Hi, I’m Pieter. While I’m a familiar face in the THoM family, I haven’t always been your classic marketer: I used to be the mastermind behind the popular Moodclub parties. Let me tell you how a humble party concept introduced me to the wonderful world of marketing!

Let’s jump back to the year 2000. As a restless law student, the nightlife in my city let me down tremendously. I had to spend my Thursday nights with bad beer and even worse music. A true disappointment for the energetic youngster I was. Those cheap parties, however, led to a bold idea: why not start my own party concept? No sooner said than done, I sat together with a befriended designer to set up my own event: Moodclub. It was a concept that fully aimed at creating lasting memories. A gathering focused on customer experience, to put it in today’s words.


Throwback to the early 2000s: me as DJ Pierre de la Rivière.

The power of Facebook

One of the elements that made Moodclub stand out was our exquisite branding. By mixing a slightly provocative logo with a brand identity that changed every three months, Moodclub became a pleasure for ears and eyes. 

Back in the day, posters and flyers were your go-to promo tools. However, these felt way too old-fashioned for a cutting-edge party. In the early days of social media, we used the power of images, downloadable content and community building. Atmospheric party pictures served as free online advertising, while we pleased our music lovers by recording the live sets. Those were made available as downloadable content on our website. Think of Moodclub as some kind of Boiler Room avant la lettre.

Slowly but steadily our fan base spread out over the different continents. Thanks to strong communities on Facebook, MySpace and fora, our music got shared all over the world. But our vision was even more future proof. As one of the first event organizers, we set up collaborations and partnerships. We introduced evenings with various genres in multiple rooms, in order to bring different crowds together. While this may sound pretty common, it was unseen in 2007. Little did we know that a decade later online advertising, social media and partnerships would be big business.

Conquering the Belgian party scene

Moodclub kept growing. At our peak, we had people from Germany, The Netherlands and the UK travelling to our parties. We became a fixed value in the Belgian party scene. Until I had seen it all. After ten years of nightlife and deejaying at numerous events in national and international clubs, I decided to use my marketing knowledge for different purposes. Like implementing great strategies at The House of Marketing.

Moral of the story

How do I look back on my previous life as a party planner? It was a wild ride, but one that taught me some unforgettable lessons and lots of entrepreneurial skills. By understanding customer experience, content marketing and branding, I had the advantage to be on top of my game when the content craze hit marketing departments. All because of something that was once a humble student party. So here’s my advice: don’t be afraid to dare. Get your hands dirty and dream as big as possible. I promise it’ll bring you lots of joy.