[MR] Event fees for WOW

[Kelly Keck]

Gorm, thanks very much for pointing out everything that goes into a large
event that doesn't show up on the event budget itself.  I think a lot of us
who haven't been involved with such major undertakings don't necessarily
know or appreciate all that goes into them.

I think those "hidden costs" exist for smaller events as well, though at a
much smaller scale. A lot of groups rent storage space to keep the various
tents, banners, cook gear, and list fences that get pulled out at every
event. Not to mention those supplies themselves, which come out of general
funds, rather than being part of an event's budget, but they definitely get
used at those events.

Additionally, I don't like the idea of picking a dollar figure and saying
it's "too much profit" for any event to make, period. Determining what's
reasonable has to take into account all the hidden costs of that event
itself, which Gorm spelled out for Sapphire, as well as the operating
expenses and upcoming plans for the group overall.  Maybe that highly
profitable event is what makes it possible to hold a smaller, more
specialized event that only breaks even or loses a bit, or to sock away
money for a kingdom event bid.

What's reasonable depends a lot on the scale of the event too. A $500 profit
for an event that gets 300 people isn't even a couple bucks a head, which
seems quite reasonable to me.

In Service,
Adriana Michaels

On Wed, Jun 30, 2010 at 4:36 PM, Alan MacNeill <gormofberra at gmail.com>wrote:

> I might suggest you rethink your philosophy, at least in terms of the
> "Major Events" (ie Sapphire, WoW, and any others in that size
> category).
>
> I know not how it goes for the folks down Carolina way, but as a
> recent past Seneschal for the group that hosts the Other Big event
> (the Gem Joust series) on an annual basis, if we only cleared $500 at
> the end, we would not be able to continue hosting the event.
>
> Having a "Major" event has a significant amount of overhead associated
> with it above and beyond a "regular" event.