October 14, 2025
Client Success Story: MOOOV Film Festival
Why Unique Festivals Can’t Thrive on Generic Software
“Fiona is designed with film festivals in mind. With previous systems, we had to manipulate them to suit our needs, which inevitably led to problems over time.”
MOOOV is a Belgian film festival focused on ‘films facing the world’. They are committed to raising awareness, confronting, and informing their audience through film. Via different activities, they emphasise education, community building and creating exhibition opportunities for films from less well-known ‘film countries’. After years of trying to make generic management software systems work for them, MOOOV started looking to switch to a solution that understood the needs of film festivals.
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What they missed in the previous software system
MOOOV’s many different activities have their own logic and planning methods. Their previous software had worked well for other cultural institutions but fell short in meeting the specific demands of the film festival. They still had to do a lot of work manually, plus they missed a way to plan schematically, with a drag-and-drop system. Nor could they easily create a screening schedule. Since they were the only film festival client for that software developer, development of the current software would be costly and time-consuming. They were advised that seeking an alternative software solution would be a wiser choice.
“We looked at a lot of different systems, for us, Fiona stood head and shoulders above the rest”
When asked if our features met their needs, they said,
“The structure and logic are exactly right. Fiona is designed with that in mind. With previous systems, we had to manipulate them to suit our needs, which inevitably led to problems over time.”
Fitting it to suit the whole team
``Everybody was quite scared of digital systems (...), but now even the most scared person works with Fiona and finds it a fantastic system.``
Fiona’s implementation to support their film festival processes led to further development in close collaboration with MOOOV to optimise their distribution processes. This ensured that Fiona met all their needs as both a film festival organiser and a film distributor, establishing it as a valuable tool for the entire organisation. As Greet Stevens, Financial and Digital Manager of MOOOV, puts it:
“I find it so important to work with a system that is understandable for every employee, in case someone drops out. Everybody was quite scared of digital systems;. They kept stubbornly working with Excel, Word, or their own script. But at the end of the year, someone (me) has to make a report with all the numbers, based on all the different inputs and that costs a lot of energy. It took some time, but now even the most scared person [for digitalisation] works with Fiona and finds it a fantastic system. New employees or interns even immediately understand how the software works.”
Durability & Sustainability
“Long term, we look at reducing our digital footprint, together with our digital partners...”
MOOOV puts a strong emphasis on durability & sustainability, which they incorporate into their own strategies and take into consideration when selecting a new partner. As they say,
“Long term, we look at reducing our digital footprint, together with our digital partners, to make what we would inevitably need to do online as sustainable as possible. [So we would ask] where are their servers, how do they view their footprint, and what do they do in terms of sustainability?”
This is also something we greatly value at Fiona. As a software service, we require substantial server capacity, but we aim to achieve this sustainably while also reducing our environmental footprint in other ways, aligning with our sustainability and inclusion commitments,
In terms of durability, we were happy to hear that MOOOV finds that
“Fiona Festival can be used for many years and a broad range. It’s the basis from which everything leaves. Information goes from Fiona to the website or ticketing system and comes back to it.”
Our best features according to MOOOV
After working together for three years and the recent adoption of our RSVP module, we were eager to learn what MOOV thought of Fiona. So we asked Greet what features she likes best:
The RSVP module
“The RSVP module saves a lot of time and energy. It’s easy to categorise people with tags and lists, and we have a template that only needs a new colour or banner per event. There’s still a lot to think about, of course, but if you do it regularly, it’s easy, and you’ll have a neat email that reaches everyone, eliminating the need for follow-up. This is also an added bonus for the VIP’s, it’s really simple for them to register and receive all the necessary information. They don’t have to send anything back or go to a different website.”
Integration between Fiona and designer tools
“We have an automatic link between Fiona and some tools that our designer uses. All the information and block diagrams automatically flow into a brochure template. It’s easy to update; the designer can just reload it. It’s easier to do that in Fiona than to do it in a PDF that everyone adds comments to. That was so labour-intensive.”
Everyone works with the system
“It’s very user-friendly, so the whole team went along, which didn’t happen with the previous system. The previous one wasn’t linked to the website either. Because everyone is now in the system, all the data is there as well, which makes it so easy to get the report at the end of the year.”
“I’m sure my colleagues will have completely different highlights: one of my colleagues gets a kick out of creating the best possible day planning, and another colleague is a big fan of the changes to the group booking forms.”
New developments and new challenges
Of course, we also want to hear how we can improve. Since MOOOV is opening its independent cinema in 2027, it will need better ticketing integration. Currently, it’s not fully automated, meaning they still need to put in some manual work, which will be too much once they’re selling tickets year-round. We’re currently working on a way to automate this process together with their ticketing partner.
Also, are you interested in how a software solution designed explicitly for film festivals can simplify your life? Request a demo!
