The Life & Times of an Event Promoter .......................

The Show!

This is the last in my series of blogs about the inner workings of BSSK - the 'behind the scenes' work that no one ever sees, but that goes into making a smooth running show ...........  hopefully!

We have covered finding a suitable venue, things that can go wrong in two parts, designing a floor plan, banners and boards and advertising.  

There is much, much more to it of course - the daily duties of phone calls, accounts and invoicing, answering hundreds of e-mails in a week, sending out promotional e-mails and social media advertising, processing booking forms, sending out booking packs to new enquiries, working on dates for future years, designing and ordering flyers, show guides and posters, and so much more.............  

In order to keep it all on track, we operate to a carefully designed show by show timetable, which details the tasks that need to be completed each week.  At the time of writing, we are juggling Newark, Scunthorpe, Elsecar, Horncastle and Chester - all 'live' and all at varying stages.  Sleaford goes 'live' next week as we start the early tasks on that one.  It is an April show - this gives some idea of how far ahead we work.  For shows like Chester and Elsecar, it is even further ahead than that.  I was working on Chester 11th & 12th April, before Christmas!

So, eventually, after weeks of all of the above we come to the show weekend.

Our run up starts the previous weekend when our valued volunteers Annmarie and Martin Webster come over on the Saturday to help us 'prep kit'.  This involves unpacking the van and topping up the Treasure Hunt prizes, the feedback cards, the prize draw cards, packing the prize draw crystal, splitting the sheets of wristbands (they come in sheets of 10) into singles and banding them in 100's, date stamping a quantity of two-day passes, adding any signage for that particular show over and above the usual generic ones, checking supplies of hazard tape, pens for the information table and all the other bits that may need replacing.

On the Monday of show week, we give the website a final check, asking the webmaster to add any late bookings, remove any cancellations and change any talks that may have cancelled and been replaced.  We then produce and print the posters for the talks during the weekend.  We cannot do this sooner as many a time we have had to reprint them due to a late cancellation due to illness.  Posters are needed too for the prize draw, for the next event in our calendar and the next event in that venue and for any talks that have changed since printing the guide.

Tuesday we produce the taxi list for local taxi companies for visitors, check to make sure everyone that is standing at the show has paid us and produce a list for the PAT test man of those wanting his services. We also print the table name cards and prepare the packs of reader and therapist feedback cards from the previous show to return to the reader or therapist concerned .  This is more of a job than it might seem.  We separate the cards into stacks per person, record the results of the cards in a register and then print name labels and envelope up.  We make badge packs up for the new exhibitors who have not been with us before - name label on envelope, two badges and an explanatory letter per new exhibitor.

Wednesday I contact the bank to order the float.  I also print 6 copies of the floorplan.  This is always done with fingers crossed, as you would not believe the number of times I have just got it printed off and stapled together and then within a couple of hours received a cancellation!  This means frantic phoning to our waiting list to fill the space, then they perhaps won't work in the cancelled space - either similar or conflicting with neighbouring stands, so at this final hour we may need to alter it  again and then print it all off yet again.  We print the actual map, a list of exhibitors sorted by their name so when they arrive we have an alphabetical list to look at quickly to locate their stand.  This can be two or three pages, then finally we have a list sorted by stand number, another two or three pages.  The reason for that is if we have an empty table towards the end of setting up on Saturday morning - we need to quickly find it by number to find out who has not arrived!  So in all, we can have five to seven pages for six copies to reprint and staple if we do it too soon.

During this time, we have still been answering phones and e-mails, processing post and bookings, and doing jobs that need doing for other 'live' shows.

On Thursday, all work on other shows stops as we start the final run up to D-day!  We record the telephone message with venue, postcode, show times and other information.  From then onwards, we don't have time to answer the phone, but may manage to check messages and get back to people once more before we leave.  We collect the float, buy refreshments for the troops for the setting up day, pack the posters, envelopes, cards, floorplans and everything we have prepared all week into the box that is the last thing into the van and the first thing out the other end.  It is then an early office finish, pack our clothes and bags for the weekend if we are staying away and then down to the personal bits like nails, hair and hopefully a reasonably early night!!!!  

The early night has often been sacrificed in the past, when some last minute disaster has hit and we are running around like headless chickens trying to sort it.  The one that is indelibly etched in my memory was recounted in 'The case of the Missing Monk' in an earlier blog.

Friday morning starts around 5 a.m. so that we can be on the road bright and early to arrive at a venue by 10 a.m.  We allow exhibitors access from 2 p.m., although the reality is that some with lots to do will try and sneak in a bit earlier.  We therefore have 4 hours to lick it into shape and we go for it big time!  The venue will have laid out the room to our spec, but without exception, we have to 'tweak' it.  This might be due to changes since we sent through the plan to them, but may also be our knowledge of what people require - a bit more space here for a couch, this stand needs space for a card rack, pull it 6" this way and 6" that - widen the gangway, narrow the gangway - not enough space between the tables and wall, too much space between the tables and wall......................  Lots of little things that go to make it all work.  Then we need to put out the table names, badge packs, feedback packs, the notices we put on new exhibitor tables about cash back services, t-lights and incense and the who's who flyer introducing our staff.  While we are doing all this, Martin is busy laying out the electrics, running extension cables into all the nooks and crannies and taping down trip hazards.

We are then ready for exhibitors to arrive.  During the afternoon while they set up, we have the Tranquility Zone to set up, the Treasure Hunt to set out, the Information Table and Prize Draw/Feedback boxes etc to set out and the talks room to check and lay up.  A new addition is setting up the BSSK book stand too.  Friday ends at 7 p.m. - a full packed 12 hour day!

Saturday morning starts at 5 a.m or 6 a.m. depending on whether we are staying away or travelling home.  Home is good, but it makes for earlier mornings!  The early start is so  I can be at the venue by 6.45 a.m., ready for the early arrival exhibitors from 7 a.m.  The troops arrive around 8 a.m., which is when the bulk of the exhibitors start to arrive - those that only take a little while to set up.  There are direction signs to put out, Treasure Hunt 'trees' to give out with the dabbers, Tranquility Zone to strike up and any last minute issues for exhibitors to sort out - electrics, extra chairs, wobbly tables and so on.  By 10 a.m. we are opening the doors and then each one has their post.

Annmarie, Martin and Lorah work reception, taking money and issuing wristbands, doing cash back, doling out treasure hunt forms and prizes, Trish works the room, minding stands, fetching change and coffee, tea or lunch, and these days, I get to have huge fun running the bookstand.  This is great as I am in the show so can enjoy the atmosphere, I get to talk to people for more than the few seconds it takes to serve them on reception, everyone knows where to find me if they need me and best of all, I get to sit down for most of the day.

The Saturday show closes at 5 p.m., but invariably it is 6 p.m. or even 6.30 p.m. before everyone leaves, then back to the hotel for dinner and bed!  

We open for exhibitors on Sunday at 8 a.m., so I don't have to get up till 6.30 a.m. - a positive lie in!!!  Pack the bag, check out and off to the show for about 7.45 a.m.  The troops arrive around 9 a.m. and we usually manage a bacon buttie on a Sunday, as there is not so much to do.  Signs back out, top up the treasure hunt table, refill the Aromair burners in the Tranquility Zone and switch everything on, tidy up any rubbish in the talk room and put chairs back in line, change over the posters from Saturday talks to Sunday, tidy up the information table and remove any unauthorised advertising material that made its way there during Saturday, fill up and tidy the bookstand and away we go with a 10 a.m. opening.

Sunday show finishes at 5 p.m., then we have 3 hours of mad break down as everyone packs and loads to get underway home, and we do the same.

Part of my ethics as promoter is that I or my team are always first to arrive and last to leave, so it is usually 8 p.m. by we start the trek home, sometimes later than that.

Monday after a show we leave the office closed to calls and new e-mails.  We have a more relaxed start to the day and then start working through the cashing up and banking, the heaps of messages we collect during a weekend from public and exhibitors, the messages on the answer machine, the weekend e-mails, notifying the prize draw winner if we couldn't get them on Sunday night, sending the winner to the webmaster for addition to the website, taking all the old plans and other obsolete bits out of the kit and lots of other 'tidy down' jobs.

Tuesday?  Business as usual as we get ready to do it all again for the next one!

I often think of that lady who stood in the foyer in Lincoln years ago and announced, 'I am going to do one of these' .  She then went on to utter the now immortalized words - "well, how hard can it be!  You get a room, stick some tables in it - charge people to have a table and others to come through the door."  Hmmm, methinks if she ever did try it, she was in for one heck of a shock!

Hope you have enjoyed this series of blogs and a peek into the life and times of an event promoter.

Best wishes

Angie

The Life & Times of an Event Promoter

Advertising Part Two……………..  Flyer by post.

When discussing marketing with others, they often roll their eyes at the fact that I still use ‘snail mail’ and religiously send out between 2,500 and 8,000 envelopes depending on show, to individual addresses.  ‘Why would you pay all that out in printing and postage in these days of internet and e-mail?’  they ask.

There is a VERY good reason for it – it works and e-mail does not!

As mentioned in the last article, I am a statistics junkie having worked in marketing and sales for most of my working life.  In order to judge how effective our advertising is and what works, we operate the Prize Draw at every show, with a questionnaire attached.  This gives us our marketing information and over many years, we have identified very effectively, what works. 

This is updated as new fashions arrive and gives us very effective feedback on what works and what does not.

This paragraph is repeating myself from last time, but is worth repeating for those that did not see the last article.  We count the number of cards per show to find out what percentage of the visitors filled one in.  It is always over 60%, but most often in the 70 – 80% bracket!  Surprisingly high!  Of those filled in, some will ignore the question and some will tick multiple choices.  This and the missing 20 – 30% means it is not an exact science, but overall, we get a good indication from these cards by applying the same split to the remaining numbers – after all, it is highly unlikely that the whole of the missing cards came because of one means of advertising.

Going back years and without exception, between 80 -95% of the cards completed fall into two categories.  These are ‘flyer by post’ and ‘word of mouth’.  The other 5-20% is made up of everything else!  The two categories are pretty near equal too – if flyer by post gets 720 hits, you can be sure word of mouth will be getting somewhere between 670 and 750!  It runs that close every time, on smaller or larger door figures! 

This means that no matter what the cost, we simply must keep posting out our showguide to the visitor database for every show!

In the last three years, we have tried targeted experiments at replacing this by e-mail and can report it simply does not work!  My e-mail stats show that of 12,000+ e-mails sent out for Manchester, less than 5% opened them, less than 1% actually clicked a link to the website, the talks or the exhibitor list.  What we don’t know is how many of that 1% then came to the show. 

By contrast, we sent out well over 8,000 envelopes for the same show with our 32 page showguide and of the cards filled in, 47% came because of that.  Another 42% came because of word of mouth and the next highest figure was 5% from brochure picked up in shop etc.  E-mail didn’t even reach 1%, nor did magazine or newspaper advertising or anything else we did.  They just made up the remaining 6% between them.

Our website gets lots of hits, but these are on the back of the postal guide being received.  We see the pattern – our mail forwarder collects the delivery on a 3 day service – 4 days later the website graph peaks and continues to spike for the next couple of weeks up to the show.

This is proof positive for me that people look at the flyer they receive and do not necessarily even bother to open an e-mail.

The postage bill with the mail forwarder is always over £1,500, but in some cases is over £3,000.  Manchester always came to over that, with Elsecar running close to the £3k figure.  On top of that there is the printing cost too.

I can see why people think I am mad, but when you consider a full page in ‘Soul and Spirit’ costs £2,000 + VAT and last time I did it, we got 10 ticks on the cards, I know which I think is the best value for money!

We still do the e-mails, but view them rather like a reminder for the flyer than the primary source of informing visitors.  We also put listings on every spiritual website we can find, such as ‘Spirit Guides’ and ‘Merlin’s Diary’ and all the other similar ones.  We rarely get any of these mentioned, probably less than 5 times in a whole year!  What does get response is our listings on ‘Stallfinder’, but these are exhibitors contacting us, not visitors.

One thing that breaks the mould is our listings on ‘The Healer Foundation’ website.  It is often second to Google in the rankings of ‘referring sites’, which are sites that people click through to our site from!

Hopefully this and the last article have shown some of the work and research that goes into getting the best return on money spent on advertising.  When someone says, ‘Why don’t you do X, Y or Z?’ there is probably a very good reason for it! 

Next issue…….  ‘Advertising – newspaper & magazine’

The Life & Times of an Event Promoter – a light-hearted look at a promoter’s musings: On advertising ……………

Part One – signs! 

So, what is the major part of an event promoter’s job? 

 The clue is in the name – we promote!  Anyone can hire a hall, hire tables and chairs and set it out, phone around and sell some space to exhibitors and create a show. The most difficult part, is how do you let people know about it and how do you entice them to come along. 

This is where a promoter needs their skill, to promote the show to the public and get them through the door and into the show. I was fortunate to have some advertising and marketing experience in my background, but even so, finding what works for creating show attendance has been a long learning curve and is still an ongoing process. 

I freely admit to being a ‘stats junkie’!  I will spend hours poring over statistics and number crunching, working out ‘cost per head’ of various advertising experiments and generally trying to find out the most cost effective way of spending the advertising budget and bringing in people. People often say, why don’t you do this or have you thought of that?  We always welcome any suggestions, but chances are by now, we have tried it and discounted it if we are not doing it. 

In the early days, it was easy.  When I first started shows fourteen years ago, we went around the local area asking shops, salons, cafes, libraries and so on to take flyers and posters and topped this up with advertising boards around the area wherever people walked or vehicles either drove slowly or stopped – approaching a roundabout for example.  This worked well and is still in my opinion, the very best way to get a new show started.  The problem is, we can no longer do much of it for various reasons. 

What has happened in the intervening fourteen years, is that many small, independent shops have gone out of business and chain shops are usually not allowed to take the posters and flyers.  More and more empty shops are appearing in towns, but also in the little parades of local shops in housing developments, which used to be some of the best to get material into. 

The major development throwing a spanner in the works however, was the Government urging local councils to implement fly posting legislation!  It has been illegal to fly-post for years, but historically, local authorities were slow to enforce it.  However, because of the eyesore created by Circus posters still up months after the event, music event posters pasted on empty shop windows and so on, around 2005/2006 the government encouraged local authorities to begin to actively enforce these laws.  

The result is that many now adopting a ‘zero tolerance’ to the activity.  At best, they will remove the signs you have spent hundreds of pounds having made and taken ages putting up and destroy them – at worst, they issue fines per sign! 

We were always very good about retrieving signs having no wish to affect the environment. We drew maps of where they were and on the Monday following a show, sometimes even on the Sunday evening in the summer months, someone was dispatched to retrieve them all and count them in so none were missed. Unfortunately however, there are no exceptions for ‘good fly-posters’, we are obliged to comply with the law, just like the careless ones. 

To get a bit technical, fly- posting is actually illegal under the Highway Act 1980, the Town & Country Planning Act 1990, the Anti-social Behaviour Act 2003 and the Clean Neighbourhoods and Environment Act 2005.  Legal measures to prevent fly-posting range from on-the-spot fines of up to £80 per sign to prosecution in a magistrates’ court and use of Anti-Social Behaviour Orders (ASBOs) with fines of up to £2500!   No wonder we have not dared to risk putting out signage for the past few years! 

 I mentioned this in a previous article under ‘things that go wrong’, but it is relevant here too, so perhaps worth repeating as a funny anecdote among the facts and figures.  My first experience of this new drive to reduce fly-posting when it first became law,  was at our Grimsby show.  At that point I knew nothing about it, but I quickly learned after that day!  At about noon on the Saturday, an officious little man appeared at reception asking for me.  He was a council official and his new job was to enforce the fly-posting laws that had suddenly become fashionable.  He announced that he had counted twenty signs and could fine us up to £350 per sign.  My mouth dropped open so much, it is a wonder my chin didn’t hit the desk!    He was going to give us an hour to get them removed ………… in the middle of a busy Saturday show!  Brain-freeze!  Not for long though, this was seriously going to hit my pocket – one of the quickest and surest reasons to melt brain-freeze!  He was clearly the sort of chap that loved his work and would pursue it to the fullest extent, but after some reasoning and sweet talk, I managed to melt him sufficiently to give us till 7 p.m. that evening – two hours to do it in after the show closed.  The butterflies that usually jiggle in my stomach throughout a show, were past jigging, they were now into a full samba!  I was in no doubt that regardless of it being a Saturday night, come hell or high water, at 7 p.m. he would be inspecting to see if we had complied! 

Needless to say, the minute the venue was secured, we were all off in different directions to retrieve the signs!  We actually had forty-five out, something I saw no reason to inform him of – he had only spotted twenty, but which twenty?  We had no way of knowing, so down the lot had to come.   I have known more entertaining ways of spending a Saturday evening than stumbling through wet grass verges, in the dark and cold, trying to cut down signs with one hand and hold a torch with the other!  By the time we had finished, we were too late to get dinner anywhere, so it was a quick MacDonalds – ughh!  Maybe not entertaining, but certainly memorable! 

Of course, most visitors are blissfully unaware of these laws – indeed, why should they be concerned with them?  If they do not need to advertise anything, they won’t have had reason to investigate them.  We hear the same comments often – ‘You should have put some signs out’, ‘There are no signs’, and so much more.  We would LOVE to do so;  it is not neglect or lack of care, we simply are not allowed.  

As an alternative, we started using AA direction signage.  Most councils will allow the AA, RAC and one designated private traffic management company to apply for planning permission for directional signs.  These signs can be purely directional however, no other information is allowed.  Each council has its own version of what they will allow on them, but in most cases it is simply Mind, Body Spirit and an arrow – no date, no venue name, no other information.  This has very little advertising value, particularly as the earliest they are allowed up is the Thursday before the show, often the Friday.  Even so, I used these for several years in the absence of any other signage, if only as a ‘comfort factor’ for exhibitors. It was comforting for them to see the signs as they approached the show and know something had been done, as they don’t see the mountain of other more effective promotion done in the run up time. 

Last year however, the AA almost doubled their quotation to me. To put signs out for the Elsecar show for example, was going to cost over £600 + VAT.   This was entering the ‘serious money’ zone, so out came the stats and the number crunching started.  It transpired that in the past two years, no show had ever reached double figures on the number of people that came because of the AA signs.  At the previous Elsecar show, only three people indicated that it was the AA signs had brought them to the show – at £600, that would cost me £200 per person……………. PLUS VAT!   They pay me £4.75 to come in, or less if they are a concession – the conclusion is quite obvious!   The AA signs are a nice extra, mainly for the comfort of exhibitors,  if we ever get back to the times where there is spare money in the coffers.  They are not however, a viable means of spending advertising budget! 

We always try to get a large banner on the roadside at the venue itself of course, but even this is not as easy as you might assume.  Our Chester show for example, charged £600 + VAT to have a sign outside.  We paid it, but we did not get 151 full paying customers tick that this is what brought them into the show, which is the number required to cover its cost  - it was actually less than 20!  Cleethorpes gave me the dimensions for their sign in feet this summer - the numbers were right, but it should have been in meters.  It was only when we turned up and found the sign to be almost a third of the size we could have had that the mistake was discovered,  Had we gone ahead with Uttoxeter, they would not have allowed a banner at all.  Best of all though, was our lovely Monastery, who would only allow our banner on days when they were not hosting a Corporate Event or a Wedding.  Needless to say, that banner was up and down like a yo-yo!

During this last year, we have noticed other roadside signs creeping back.  Not on the main roads, where they are removed immediately, but on byroads, in nearby villages and so on.  I now face a new dilemma - I am not entirely comfortable putting up signs knowing what I do about fly-posting laws, but if others are putting them out and we don’t, we appear negligent rather than law abiding in the eyes of those who don’t realise the issues.   One antique fair promoter told me he does it and absorbs the fines as an advertising cost – certainly a school of thought.  Maybe a few village signs might be an idea once again. 

In order to judge how effective our advertising is and what works, we operate the Prize Draw at every show.  Every visitor is given a free entry card for this to win a prize of considerable value – usually a really nice crystal piece, something visitors will be attracted to but perhaps not afford to buy for themselves.  On the bottom of the card is the question, ‘What influenced you to come to the show?'  There follows a list of options, newspaper/magazine advert, banner at venue, flyer sent by post, flyer picked up in shop, poster, BSSK website, other website, exhibitor newsletter, BSSK e-mail and so on and a tick box next to each.  We count the number of cards per show to find out what percentage of the visitors filled one in. It is always over 60%, but most often in the 70 – 80% bracket, surprisingly high!   

Of those filled in, some will ignore the question and some will tick multiple choices. This and the missing 20 – 30% means it is not an exact science, but overall, we get a good indication from these cards. Going back years and without exception, between 80 -95% of the cards completed fall into two categories. These are ‘Flyer by Post’ and ‘Word of Mouth’. The other 5-20% is made up of everything else!   The two categories are pretty near equal too – if flyer by post gets 720 hits, you can be sure word of mouth will be getting somewhere between 670 and 750!   It runs that close every time, no matter what the door figures . In the early days when we didn’t  have a mailing list, 'Advertising Boards' and 'Word of Mouth' worked in tandem in the same way.  Gradually as the mailing list grew, Flyer by Post took over from Advertising Boards, but boards still brought in the most new people. 

Hmm, maybe I should follow in the footsteps of that Antique Fair promoter after all! 


Next instalment: Advertising Part Two – ‘Flyer by post’ and Media advertising.

The Life & Times of an Event Promoter - Floor Plan, What Floor Plan?

The origins of the phrase ‘Floor plan?  What Floor Plan!’ (Occasionally and only in times of greatest stress ‘Floor plan?  What ‘bleep’ Floor Plan!’)
So, you might be asking, what is the big deal about a floor plan?  Indeed, in the now immortal words of that lady referred to in the last article, “……………how hard can it be?  You stick some tables in a hall, charge people to have a table and charge us to come through the door!  Its’ a win-win situation.”

 Hmm, well it is not quite as simple as that.

Having acquired a venue, the first thing one needs to know is how many stands can be fitted into the space.  This determines the revenue the show could make if fully booked and when this is added to all the other costs such as advertising, printing, postage, staff, insurance, table hire, marquee hire, and a list of other bits that goes on forever, the cost of the stands can be calculated.

We do a site visit armed with a large tape measure and draw up a plan.  We take measurements between every door, and mark the position of fire exits, power sockets, fire extinguishers and any other feature. Once back at the office, we convert this to a computer CAD drawing.

Once the room is drawn up with all the features in place, I usually start by fitting in just single, 6’ trestle tables, leaving gangways the size required by health and safety guidelines and a 2’ or preferably 2’ 6” gap between tables.  The plan may be changed several times while we decide the best way to lay out the room, should the blocks run this way or that and so on, but the result is a nice, neat plan with the maximum number of single tables possible.

So, we have a nice, neat plan of the room with neat blocks of single tables.  Booking starts and then the fun begins.  Of course, only about half of the bookings want a single trestle table!  We get bookings for doubles, L shapes, tables with couches, tents or just space for an exhibitors own stand.  Next are requests for space behind the table for boards, banners or extra tables, or to get wheelchairs, pushchairs or scooters in.
Then we have the ‘extras’.  All our terms and conditions and every bit of booking related paperwork states that the booking is for a single table (or double etc).  In reality however, exhibitors bring extra tables to deepen the stand, small tables to add on the side, racks, rails, shelves and all manner of extra bits that they wish to squeeze in.  In most cases we do our best to accommodate these and where we know about them, to work them into the plan from the outset, but the 2’6” gap between stands gets more and more compromised until it is not unusual for someone arriving towards the end of set up time, to be unable to fit in at all!
The next challenge is stand content.  We limit the overall number of any type of stand, but hours go into making sure readers, jewellery and crystal stands are spread around the hall and not on top of each other.  We do our best not to have readers side by side or directly opposite each other.  If possible, not back to back either – although that can be hard to achieve on smaller shows.  Likewise, jewellery will be as spaced out as it can be and any other stands that do similar things.
We then take into account personal preference – back to a wall, near the loos, not near the loos, near the café, not near the café, near the entrance, not near the entrance – in a darker part, in a lighter part – not near readers, not near therapists, not near noise, not near music – even not near a particular exhibitor or list of exhibitors!
Things are taken into account like leaving sufficient depth for back boards – they do not do well on corners of central blocks as they impinge on the stand at the end – readers will want chairs in front – does the gangway allow for that in that position?
Eventually after draft 14 or 15, we have a floor plan!
Then, someone cancels!
We usually manage to re-let the stand, but more often than not, it may not be for the same thing or it will not fit the space.  Maybe the new exhibitor has a couch but the original one didn’t, so the replacement won’t fit where the first one was.  We start to swap spaces.  This has a ‘domino’ effect.  You move one, then the one next door can’t stay there, so you move that one and again, the one opposite now has to move.  By now we can be up to draft 20 or more. We have learned over time not to print the actual floor plans for our stewards out until the day before we set off, just in case of last minute changes
We used to print the plan in the show guide with a key.  This was in the ‘good old days’ when we received very few cancellations.  As the recession hit and cancellations and changes to stand size increased, we had to stop this as it caused more havoc than help!  The guide goes to print about three or more months ahead of a show.  The amount of changes that can occur in that time meant the plan could end up having no resemblance to the eventual lay out of the event.  We still get visitors asking for that, but it is simply no longer possible.
So, we arrive at the show, we adjust the tables that the venue has set out, to take account of the latest draft of the plan.  We juggle them about to get the right amount of space between, or as best we can, we put out the table names, the information sheets, the feedback cards and any other bits and pieces and then we are ready.
Exhibitors start arriving and before long, someone either won’t fit the space as they have something we didn’t know about or have forgotten about, or simply don’t want to be where we have put them and want to move.  They feel cramped, don’t like the way the neighbouring stand is set up, don’t like the energies in that spot, want to be facing the door – all manner of things can mean an exhibitor doesn’t feel happy in the space allocated.
My instruction to the team is, that within reason, we do what we can to make everyone happy!  My theory is if an exhibitor starts the show on a bad note, they are less likely to give off a positive, upbeat energy and so perhaps won’t have a good weekend.   If we can do our best to accommodate what they are asking for, they will be much better placed to take advantage of the weekend.  So, we adjust tables, move bits and pieces, move whole stands and generally try to be accommodating.
Sometimes though, someone can just be too unreasonable in their expectations, or more likely, arrive too late and so we are limited for options as much of the space is already set up.  Then, reluctantly we have to say no.  On occasion, by the time a show is set up, the draft of the plan that we are using (which by now can be number 28 or above) may bear very little resemblance to the finished show!
I must admit, there are times when I think those promoters who have a ‘this is it, take it or leave it – if you didn’t book it and didn’t pay for it, forget it’ approach, might actually have something!  There was one famous occasion when we had moved about 12 stands and ended up with two readers too close together and no more time or space to alter anything anymore, when I threw the plan up in the air and said, “Floorplan?  What bleep floorplan!”   The team fell about laughing, particularly as most of them had never heard me swear, and it stuck!  It is now the phrase often used if we get several changes on set up day and especially if it happens on the Saturday morning set up.
After all, “………….how hard can it be?  You stick some tables in a hall…………..”

Next instalment:  Advertising

The Life and Times of an Event Promoter - More Things That Have Gone Wrong

The Life & Times of an Event Promoter – a light hearted look at a promoter’s musings:

More Things That Have Gone Wrong – a trip down the memory lane of my biggest nightmares and some of the things that have provided the steepest and sharpest learning curves!

Following on from last month’s instalment, here is a chronicle of more of the mini-disasters that have befallen us in the run up to shows over the 14 years of show promotion.

As I said last month, retrospectively, these things become funny, particularly when you remember how you were running around trying to sort it out, but at the time, the stress levels are off the scale.

Hopefully we manage to keep a calm, unruffled surface so that neither visitors nor exhibitors have any idea of the panic going on behind the scenes.

Here are a few more of the memorable ones from the ‘casebook’ ………………………….





‘THE STRANGE AFFAIR OF THE MISSING MONK’ –

In 2010, we were approached by a lady who was organising the Western area of a UK tour for Lama Ahbay Tulku Jigme Thupten Rinpoche, a high ranking Tibetan monk.  He was on a fund raising tour for his monastery and she wondered if he could attend the Manchester show and give blessings for a donation.


We were most pleased and excited to have him, but as the Monastery rooms do not seat large numbers, suggested we sold tickets for consecutive sessions throughout the day for a ‘donation’ of £5.  This would prevent a scramble for places and make the whole thing run smoothly, or so we thought.  Ha!  As my old grandmother used to say, “You know what thought did!” Five sessions a day in a room holding 35 people for two days – 350 tickets available and by the last week before the show, not a one left!  We even had a reserve list of names to take any cancellations.


The Thursday afternoon and evening before the Manchester show is spent packing up the ticketing system, loading the van, packing our own personal things for staying away and generally running through everything to make sure nothing vital has been forgotten.  We normally finish all of this by 10 p.m. and then are up at the crack of dawn to travel to Manchester.


At about 4 p.m. on this particular Thursday, just as I was signing everything off and closing down computers etc ready to start this mammoth task, in drops an e-mail from our visiting monk to say there were problems with his visa and he didn’t think he would make it to the UK until the following Tuesday!  This is the sort of e-mail that you read but the brain cannot comprehend what it is saying – so you read it again and realisation begins to dawn.  You have 300 people who have paid for tickets to see a monk who is not going to arrive!  Some are travelling from as far away as Scotland, Somerset and in one case, Europe, especially to see him!  Errr…………………  brain freeze!


Instead of packing and all the other things we were supposed to be doing, Chris and I spent the whole evening phoning everyone on the list, explaining the situation and getting their details to refund their card with the £5.  One of us phoned, one processed refunds – then we would change over and the other one phone etc.  We phoned the last one at 9.30 p.m. and with the exception of about 15, had managed to contact everyone.  We e-mailed those and another half-dozen got back to us, so we had 10 who may arrive not knowing the monk was a ‘no show’.  Not good, but better than we could have hoped.


We then had to start all of the jobs we should have been doing and eventually hit bed at 3 a.m. to get up again at 6 a.m.


Imagine my shock then, when on Saturday afternoon, in walks said monk who after much cajoling of authorities had managed to sort the problems with his visa and get to Manchester.  He wanted to continue with his sessions on Sunday.


There followed one of these surreal conversations through his interpreters while I tried to explain that we couldn’t contact the people that had previously booked and now been refunded, while he wanted us to try – all in the middle of a very busy Manchester Saturday.  Oh boy!  In the end we settled for a few large posters on the two entrance desks and let fate take care of it and his helpers collect cash payments.  He was full all day so it worked – in a fashion!


I recall a lady who stood in front of me at a show and uttered the now immortal phrase:  “I am going to do one of these – well, how hard can it be?  You stick some tables in a hall, charge people to have a table and charge us to come through the door!  How hard can that be – it’s a win-win situation.”  Ha!




‘THE MYSTERY OF THE MARKET LICENCE’ –

I suppose given the size of the Manchester show, the sheer numbers of visitors and the complexities of fitting all those talks into the small rooms in the Monastery, fitting stands in and around pillars and trying to pull the whole thing together, it is bound to throw up more issues than any other show – stands to reason really.

There have been a couple however, that like the missing monk, were totally unexpected and threw us a real curve ball!

The next of began two weeks before our October show one year.  Our advertising hit the Manchester Evening News and one diligent and slightly officious member of staff in the Manchester Markets Department spotted it.  She rang up and asked a few probing questions and then announced, “So in effect, you are running a market”.  I agreed, as this is indeed what we are running –with some additions and trimmings its true, but a market nevertheless.

“You need a licence” was her next one-liner.  I was ready for this – “the Monastery informs me they have checked with the council and hold all necessary licences” I said – ha, that burst your officious bubble thinks me!  She went off to check and came back to announce that in fact, they did not hold a market licence.  Apparently Manchester is one of few cities that hold some particular ancient charter and the granting of licences is a different procedure which can take up to six weeks as a minimum.  By now the rest of what she said was lost in a blurr as the panic and brain freeze kicked in!

We weren’t licenced – the Monastery had let this slip the net – we had two weeks to the show – 8,000+ brochures were in circulation - £3,000 of newspaper advertising was paid for – people were booking hotels, travelling from Europe and the length of the Uk – and they were not going to let me run the show!  Aghhh………………..

A phone call to Elaine Griffiths MBE, the CEO of the Monastery was in order.  I explained the problem – she assured me they were licenced for absolutely everything and not to worry, but she would check it all.  Thirty minutes later she was back – apparently they were not licenced for markets.  She was mortified – completely unable to find out why not, but rather than waste her time on ‘why not’, wanted to get to grips with sorting it.  I mentioned the officious lady and passed over her name “… but she said it will take six weeks” I said “Do I worry now?”

To this day I have the greatest admiration for the determination and strength of Elaine Griffiths!  “I don’t need her name” she said, “I start at the top!”  That is exactly what she did.  I understand she rang the Chairman of the Council (or the CEO or whatever it is on a council), reminded him what a good friend the Monastery is to the Council and got him to sort it!  She made it clear that, to coin a phrase, the show must go on and that she wanted him to pull whatever strings were necessary to ensure it did.

Not sure what he did but I would have loved to be a fly on the wall when the phone call between him and the officious lady took place.  The result was our licence arrived in three days and the show was saved.

I was then presented with a bill by the Monastery for the licence fee, but couldn’t really complain.  Apparently we are their only event that requires one – when they have a handful of stalls at concert or when some speaker visits, it is not enough to require licencing.  As such, as they only need it for us, we have to pay for it every year.  It costs a further £700 a year for the two shows – sigh…!

All of this taking place, and most exhibitors and public blissfully unaware.  Easy this job – stick some tables in a hall…………………………………  ha!

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‘THE CASE OF THE MYSTERIOUSLY SHRINKING HALL’-

We had one attempt at a show in Stoke on Trent, using a sports hall, but one that seemed familiar with running non-sporting events.  Sports halls are notoriously difficult to run shows in – unless you are wearing shorts or lycra and carrying a bat or racquet of some description, they don’t seem to want to know.

When you come to book the show, you speak to a ‘marketing’ or ‘sales’ person, who is eager to get the booking.  He/she promises all sorts of things, yes we can do that, no problem, of course you can have this …………..  and so on.

This is all well and good, until one gets to the weekend of the show and finds oneself dealing, not with this amazingly obliging person, but with the ‘duty manager’ for the weekend.  In many cases this poor soul is well hacked off at having a non-sporting event in his wonderful sports hall to start with.  To add to that, not only does he/she have an event to contend with, but one full of strange things and equally strange people!

Words like energy, atmosphere and ambience clearly have no place in his vocabulary and with a deep sigh, one just knows this is going to be somewhat challenging!

All our sports halls have had similar problems over the years, one reason we have given up on them, but the best of the lot had to be this one we tried at Stoke on Trent.

We had previously viewed a few times of course, and submitted a wonderful floorplan for setting up on the Friday ready for our arrival. We arrive at 10 a.m. on a Friday, make the necessary tweaks to the lay up, put out table names and other newsletters, envelopes etc, and then exhibitors are allowed in from 2 p.m. to start setting up. No one had made any mention of problems, so it was quite a surprise on arrival at 10 a.m. to find a big green curtain drawn, effectively cutting the hall in half.  Not only that, but they had meticulously laid up half the floorplan, even to the point of a double stand having one table in place actually butting up to the curtain, without the other on the opposite side!  It actually looked quite comical, but also rang LOUD alarm bells.

Having tracked down the duty manager and politely enquired about the reason for this, I was informed they had badminton till 9 p.m. and weren’t prepared to cancel it.  The conversation that ensued became a little less polite as it progressed, but the end result was that they simply were not going to budge.  Brain Freeze!

Not for long this time though as it was clearly pointless wasting any more time, so the energies had to be transferred from arguing our corner into resolving the problem.

I decided to separate the exhibitor list into ‘those we knew would definitely arrive that day’, ‘those we knew would definitely not arrive that day’ and ‘those who might arrive’.  A quick look at the floorplan confirmed that ‘sod’s law’ was definitely alive and well and in full swing – the majority of the stands that we knew would definitely arrive and those that might arrive, were in the half we couldn’t use till after 9 p.m.  Wonderful!

I spent the next half hour re-jigging a floorplan that had been carefully pored over for hours previously and managed to fit everyone into the operational half without leaving all the readers who normally are the ones to arrive on Saturday, next door to each other in the other half!

We then had to stay onsite until after 9 p.m. to set up the other half ourselves, ready for the Saturday morning.  No dinner again that night.



 ‘THE ADVENTURE OF THE KITCHEN THAT NEVER WAS’

There are too many of these incidents to relate without getting boring, but a fitting one to end on, was perhaps the one that gave me the biggest episode of brain freeze of any I have encountered.

The Monastery is our biggest show and the most difficult in terms of planning and organisation.  Anything up to 70 workshops and talks spread over two days and 7 rooms, with up to 75 tickets available per session, takes quite a lot of preparation and organisation.

A careful site visit per show takes place, just to make sure there are no changes before we start planning the schedule.  Well, it certainly does now!

There was a show a couple of years ago, where I made the mistake of assuming that as everything had run well for a few times and as the earlier one in the year went well, it would be enough for the October show to exchange a few e-mails with my event contact and go ahead as before.

Imagine the scene when during set up on the Friday of the show, one of my stewards came to find me with ‘a bit of a problem’ in one of the rooms.  “A bit of a problem”?  That had to be the understatement of the year!!!  The room had been booked out for 7 sessions per day for two days, with 65 seats per session, most of which were fully booked.  It now held a bright, shiny new kitchen!  Cupboards, appliances, the full works.

We were at the Monastery, we had no way of contacting all of the visitors even if we had the time.  Too lose 910 seats during a weekend would cause chaos and one of the speakers in that room was flying in especially!  Brain Freeze!  This time, the thaw took some time to set in and I must admit, it was one of the stewards who actually said, ‘isn’t there anywhere else to use’?  That started the cogs whirring, every space that could be used was in use, but after some thought, I hit on the room used by the NFSH at this show (National Federation of Spiritual Healers, now called The Healing Trust).  I hated to do it, but needs must.  I liberated the room from the NFSH and used it for the workshops, installing the poor, long suffering NFSH onto the first floor landing, near to the lift!

This is where they spent the next few shows until fortunately some more changes enabled us to give them a room again this year.  We do thank them for being so obliging in our hour of crisis.  It certainly saved the day on that occasion!

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So there we are folks, just some of the things that can go wrong when you think every ‘I’ is dotted and every ‘T‘ crossed.  Life has a way of keeping us on our toes and preventing us from becoming complacent it seems.

When I recall these incidents, which with the distance of time have now become amusing, I still think of that lady uttered the immortal phrase:  “I am going to do one of these – well, how hard can it be?  You stick some tables in a hall, charge people to have a table and charge us to come through the door!  How hard can that be – it’s a win-win situation.”

I often wonder if she tried, and if so, what she thinks now!





In the next instalment –   The origins of the phrase ‘Floor plan?  What Floor Plan!’ (Occasionally and only in times of greatest stress ‘Floor plan?  What ‘bleep’ Floor Plan!’)