and respect of people within the motion picture industry and was welcomed into the bectu in the 1980’s. snow became an obsession for david whose aim was to make snow business the world leader for snow and winter effects .
darcey crownshaw' s company snow business, which he founded 31 years ago, specialises in delivering more than 300 varieties of snow - both real and artificial - for the world' s biggest film and tv productions .
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today, snow business offers more than 200 types of artificial snow and ice to its international customers – from light frosts, to fluffy, settled snow, to falling snow, to icicles, and seemingly every variation in between .
in 1996 snow business expanded its operations by incorporating in the usa establishing offices in los angeles and south carolina. with an ever - expanding workforce, year 2000 saw the company become a signatory to iatse (branch 44). snow business can now supply fully unionised facilities to all american filmmakers .
the largest area over which artificial snow fell continuously measured 12, 462. 78 m² (134, 148 ft²), and was achieved by snow business international (gloucestershire, uk) over bond street, london, uk to celebrate switching on the street' s christmas lights, on 23 november 2006. * * please make sure that it is listed as:' snow business international' and not snow business (uk) as this is a different company. * *
it’s a glamorous roster and one far removed from the company’s genesis in 1983, when crownshaw was working for a paper products business and seized on an opportunity .
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the harry potter series of films also utilised snow business. pictured in a scene from harry potter and the prisoner of azkaban
snow business is constantly researching, testing, and developing new snow materials and equipment. we test and evaluated every variety of snow and every type of snow machine we ever encounter, then we meet the manufacturers in order to refine and customise their wares for our specific use. this ongoing development completed with the backing of product manufacturers, is what keeps snow business ahead of all of its rivals
snow business is the world leader in the supply of artificial snow for motion pictures. although it is the largest company of its kind in the world it actually offers its services via a series of small units each employing local full time staff, this allows the service to be very ‘one to one’ i. e. ‘personal’. the company’s open management structure means your telephone call may as easily be answered by the president of the company as by any other employee .
the firm’s relationship with eon productions, the company behind the bond franchise, began in 1994 – when snow business created snowy runway scenes for goldeneye – and has continued with contributions to several subsequent movies, including current release spectre .
but the biggest barrier to early growth in the industry was getting his fledging company’s name and products known and trusted. the solution, crownshaw says, can apply to anyone in business :
snow business is truly internationally and is able to provide snow anywhere in the world. with an impressive number of friendly world - wide contacts the company can draw on local knowledge and expertise, something that is essential when large budget movies have so much money invested and so little time to produce .
snow business hollywood 21318 hart st. canoga park, ca 91303 tel: + 818. 884. 3009 fax: 818. 884. 3110 email: snowbusinesshollywood
the company signs its first james bond contract, for goldeneye. it would go on to supply snow for all but one of the subsequent films, up to the present day
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as the range of products became ever more widely used on locations, the company designed and supplied equipment for laying the materials more quickly over ever - larger areas. later, as the equipment and materials became more sophisticated, the company supplied specialist technicians to operate and supervise contracts .
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with film work now making up only 20 per cent of the company’s business and a diverse range of other revenue streams – including shop window displays (one telecoms giant paid $ 1m, or £650, 000, for such a project), events and global product retail – underpinning the growth of snow business, crownshaw has much else to focus on. but he admits that the big - and small - screen projects have still provided the biggest thrills so far :
' we' ve got over 300 different types of artificial snow. or you can make real snow, that' s kind of a little bit bigger and whiter. even when we make real snow - even now, it' s just one kind of snow but we can make it in different varieties .
today, snow business operates in 28 countries, turning over £5m and employing 35 people in the uk. its list of movie credits includes batman begins, bridget jones’s diary, gladiator, notting hill and paddington .
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a crew from the black arts company travelled with british forces and their families to bulgaria. film now in post - production and on this site soon .
his innovations in snow that is suitable for massive film crews and fictional situations has made his company hollywood' s first port of call for winter creations when the on screen temperature drops and they can' t wait on the weather .
‘snow business systems’ are supplied to many countries through a growing network of fully trained agents. we currently have agents in the czech republic, hungary, canada, new zealand, spain, belgium, holland, denmark and portugal .
however the 31 years spent perfecting the different types of snow were not always easy .
in year 2000 snow business opened its ‘international sales’ department, headed by rebecca binns. this department is currently based in the uk and is dedicated to offering the best possible service anywhere in the world through its international links and contacts .
“in my first full year i turned over £980. ” but he remained convinced of the potential and willing to take risks to grow the business .
what is your artificial snow made of? actually, we have 168 different products that we can use. primarily, the stuff that we use the most is paper snow .
impressive snow & winter effects for major films and iconic television shows for over 30 years .
snow business is involved on a winter film set somewhere in the world, every single working day of the year. the experience this gives, coupled with our range of over 140 types of snow, frost and ice materials, allows us to offer the most competent advice and supply the best winter effect for any scene, anywhere in the world .
with production credits that include hollywood blockbusters such as gladiator and gangs of new york, to much - loved british tv series such as coronation street, a small gloucestershire business has celebrated another year as the world' s most sought - after expert in fake snow .
you may not have heard of darcey crownshaw before, but you’ve certainly seen his snow. the entrepreneur – whose special effects company operates from a 1730s water mill in stroud, gloucestershire – has created artificial wintry scenes for everything from coronation street to winter olympic games opening ceremonies and high - street shop window displays :
which is your proudest accomplishment? “wonder boys. ” all the snow in that movie is all fake .
from being intensively hands - on with day - to - day operations (“because i was still making every decision, i was strangling the company and this is a typical thing of small businesses that grow”), crownshaw has taken a step back: “when i started i worked 80 hours a week, and i’ve only just stopped dreaming about snow – all my nightmares were about snow not being ready on time, ” he laughs .
the artificial snow is created from ingredients such as paper, wood pulp, starch, polymer and biodegradable plastic, while real snow can be customised to appear, for example, as light snowflakes, or a thick and heavy downfall .
after that first chance encounter, the next three years saw a wider range of cellulose based products being supplied to the special effects industry. these included ‘moondust’, ‘spray lawn’, ‘spray foliage’, ‘spray jungle’, ‘wash - away soot’, ‘sandblast - free sand’, and the first 100% biodegradable, eco - friendly, purpose made ‘artificial snow’ for motion pictures. this product ‘snowcel – full size – cellulose based snow’ was first used in neil jordan’s motion picture ‘company of wolves’ .
whichever road crownshaw goes down in the years ahead, you can be certain the forecast will be for plenty of snow .
' we have to understand what the customer expects and then you have to deliver. when a director says
i want snow
, you have to start a conversation and say :
well, what snow do you need ?
'
and what of the company’s work on the latest bond movie, spectre? “we created fake snow that matched in with real snow, ” he explains. “by the time everyone’s rehearsed, it doesn’t really look like you’re the first man ever to climb that mountain. so we had to go in and match the real snow perfectly. when you’re on mountains, things don’t tend to biodegrade because it’s just like putting it in the freezer – and if you’re in a location that does thaw the last thing they want is a load of paper and plastic left behind – so we used snows that biodegrade with ultraviolet light. ”
the technology does have its downsides. unlike the snowflakes that kindergartners cut from construction paper, artificial snow doesn’t have lacy dendrites. as a result, individual flakes pack together more tightly — better for racing, worse for powder - skiers. one acre of snow, one foot deep, can cost up to $ 2, 000, and it depletes water resources and devours energy. but it has also become the insurance policy that keeps ski resorts, with their sophisticated lifts and posh lodges, in business. “if you don’t have snow on the slopes, ” bender says, “you don’t have anything. ”
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“if you see snow on telly this christmas, it’s ours. if you see a snowy scene in an advert in a magazine, it’s ours, and if you’re on a plane travelling somewhere and you watch four movies with snow in them, that’s ours too, ” he chuckles .
what are the advantages of using artificial snow on a film set? you can control it. also, you’re never dealing with the cold weather .
he has even used snow that has a tinge of yellow - so it didn' t make a white fridge being advertised appear off - coloured .
director’s editor spent nine years interviewing tv and film stars for sky before joining the iod in 2011 and turning the microphone on britain’s business leaders. since then he’s grilled everyone from boris to branson and, away from work, maintains an unhealthy obsession with lower league football .
“i come into the office one day a week now, but i have an office at home. i’m always working, always looking at what’s coming next, analysing our pay equality, looking at what we’ve got in our portfolio that’s not quite as eco - friendly as it could be and asking ‘how can we replace that? ’ getting your head out of the day - to - day running of the business, you can get into the long - term objectives. a certain detachment does help you to see the business in a better way .
setting up an office in hollywood in 1999 was a landmark moment for snow business, but operating in the us has not been as smooth as crownshaw expected: “it’s a real eye - opener – we speak the same language so you think setting up will be a lot easier than somewhere like the czech republic, but it’s the most difficult place i’ve ever worked… the culture is different, the taxation system works on a totally different premise .
when darcey crownshaw first made artificial snow for films, his annual turnover was just £980. today his gloucestershire firm turns over £5m and produces over 200 types of snow for projects ranging from shop window displays and the winter olympic games, to the new james bond film spectre. here he talks innovation, global growth and taking a step back
the day after tomorrow movie (pictured) was particularly challenging because of the sheer scale of snow required for the production. the film depicts earth during an apocalyptic climate event
a week spent in fake artificial snow was not going to make cast and crew sick, nor turn to slush due to hundreds of people tramping over it days on end .
“listen to what people say they need and show them you can respond. because then people think ‘this guy listens to what i tell him, i’ll give him a go’. for example, when we did snow for the muppets, our snow was too big because muppets are much smaller than real people, so we had to invent a much smaller snow, which isn’t as easy as it sounds. but when they say ‘come back with something smaller’ and you do come back with something smaller, they say ‘ok, great’ and it goes from there. ”
a movie special effects expert got in touch, looking for someone to supply an alternative to the messy, eco - unfriendly salt and polystyrene - based materials he was using to double for snow. “he suggested there was a lot of money to be made in this and that i really ought to go into it full time, ” recalls crownshaw, whose solution was a snow made from recycled paper .
but by the 1980s, it was already enhancing the expansion of winter resort business. “for us it was essential right from day 1, ” says bob wheaton, president of utah’s deer valley resort, which opened in 1981. (the resort currently employs 40 people to make snow .) now ski slopes sport multimillion - dollar snowmaking facilities, with arrays of $ 30, 000 automated snow guns fed by miles - long networks of underground water and compressed - air pipes. unlike the early guns, the nozzles are often mounted dozens of feet into the air, giving the water droplets more time to freeze as they float to the ground. dirt particles, called nucleators, are thrown into the mix too. “you can take pure water down to minus - 40 and not freeze it, ” says joe vanderkelen, president of smi snowmakers, one of the nation’s largest purveyors. “but if you drop a fleck of dust in it” — which helps form a hexagonal array — “it will freeze. ”
what are the major milestones in this industry? there are some pictures that we found from ’50s movie sets, where people were actually just shoveling asbestos into a fan. in the early ’80s, paper snow started to be used, and it solved all the environmental issues .
' other snows might sparkle when the camera goes close to it. other snows might be really white so it goes slushy on the paths when cars drive through. others bulk up so you have three feet (deep) snow a man can fight his way through.'
“also, one of the useful things the government does now, through ukti, is offer training and support to help companies move into global markets. for a membership fee, we were able to approach china at a lower cost as they offered grants. you can also host meetings at a british embassy with your prospects, and receive guidance on business protocols in the country you’re going into. the expertise is out there and you can access it very cost effectively. ”
' normally on a movie set we' ll be using seven different types of snow to achieve what the director wants. some will be very white in the background while snows in the foreground will be much better looking close up and will be durable so the actors leave footprints when they walk .
before humans conquered snowmaking, ski resorts relied on the vagaries of old man winter. he was not always forthcoming. so in the dry connecticut chill of 1949 - 1950, walter schoenknecht, the owner of the mohawk mountain ski resort, took matters into his own hands. “he trucked in 700 tons of ice, ” recalled arthur hunt, a forefather of artificial snow, in a retrospective in ski area management magazine. schoenknecht subsequently “had it chopped up and spread over a single slope. ” it was the first known use of fake snow on a ski slope. it also helped spark an idea. one monday that march, hunt’s colleague wayne pierce came up with a shrewder plan. he figured that a drop of water, propelled through below - freezing air, would turn into a snowflake, hunt recalled. along with dave richey, their partner in a ski factory, they slapped together a spray - gun nozzle, a 10 - horsepower compressor and a garden hose into something of a d. i. y. snow gun. they experimented with it all night. “by morning, ” hunt wrote, “we had a 20 - inch pile of snow over a diameter of 20 feet. ” the contraption was later used at mohawk mountain .
' things like the day after tomorrow - that was quite a challenge - just the scale of the snow. then you get things like maleficent, when they wanted really amazing ice shapes and special features, so again that' s a challenge. when we did the muppets movies, we' d never worked with actors six inches high before .
the length measured 903. 1 m (2, 963 ft), the width at the narrowest point 13. 8 m (45 ft 3 in). in total, 40 machines used 200 litres (352 pints; 422 us pints) of fluid to produce the effect. the snow was eco - friendly, melted on impact with the ground and was made from seaweed .
fake snow took a while to stick. through the ’70s, the initial product, icy and blue, was considered something of a nuclear option. “it started out as a couple of bad winters here and there and, ‘oh, my god, we have to have snowmaking in case we have another bad winter, ” says curtis bender, a retired professor of ski - area operations at colorado mountain college .
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how long does it last? as long as you don’t have any bad weather, it’ll hold for a few weeks .
just recently we’ve done a few weddings, some car shows and also a lot of shop windows. we’ve also done a few parties in hollywood, which are, you know, a little on the flamboyant side .
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our wide range of products accommodates all of the common challenges faced by visual merchandisers .
“i invited the manager from the midland bank to my house for coffee, impressed upon him i had a house, and asked if he could lend me some money. i promised i’d get money from doing a film and pay him back in six months .
“each time i won a film, the next one seemed a little bit bigger, so i’d invite him back and he’d lend me more money and it just grew on borrowed bank money. those were the days when bank managers had customer relations – true personal banking. ”
“you’d build something and suddenly you’d lose it, because the us film industry goes into decline around every five years, ” he says. “but i managed to expand internationally – if i went to do a job in the czech republic i’d leave equipment out there and set up a distributor, then i’d go to moscow and set someone up there and copenhagen and so on. ”
“the advice we read from the dti [ now bis ] was that, if you set up in america you will get sued, so you need to make sure the us division is a totally different entity to the uk division – otherwise when one goes down it’ll bring the other down .
“we’ve found that the best way to work internationally is with local partners, ” he continues. “it’s obviously slightly more risky because you’ve got to take on people that you perhaps don’t know too well – but you just structure it so that, win or lose, you come out alright .
materials used include papers, foams, waxes and ash, and their method of application ranges from easy layering by hand, to dispersal by dazzlingly sophisticated machines .
“all the plastic bags we use for packaging are made out of vegetable and return to vegetable – no petro - chem in them at all, ” he says. “that has opened doors for us with people like greenpeace, the body shop and john lewis. ”
“there were two jobs that stood out, one was goldeneye and the other was doctor who. being on doctor who was just mind - blowing because i’d always watched it as a kid .
“ goldeneye was great, it was shot at leavesden aerodrome – just being there when that tank hurtled past at full speed, literally a car length behind the vehicle it was chasing, it was incredible, ” he says .
“you have to have one eye on the now and realise that’s what is bringing in the bread and butter – but also give yourself the space to understand what’s coming up in five years’ time. where do you need to be? how do you get there? start planting those markers – the sooner you plant them, the less of a diversion you take on the wrong road. ”
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mr crownshaw started out 31 years ago supplying old newspapers for the film pompeii .
he said:' in our first year of trading we turned over £958 which wasn' t a lot and we' re now in 25 countries, including places like iceland, canada and russia, but also places like korea.'
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star wars: the force awakens is to be released in cinemas today with the first of 20 viewings at stroud' s vue cinema 11. 45am .
star wars vii has also proven to have had an impact on the tourism in the region. confirmation that it was partly shot in the forest of dean has sparked an interest in holidaymakers heading for the area .
holiday letting specialist, urltoken reports increases of 145 percent in bookings to the area for 2015 since the announcement and in the lead up to the film’s release .
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snow business is a provider of artificial snow for various entertainment industries . the company was founded by darcey crownshaw in 1982 . crownshaw was working in the paper industry when a production unit filming the last days of pompeii for abc-tv placed an order with his employers for three quarters of a ton of shredded grey cellulose paper to use as artificial volcanic ash . the firm would not deliver less than 20 tons so crownshaw fulfilled the order himself using the padding from jiffy bags . crownshaw later supplied the same production unit with paper snow , and spotting a gap in the market established snow business . the company produces over 160 different types of artificial snow as well as frost , ice , snowballs , snowmen , icicles , igloos and icebergs . film credits include band of brothers , die another day , the day after tomorrow , the harry potter series , the lion , the witch and the wardrobe , and the golden compass . on 23 november 2006 snow business international set a guinness world record for the largest area covered with continuously falling artificial snow , covering the new bond street , bond street and old bond street areas of london simultaneously . the area measured 12,462.78 m ² ( 134,148 ft ² ) . 
snow business is a provider of artificial snow for various entertainment industries. the company was founded by darcey crownshaw in 1982. crownshaw was working in the paper industry when a production unit filming the last days of pompeii for abc-tv placed an order with his employers for three quarters of a ton of shredded grey cellulose paper to use as artificial volcanic ash. the firm would not deliver less than 20 tons so crownshaw fulfilled the order himself using the padding from jiffy bags. crownshaw later supplied the same production unit with paper snow, and spotting a gap in the market established snow business. the company produces over 160 different types of artificial snow as well as frost, ice, snowballs, snowmen, icicles, igloos and icebergs. film credits include band of brothers, die another day, the day after tomorrow, the harry potter series, the lion, the witch and the wardrobe, and the golden compass. on 23 november 2006 snow business international set a guinness world record for the largest area covered with continuously falling artificial snow, covering the new bond street, bond street and old bond street areas of london simultaneously. the area measured 12,462.78 m ² (134,148 ft ²).
snow business is a provider of artificial snow for various entertainment industries. the company was founded by darcey crownshaw in 1982. crownshaw was working in the paper industry when a production unit filming the last days of pompeii for abc-tv placed an order with his employers for three quarters of a ton of shredded grey cellulose paper to use as artificial volcanic ash. the firm would not deliver less than 20 tons so crownshaw fulfilled the order himself using the padding from jiffy bags. crownshaw later supplied the same production unit with paper snow, and spotting a gap in the market established snow business. the company produces over 160 different types of artificial snow as well as frost, ice, snowballs, snowmen, icicles, igloos and icebergs. film credits include band of brothers, die another day, the day after tomorrow, the harry potter series, the lion, the witch and the wardrobe, and the golden compass. on 23 november 2006 snow business international set a guinness world record for the largest area covered with continuously falling artificial snow, covering the new bond street, bond street and old bond street areas of london simultaneously. the area measured 12,462.78 m ² (134,148 ft ²).