On Site Planning

Authenticity and Events: The New Movement

Our first international guest, Dan Bolton brings two words to mind: Genuine and Authentic.  He shares how specific events have impacted him as well as help change culture!  This episode shows how events are more than just gatherings but can be movements!

How did you get in the events world?

Pretty much by fluke, I was a circus performer. I wasn’t that good at it actually. We toured around the UK and Europe, I was a fire breather, stilt walker, a clown. Not the career path my parents had wanted me to do. They thought I’d be a lawyer, doctor, or police man, when I said I was going to run away with the circus they were disappointed. That’s how I got into it then it was the case of you need a real job. I started booking entertainment and managing, creating shows and performances, worked with agencies and started my own business 4 years ago.

You’ve worked on projects around the olympics.

I’ve done two. I was a performer in Athens for the closing ceremony, I was a dancer. Then for the London olympics I was supporting the choreography for the athletes parade.  Every time you see the athletes with the flags, we do things like that as well. 

It’s [the olympics] interesting because it’s dominated by two or three big companies always pitching for them.  It depends on who is the favorite at the time. Can you imagine the politics  and stressed involved? We worked with Jakata last year, the stress levels to put that show together were pretty intense.

It’s something I’m going to talk about in my session tomorrow (At ILEA Live) basically talking about how bigger events really do help drive and position countries. It’s basically a marketing machine so they showcase their country and use it as an opportunity to promote themselves and empower their population.  It’s a pretty big deal. There’s often interventions or recommendations with presidents. Last year in Jakarta, we were working with the military and Vice President.

Events can really put you on the map.

Yes for good or bad reasons. They definitely put places, people, and country on the map for sure. It’s a form of soft power, thats why these countries bid for them, they want to project themselves as a great nation.  

We are working on Expo 2020 at Dubai, a world fair that happens every 5 years in big cities.  They bring together 195 nations taking part in this six month festival.  They have over 60 events every day for 173 days.  It’s huge, countries build pavilions and they are almost like mini embassies and they showcase innovation and technology. They are like a tour center to showcase countries. People travel from around the world.  They are expecting 25 million people to attend.  They are building infrastructure for that. They are building a whole city basically outside of Dubai to accommodate. Then they factor that into the legacy plans.  This will become a destination once the event is finished. It’s an opportunity for people to come experience the Middle East and position itself as a center for live events and knowledge sharing, bringing people together. This is important for the way the world is. Nations use these experiences to really propel them into the future. It’s competitive. It can really help drive the future of the city or destination.

Great, tomorrow you are speaking, what are you speaking about?

I’m going to talk about my experience in Jakarta, some of the things we went through.  It was a really humbling experience.  We go there and kind of tell people what to do. They are bringing in the internationals and we got so absorbed into the culture, it was a beautiful experience.  They are all volunteers, 4000 we had to choreograph. You have these school girls and they don’t see the big picture, it’s a four month journey, they don’t want to be there, they are forced there and it builds to this extremely proud moment of them being proud of their country.  It’s empowering to see this. 

What’s the most memorable event experience you have ever had?

I’m going to say a recent project, the special olympics. 

Anything new for those starting out?

This industry is changing so fast. We need to be consistent, authentic, real it’s hard work.  People think it’s really easy and simple, but it’s pretty stressful.

Insta: danboltondxb

Insta: Charlesevaneide



Twitter:The Meeting Minds

Getting Real with an Events Planner Part 2

What are you up to?

This spring I took a few months off to be with my kiddos. I was doing the whole mom thing and doing all the activities and cooking, and in the interim I did my first show calling gig. It was terrifying. It’s super scary. I loved the control of it.  I had zero experience show calling so I called a friend of mine to prep.  I sent her gift cards and we practiced multiple times. It ended up being ok, but the thing I learned is its not what on the paper its about what you don’t know is going to happen and how you are going to keep that calm voice and directing people. 

I’m apart of this non profit, she climbs mountains that supports motherless daughters.  We are now doing a new program called girls drive up, youth motherless daughters ages 8-18.  We’re doing a launch party Nov 16th. It’s a fundraiser/launch event.  Sheclimbsmountians.org

What are your pet peeves?

I do not like getting gas, I like going down to 0 miles on my dashboard and my husband wants to kill me. 

Another one is people who are not accountable. If you sign yourself up for a project you need to be accountable and communicate if you can’t do something.

Not starting on time. 

What are you working on right now?

Target’s fall national meeting. It happens September 11th, I’ve done it for 5 years now. I’ve been an element producer, for the last 3 or 4 years I’ve been the presentation lead, the lead for all the executive speaker presentations. Which includes the power point and the video. I meet with them and work with the communications team who writes scripts and outlines, work with the decor, video team. Schedule all the rehearsals. There are 20 people on the core team, and there are 100’s of staff once we get on site. 12-14,000 attend this event. 

Insta: shadiaevents


Insta: Charlesevaneide


Twitter:The Meeting Minds

Planning Events in an Unpredictable Environment

How did you get your start?

I fell into the events industry through working for a non-profit. You wear many hats and ended up planning board meetings for 30 people each month and moved onto Galas. I consider my first big girl job The Basilica. I remember by then boss asking me if I knew anyone interested in an events job and she remembers it as do you know anyone interested in an events job. 

I think what got me to the point where I am today are the relationships I have built over the years with vendors, volunteers and co workers. I have tried hard to who my value through each event that I produce. I make sure I am along side everyone else when we are picking up the trash or pouring the beer or hauling wood to make the fires at Holidazzle. My first year I became the fire master.

I always want to be a part of making the world a better place and I am very lucky to be able to do that through events. 

How do you plan for an event when you do not know what the weather will be like?

  • Always have a risk management plan that includes weather and make sure all your vendors have a copy of it
  • Talk to the Police, Fire and EMTs about their recommendations. 
  • Plan ahead, where do people go, where does the talent go?

How do you push the boundaries?  

  • When I say boundaries, it doesn’t always mean bringing in something crazy that no one has seem before. Say you have events with a long history, and you have a great team of folks who have been working on that same event for a long time. Help them think outside the box. What can we stop doing and what can we do that’s new? What are some new revenue streams? 
    • Why are we doing something that creates more work and what is the ROI? 
    • How can we look at the space differently? 
    • Why does the stage always need to go in the same place?
    • Yes we do need to do active shooter training and yes we should have the contact information for all the buildings surrounding the event in case someone decides to throw a party and watch the show on the roof and we don’t go into full active shooter mode.

Instagram: Charlesevaneide


How to Create an Event that Flows: from a Production Manager’s Perspective

Kyle Arndt, EideCom’s Production Manager takes time out of his day to sit down with Charles and Lisa. He shares from his perspective, how to create a show that flows and what goes into the details. Kyle has years of experience in the industry and with that comes many must know tips!


We have a special guest. We actually have the pleasure of working with them every single day here at EideCom, Kyle Arndt welcome.


Well the guys, thanks for having me. You know we get to, we get to hang out. We never get to hang out like this.


So I thought I would just start by maybe tell us a little bit about how you got into production in general, how you got into the industry.


So once upon a time I dreamed of being a rock star. So when I was growing up, I played guitar and then, through my first couple of years of college, we played shows every weekend. And then I ended up like realizing that I liked setting up the equipment and dealing with the equipment more than I liked playing shows. So then I started working for my friend’s bands and I traveled the world working for a bunch of different bands. And then, um, when I got sick of traveling, I joined up with a few companies in town. And then about six months after working around town, I found EideCom here. So then I’ve been on the team for the last two and a half years now.


Well, so let’s talk about kind of from the beginning, how do you make a great production that’s well-oiled and turns out to be very successful?


The holy grail to all these things is how we build a quote, how we recognize where stuff might be missing, the holes, where we need content for, how we play stuff, how many microphones we need, how we build; everything is off of any sort of schedule we can get from the client. If you’re putting on an event, make a detailed schedule or a rough schedule to start and we’ll ask questions. You know, that’s one thing we do is look through a schedule with a comb and say, hey, you know, it looks like we’re missing something here. Or it looks like you have this many people talking here. We’re going to add some, some equipment for that. We’re going to add a few microphones for this. Do you plan on having all these people speak at the podium or do you need microphones for them all? So it’s just the schedule is really the key and that kind of needs to outline the obviously the timing of things. Who speaks at what time for how long they’re speaking. If you’re working with a great production team, they’re usually asking these questions upfront. Building the schedule is different, different per scope of work. A lot of times these gala’s we do you get the information the week of or of the day of even the content shows up on a jump drive and then usually just it’s important for you putting on a show to know who your point person is with, with the product.


What are the importance of Comms?


There’s a couple of different kinds of systems. I’m mostly familiar with a product called clear, their newest stuff I think is helix net, which is a wired system. So anybody that’s sitting at the front of House table or anyone sitting backstage where their position doesn’t call them to be roaming around the room, you would just plug in there. They have like a comm unit and they can push talk to the people they need to talk to you. And it can be programmed. It doesn’t sound like a radio, Sounds like us talking right here. It’s super nice. It’s super crisp and clear. You can hear everything they’re saying. It’s super controllable. It’s programmable.


We always have three teams of people on comm. We always have audio, video and lighting. If we add cameras to a show, that’s another set of people. If we add the client to that, that’s another set of people. So a lot of these shows, even the bigger conferences can have up to 50 or 60 people on it.


Tell me about the importance, do you need it?


Absolutely. Yeah. I mean it’s like the last thing I’ll try to take off an estimate. When someone’s trying to cut costs, I’m like, we absolutely need this. Even if we’re all sitting next to each other, say it’s a small show if we’re all sitting next to each other, it’s better for us to be whispering to each other than yelling. The comm is insanely cool technology. We can separate everybody. So it’s these people talk to these people and then everybody connects on one channel everybody can hear this, but only people can talk down this ETC.


The most important things for the stage manager be doing is to make sure everybody on stage can be seen on camera. To me whenever I get to stage manage, I like to remind people, I’m like, hey, you know the cameras straight out in front of you. We have a camera over here and there’s a camera over here.


Like just so they know like they’re always facing forward and you know like in that part of that comes into play. Like some people do panels on stage and okay, then you’re looking at the stage managers usually in charge of setting up those debt furniture, right? So they play a big part and going where it, can this be a pit positioned on stage so we can pick up everybody nicely on camera.


Do rehearse the furniture?


Yeah, so that’s where comm comes into play because then during the setup, because usually it’s a five minute change over, but then you’re the stage manager who’s helping them set up, you’re connected on comm to the video director who’s watching, who’s physically looking at the camera shots. You got a camera operator and moving around and making sure you can see everything and they’re going, yeah that furniture needs to move. It’s not like somebody’s running back and forth and it takes more time.


Tell us about the show flow…


There’s a few things I like to do when I gather the information and this information is key. When I talk to a presenter, whether that’s a CEO, an auctioneer, or a keynote, whoever it is, I just like to say, you know, you’re supposed to speak for about this amount of time. How are you wrapping up your speech? Like what are you saying to end it, right? Cause there’s a lot of times I’m looking for a cue. I’m looking for, somebody is going to press a button at the end of this that’s going to start music, the lights are going to move and that has to happen all at the same time. So we’re looking for a vocal cue.


Some keynote, CEO’s, and speakers they’re very, very good about what they’re going to say. . And then at the same time, some people literally haven’t thought about it yet. They’re planning on winging it, I’m just going to go up there and talk for a little while. So I’m like, well, it would be helpful for us to just kind of know how you’re going to wrap up. How do you, how do you plan on ending this speech? Like who name five people you’re going to say thank you to or something to get to get them thinking about it because that’ll help them glue it together as well to just kind of bundle it up.


So that leads me to the question about rehearsals before we talk about transitions and other things like that. Like tell me about rehearsals.


We get the opportunity of doing a show in all different situations. When we have short rehearsal time or no rehearsal time, we can pick our team based on that. I think the most important part of rehearsal is how somebody is getting on and off stage. Because once they’re on stage, they’re going, if it’s a performance piece, it’s a little bit more involved. But if it’s a keynote, it’s like they want to know how they’re going on and off stage, what the lights are doing, where they’re walking from. We get the opportunity to figure out like how long they’re going to take to get onstage.Everyone’s walks at a different speed, if they get the opportunity to do it twice, that’s kind of in their mind like this is how I’m going to do it. Now if we cycled to a performance, they’ve got dancers and they have singers and they’re on this stage and they’re gonna move to this stage. We have the opportunity of setting up the day before for this particular gala and we’re going to run through that for probably about three hours from the night before and we’re going to get the performance piece rehearsed the night before. That way we have time to walk through anything the next day if needed, and then we get it. And then we’ll take the rest of that time the next day before the event starts to go through all the the keynote speeches.


From a production standpoint, we love the venue the day before. Now we understand that it increases costs and we take steps to try to minimize that. We’ll go in with a reduced crew just to get some stuff in place. Try to do a half day there. There’s ways that it doesn’t double the labor costs. There’s creative ways to figure that out. If you’re a client and you feel like you’re always running around with your head cut off an hour before the show starts, trying to get in the night before the day is going to help your show immensely.


We were talking about the show flow and it going well. Are there softwares or tools or do you just use a spreadsheet?


There is a web based program called show shoflo. It’s more or less just a spreadsheet that you update on the web so everybody can see it on their device or whatever. They can log into it and they can even follow along. So as the show goes, the timings on there and there’s a person in charge of pressing next, so you can see, okay, we did that, this is what’s coming up next.


When we get the opportunity to help build the show flow we tend to use a spreadsheet. That’s how a lot of our show callers have always done it.


How do you make sure that weird stuff doesn’t happen?


I just talk through a show so many times before the show. With the team, with myself, with the, with the client, with everybody. Just to make sure we got everything okay. Every piece of the transition, how something ends, what happens in between, how that person gets on stage every detail is talked through. Those small points speed everything up. They make it so it’s not awkward because it can’t cause the second it’s awkward you’re sitting at the tech table and back, everybody’s turning around looking at you and you’re like, oh, I guess it is our fault because we are running the production.


Tell me about like having an MC?


The best mcs they kind of show up and they go, Yup, I’ll go on stage whenever you guys need me. Uh, looks like there’s a script printed out. Let me know if I’m needed for anything else. The news casters around town, they’re all very good. I think the quality of a person is how involved they are in the project. That speaks with how our team works here. We try to be very involved with everything we’re doing. And then we’re invested. Same thing goes with an MC. It’s like, you know, how much are they involved with your organization, if at all?


You’ve done some of our shows repeatedly, do you have a level of comfortability once you’ve done it before?


Oh, absolutely. Every time we do a show, the second year the show goes well. The second year it’s like, we did this last year, how is it different? We’re familiar. We know the people involved. We go, okay that person’s speaking for sure they’re involved with the organization at this level so there’ll be on stage. We get to the opportunity to go into a little bit more detail. We know where are the most important people sitting.

Event Production Traps

Wanting to know tips and tricks straight from a partner in production?  This week Lisa and Charles sit down and go over traps event organizers can fall into.  They use their experience in the industry to create a “cheat sheet” for you.


Charles:  So glad you joined us on this special edition. This is the first time Lisa and I have sat down the two of us to share what’s in our brains.


Lisa:  I think this will be great cause we can finally share with you who we are, what we do, and how you can get better without anyone here to interfere.


Charles:  Here’s the deal, Lisa and I work in the production side of events.  I don’t know if you know that. The company I started back in 2003 is EideCom. It’s basically a full service audio visual creative organization.  Lisa has been with me about a year and a half. It’s been great, a lot of fun.


Today what we’re going to do, we’re going to talk about what Lisa and I run into, every mistake and scenario organizations do on accident that end up hurting and screwing up their process, costing them more money.  I said to LIsa the other day, we need to an episode that helps people understand some of the stuff so they don’t make these mistakes.


Lisa:  We just talked to Kris Lindahl about leadership in our last podcast. He talked a lot about how event organizers typically dont see through the lens of an attendee. We take a different approach where we sometimes come to the conference or event to just view it and see it and help make notes.  We’ve seen a lot of things.


Charles:  We have.  If you start as an attendee in your mind, you’re going to always put the visible things right on paper.  In fact often times I say if I’m not doing someone’s show, “Hey how about I come check it out.” I’ll sit in the audience and make notes. It’s not just all negative, I make positive notes too, like what went well.  I think one that I really want to kick off with, choosing the venue before you understand your production. How often do we have people that have chosen the venue, it’s a new one, and wants to know how much it will cost to produce the show.


Lisa: And it sometimes isn’t a great venue to do production in.  Sometimes it’s already set in stone and we think, do we tell them it’s really bad?  Or do we think, great we will work with this? From unions to the in house internet fees, things like that, you have to take into consideration what comes with the venue.


Charles:  I’ve always been blown away by some of the internet fees that have been charged to some organizations, it’s been $75,000 to $100,000 to provide internet to their attendees.  Wait for internet for attendees for their whole life forever? No just for three days. You mean in the ballroom? It’s just crazy to me!


The other big pitfall with your venue is understanding what type of requirements they have.  Like the in house – PSAV is a large organization and is in house in a lot of places. But there are other organizations that are in house at some places as well.  They have their own set of rules. Some places will require you to use them for any rigging, anything that’s going to hang from the ceiling. That rigging often times, we’re allowed to bring in our own motors and trussing, but we are required to let them rig it because it’s their building.  There are other scenarios where they require us to use their motors, truss, and rigging. We literally have to have contract to them. A lot of people when you book a venue don’t think of these things. You sign the deal and it says rigging power internet to be assessed. We come to help you with your show and they say $100,000 for rigging. There are other venues that wouldn’t cost that much.


Lisa:  It’s kind of a double edged sword because for a lot of our clients that aren’t doing rigging, we recommend they move into that rigging scenario because it adds a lot to their show.  But it adds a lot of expense so you have to realize what the investment actually costs.


Charles:  To those of you who don’t know what rigging is, it’s the stuff that hangs lighting and projection and other elements over your head.  You can make better use of the space because you are not using the floor to support things. It’s safer actually, you don’t have things hanging in the air ground supported that can topple over.  Not that they usually do but, nothing usually topples over. The possibility is lower.


The next one I want to come up with is underestimating what it takes to do a good production.  A lot of people they don’t realize how much staff and equipment it takes.


Lisa:  Or even just the lead time to set the room up.  We usually ask for a whole day prior to the show for our medium to large shows.  Our clients are like we only have the room the day of. That puts strain on your people and doesn’t make for the best environment and you don’t have time to run through the show.


Charles:  We have some really large shows that take up to four or five days to just load them in.  To your point, I think it’s important to note, if you have a four day load in and you are trying to do it in 2 days, you’re not really saying anything.


Lisa: You’re stressing everyone out and to go back to our episode of sleep, you’re team is going to be running at two percent.


Charles:  Basically human working hours to put it up, if it was going to be 10 people for 4 days now its 20-30 people for 2 days, if it’s even possible.  Don’t underestimate the cost involved in bringing in the right stuff and give yourself enough load in time to strike the show, AND load out show. We did an event recently very large in a new stadium, we had 2 hours to strike a show that took 2-3 days to set. How are you supposed to do that? This stuff takes time.  Don’t underestimate the cost or loading/out time. That’s really important.


Choose a venue before you choose your production company.  A lot of people say I use the inhouse team wherever we go. That is ok up unto a point, until you want a cohesive ongoing consistent look and feel year to year, show to show, city to city.


Lisa:  When your brand is a high level expensive beautiful brand, you want it to be consistent wherever you go.  If you are working with a new team, it’s hard to keep the brand on point.


Charles:  The relationship you have it’s not the same.  The people that are doing your production arn’t as invested.


Putting your budget into the wrong things.  #1 most important thing in my opinion is that everyone can hear when it comes to production.  Don’t sacrifice the quality of the audio. There’s science to back this up. If people can’t hear or there’s an echo or slap back that’s really annoying.  SLap back is where the audio is hitting the back of the room and then hitting you again, what you’re doing is you are exhausting your aducience quicker. WHen the human brain has to hear something and decipher and decode it, it requires a lot more energy for someone’s mind.  Take 5000 in an audience not every person is having to listen closer and try and decipher what’s being said.


LIsa:  Just think about someone where english is their second language, another level of decoding.


Charles:  If you don’t have good audio that is strong and clear the problem you are going to run into is audience exhaustion and you don’t want that.  Have you ever been in an experience that is 2-3 minutes long and you’re tired? There’s other times where you could sit there for hours. Even in restaurants and other places, think of places you can be there for a long time.  It’s requiring less brain power for you to be you and sit there. That is a real thing.


The next thing is understanding unions.  Unions are a part of what we do. They are apart of the events world.  Some people have their opinions some hate and love them. It doesn’t matter what matters is that they are apart of it.  For those of you that are anti-union, don’t go into a union situation and be a jerk. It doesn’t help you. Don’t try to go to the negotiations mat without respect from the people in charge.  This is their livelihood and the way of doing business. You chose a venue that has a union and you’re going to change it. You;re not going to put up and fight and they are going to give in.


LIsa:  If you’re willing to talk to your production company ahead of time, we have a good handle of this, certain towns have unions, others have less.  Just have that conversation in the beginning. Get some advice on that before you choose the prettiest coolest place.


Charles:  Totally, Chicago is notorious for having lots and lots of union.  It is what it is. They also have fabulous venues, centrally located, and a hub. There’s lots of reason’s to have a Chicago meeting, but know that when you work in chicago it’s going to be a part of life.


I have a client who did an event in Chicago and they were not aware of the cost the union would occur on the event.  I don’t need to speak numbers or names but it was a huge shock. They had already signed the deal, we were basically stuck there.  know the union situation. That has a huge impact on budget. The fees can be as large as the production fees.


Lisa:  Let’s talk about equipment.  Most event planners don’t know the difference in brands, but it matters.


Charles:  I don’t need to go into specific brands.  Each production company boasts they have the best brand.  Let’s look at vehicles: you have your regular american brands – Ford, Chevy, then you have your higher lines – Mercedes Benz, BMW, then you go even higher – Maserati, Aston Martin, then you have Lamborghini.  You don’t want to be using a go cart. A lot of companies they realize the meeting planner doesn’t really know so they show up with a go cart they bought from guitar center. Or they underestimated and rented the cheapest equipment.  


My perspective is there’s maybe 3-4 players in production

  1. High level creative companies that are full service production
  2. Mid level production company that own junkier equipment.  They take on small to medium shows but charge full service rates on junkier equipment
  3. Producer then who calls on different companies that specialize on things.  The producer knows the really good players and you don’t care because you trust them.
  4. Then there’s another kind of producer.  They are someone who pretends to be a production company and source out all of the production to one or many companies.  Which is to usually the 2nd company. They are trying to make as much margin as they possibly can on the show. They sell it for a market rate but bring in a second rate production group that does lower end stuff.  It’s so the lower end producer can make more money.

If you want us to take a look at who you are hiring reach out.  That stuff does matter. If you are tiny conference with a small budget, you’re not going to hire a group like us because we are way out of your budget.  If you are a large multi day conference and you are looking for people that can manage all the high level details that you probably would. We run into horror stories where people don’t realize what they are hiring.


Lisa:  If I went out on my own as a producer, I wouldn’t want to hire crappy people, even if it cost more I would hire a better production company because it will be a better experience.


Charles:  The other thing is being extremely picky with making sure that the crew is well trained.  For example I don’t mean just trained in the skill that the person should know already. Don’t be afraid to see some of the work that they have done.  The other thing is training in customer service. We spend so much time talking about customer service and communication. Unfortunately the production world is not focused on that.  The production world is generally focused on gear and knowledge and logistics. We built our business to be about the customer service experience. For those of you that are my competitors, listen up.  Read the book the Customer Rules by Lee Cockerell. I’m giving my secrets away.


Lisa:  I think instead of keeping the competition down get them to do better, it keeps us accountable to work on ourselves.


Charles:  Let’s talk about not doing enough pre planning.


Lisa: I just met with a client yesterday that said they rushed through rehearsal then during the show had issues with a video.  You need to make sure you save time to rehearse the show and that comes with making sure you have enough time in advance.


Charles:  That leads back to the first point we were making which is don’t be hasty when you choose your venue.  These are things you need to negotiate. Enough time. Before you sign the contract you can negotiate these things.  If you have to pay you have to pay. Budget enough time to load in/out and also to rehearse. Your executive team and leaders who are going to be apart of your event are not only going to feel special you invited them to a rehearsal but will also feel relieved when they walk on stage for the show.  It will be you who says it’s going to cost you a day in venue but if we’re not rehearsed what’s the point in general?


Lisa:  If the show does’t flow your money is in vain.


Charles:  Not having accurate drawings.  Lisa and I are sticklers about making sure the drawings are extremely accurate so when we show it to the customer and they show up on site there’s zero surprises.  Remember, this is a big one. Surprises are bad. I know when you were a kid you loved surprises but surprises when the client shows up are not good they are bad. A good way to fix that is to have good drawings that are accurate.  Even if they are not photo real have them accurate.


Lisa:  Also if you have the budget for it, do an onsite meeting.  Even if your shows in california and your production is in Chicago.  Take a day to fly out there and see the spaces. Sometimes there are hidden things you didn’t know about that day of could ruin things.  


Charles:  Don’t be afraid to ask your production company to do the drawings for you that include other elements.  “Can you do a drawing with chairs in it?” Don’t be afraid to ask because they will help you to see and not show up surprised.


Not requiring uniforms:  As the meeting planner organizer, make sure that everybody on the production crew are dressed professionally.  Ask your production provider how their people will look on site. That is huge. Last thing you want is your executive team saying “hey what’s with the guy in the hoodie holding the camera. We’re at an executive summit, no hoodies allowed.”


Lisa:  The branding aspect of it, especially if you’re in a venue with union, you want to know what crew you are talking to.  If they don’t have an identifying mark how do you know who is on the team.


Charles:  Some people will hire an independent security company going around making sure everyone is following the rules.  On certain shows I do that. I have an independent security consultant and make sure everyone is dressed properly and identified properly. When you are dealing with audiences and crowds you want to make sure everyone is safe.  I know I veered off on the safety issue but that comes back to a sharp looking crew.


Lisa:  On thing we’ve been really talking about as a team is, a lot of people go to their production company and share what they did last year and it was fine and want us to do the same thing.  We take a different approach, we ask how can we create a better experience. Everyone that comes to these yearly events already expects something new and exciting. If you’re production can’t come to you and help you to make it more engaging, it’s same old same old.


Charles:  People always ask what I do for work, people come to us to change their event game.  I think it’s important as a meeting organizer that you’re expecting out of your vendors and partners, we consider ourselves a partner, that they are bringing you new ideas.  You have to match that with a healthy budget. If you are expecting your production company or designer to bring you new ideas but you are a cheap-wad, they may not because they know you don’t have the money for it.  Make sure your appetite and budget are close to each other. I know they will not be the same, just make sure they are close to each other. Put the budget in the creative. We didn’t use to charge for the creative services, we’d come up with ideas, but I realized that is where the values.


Lisa:  We could be the nicest people and that’s how we won our customers, but if you don’t have any new ideas or anything different, why would people keep paying their friend if they don’t have anything new.


Charles:  Don’t take this the wrong way, you don’t want to get into the flavor of the month club where you are taking the wheel and trying to reinvent it.  Certain things like audio, if it’s working well don’t change it. When it comes to giving your audience a fresh new feel and look every year, it’s worth it.  You want to remember everyone who attends your event, you are competing with other things. Not only are those other things entertainment or discretionary income or family functions that could interfere with the need to go to the conference you’re putting on, remember you’re competing.  If every year they know it’s a treat to go, that makes a huge difference.


Lisa:  I’ve signed up for things and didn’t go back because it was boring, hopefully your conference doesn’t fall into that.


Charles:  We were just in our new presentation theatre and it’s funny to think about how many different ways you can put on an event, it’s unlimited.  We were watching the Adobe Max conference, the opening sequence was inspiring. We were like “oh my gosh it is possible!” Make sure you’re gathering inspiration from other things.


Lisa:  If you’re an event organizer look at things for inspiration.  See what other people are doing. If they are doing something cooler than you on the same week as yours…. Just saying.


Charles: Lisa and I are not involved in the operations side of the business.  That’s for good reason. It allows us to think about the customer and what they need and allows us to come up with new ideas.  The production and operations side of the business, they love when we hand them a new idea because they can draw it up and it’s cool.  They didn’t have time to think up things because they were busy at shows. Make sure as you’re working with your production company that you are being fed new ideas and they are staying up on the trends.  But do not sacrifice things that work. What else do you have?


Lisa:  Familiar team.  If you have a team you know and trust, can bring to any venue, and know what you’re getting that’s invaluable.


Also, a lot of people nowadays are looking at multi-year multi-event contracts and how can that help your business have a more consistent budget, product, and relationship with your production team.  


Charles:  There are economies of scale and they are cost saving.  There is a cost of going out and finding new business. It costs something.  If we have a multi-year agreement with someone, you’re removing the need to replace that business every year.  We are willing to give special perks and discounts so we are not worried about winning the business next year. It works fantastically for you as the client because then you can ask them to add value and save cost if you are guaranteeing them business.


Lisa:  DOn’t do that right away, just because you don’t know how you will work with a new company.  Do a trial event or a couple and if you like what we are doing, then let’s talk about it. You’re not going to get married on the first date.


Charles:  Some of our great wins have come that way, from starting out something small and realizing it works really well!


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Meeting Minds by EideCom