New Tours, New Connections at AMC
The 2015 Arena Management Conference (AMC) puts new tours center stage on Tuesday, September 22. First, it’s a look at non-musical tours hitting arena calendars with Mark Duryea, vice president, north american routing & tours, FELD Entertainment; and David Pitman, director, tour planning, Cirque Du Soleil.

Then, it’s on to the promoter and agent panel. After a meet and greet reception, Bredan Buckley, vice president, Columbus Arenas Sports & Entertainment, will moderate an interactive discussion with Paul Emery, founder, Emery Entertainment; Joe Litvag, senior vice president, AEG LIVE/AEG LIVE Events; Ed Rubenstein, CEO, ArenaNetwork; Aaron Tannenbaum, Music Agent, CAA; and Jay Williams, partner, WME.

To his AMC colleagues, Buckley says, “Engage! With this level of expertise at AMC, we have a great opportunity to discuss the issues that agents and promoters are facing, as well as the effects (today and tomorrow) those issues have on our side of the business.”

The afternoon block of touring sessions will be the perfect wrap-up for a conference entirely devoted to the business of arenas.

“IAVM is the best way to interact with industry colleagues that I have seen in my career,” continued Buckley, “the chance to blend that with industry experts that affect the rest of our daily business is an opportunity that should not be missed.”

The Rise of Festivals
One issue on the agenda for the agent and promoter panel is the continual rise of festivals in the evolving concert landscape.

In terms of buzz, festivals are quite the conversation starter. A 2014 study by Eventbrite and Mashwork followed social media traffic for some of the largest U.S. festivals. Findings are unique to each festival (click the image at left for details, via Huffington Post), but two consistent attendee drivers are the artist line-up and the festival experience itself.

For promoters and owners like Live Nation and AEG, festivals are a rapidly growing slice of the $6 billion North American concert industry. As Niel Shah writes in the Wall Street Journal:

“In April, Live Nation bought a controlling stake in the Bonnaroo Music and Arts Festival in Manchester, Tenn., which featured Mumford & Sons, Billy Joel and Slayer this year. Last year, it purchased C3 Presents, the promoter of Lollapalooza, which kicks off Friday. Its other big acquisitions have included Insomniac Events, which produces Electric Daisy Carnival and other electronic-dance-music festivals. Live Nation says it holds four of America’s top five festivals by attendance, and 70 festivals world-wide. In 2012, it had none of the top five.

“Since 2010, AEG Live has added at least 12 major U.S. festivals to its portfolio, either through acquisitions, partnerships or launches. In January, it bought a controlling stake in the beachy Hangout Music Festival in Gulf Shores, Ala., and, before that, Firefly Music Festival in Dover, Del., two fast-growing festivals. In 2010, only 10 percent of AEG Live’s bottom line came from festivals; now it’s about a third, the company says.”

Festivals are big. Beacon Economics reports that 48 of the events promoted by Insomniac (Electric Daisy Carnival, Audiotistic, Beyond Wonderland, Electric Forest) generated $3.2 billion in U.S. economic activity between 2010 and 2014—including $180 million in taxes, and the equivalent of 25,000 full-time jobs.

How arenas adapt and evolve in the current concert environment is one of the big conversations happening at IAVM’s Arena Management Conference. There are challenges (always), but there are also opportunities that can be informed and shaped by the interest and economics currently driving the festival scene. Discovering the opportunities, identifying solutions, and finding the next steps forward is why we come together.

And, like any great show—be it in an arena or a cornfield—it’s impossible to explain to someone who wasn’t there.

Arena Management Conference
September 20-22, 2015
Hilton at the Ballpark, St. Louis, MO

Photo: Imran Chaudhry / Flickr

Imagine getting to vote for future session content at a conference. Well, South by Southwest (SXSW) allows you to do that with its PanelPicker, which is now open for voting through September 4.

I tell everyone in earshot that SXSW is one of the greatest conferences one can attend for professional and personal development. And now with a convergent track focusing on sports, it’s even more relevant to venue professionals.

There are almost 4,000 entries just in the Interactive track alone, so I focused on the sports theme to help you decide on some sessions to vote for, such as

The Future of Mega-Events
Creating Real-Time Fan Content From Experiences
Game Changer: Inside the World’s Smartest Arena
Are You Engaged? Connecting with Multiplatform Fan
Getting Millennials off the Couch & to the Stadium
The Future of Sports, From the Future Generation
Virtual Reality as a Fan Engagement Tool
How Basketball is Making the Golden State Greener
The Future of the eSports Revolution
What Will a Sports Fan Look Like in 2030?
Coming 2 U Live: the Future of Streaming & Sports
How to Reach Consumers via Less Traditional Sports
Keeping Your Eye on the Ball: Engaging Today’s Fan

Fair warning, not all of these sessions will make the cut, but by voting for them, you definitely help their chances of being in the program. Check out the PanelPicker site to view more proposed sessions, and let me know if you plan to attend SXSW next year (March 11-20) in Austin, Texas.

Further reading: Our blog posts from 2015 SXsports: “The New Cathedral: Sports Stadiums” and “The In-Stadium Fan Experience in MLS.”

(Image: SXSW/Robert Ward)

KeyArena in Seattle played host to 12,000 professional video game players last week for the International Dota 2 tournament—an event that offers a $6.5 million prize for the first place winner. To compare, Jordan Spieth netted $1.8 million for winning the 2015 Masters Tournament.

So, what do you need to know about this increasingly popular sport? Well, the good folks at Engadget provided the following interactive infographic to help you understand it better.

Continue Reading →

The Vanier Family Football Complex is now open at Kansas State University.

“It is a great day for K-State as the beautiful new Vanier Family Football Complex is operational and open for our football staff and student-athletes,” said Athletics Director John Currie in a statement. “This new facility is another example of our commitment to a world-class, student-athlete experience and being a model intercollegiate athletics program while furthering our position as a leader at the highest level of intercollegiate athletics. We appreciate the flexibility of our staff during this process and also the hard work and hustle of our design and construction management teams as well as all of our donors who helped make this project a reality. It was truly a team effort, and I know this is a facility that the K-State Nation will be proud of and will be the envy of all other programs.”

The 132,000-square-foot building was completed in just seven months by the construction management team of Mortenson & GE Johnson Construction and in conjunction with sports design firm Populous ahead of schedule and under budget.

“Our ability to finish early and under budget was predicated on a ‘project first’ mentality,” said Adam Hardy, senior project manager for Mortenson/GE Johnson Construction, in a statement. “Nearly 1,700 craft workers worked through freezing temperatures, torrential downpours, and 60-hour work weeks to make sure the K-State Family would return to a new-and-improved stadium.”

The complex includes a new student-athlete enhancement center, an 18,000-square-foot Olympic-quality strength and conditioning center, and a new sports medicine and recovery facility. There are also individual position meeting rooms and offices for the staff, as well as a locker room that is twice the size of the previous room.

“The Vanier Family Football Complex represents K-State’s commitment to excellence in athletics, academics and the student-athlete experience,” said Ben Stindt, principal at Populous. “The design combines an efficient design with state-of-the-art technology and high-end amenities that will make the complex feel like home for student-athletes, staff, and fans. This is the next generation of the training experience and fan experience in collegiate athletics.”

Members of the football team were provided their first access to the facility on last week, which you can watch below.

Members of the Vanier family, the namesake of the new complex and lead contributors to the facility, were also there for the first look.

“The facility is absolutely incredible and something that the student-athletes and fans deserve,” John Vanier said. “I had the opportunity to travel around the country touring other facilities when this process began, and I did not see any other that even compares to this one. It is absolutely the perfect facility and one that every school in the nation would aspire to have.”

(Image: Populous)

This week’s finale spotlight of recipients in the IAVM Foundation’s inaugural class of 30|UNDER|30 are asked, “What influenced you to get involved in the venue industry?”

Natalie Barrow
Director of Arts Education and Community Outreach
Cobb Energy Performing Arts Centre
Atlanta, Georgia

“There are two main reasons I got involved in the venue industry, which are my passion for arts and entertainment and serving the public.”

Bill Enkhbayar
Event Manager
Global Spectrum – Boardwalk Hall
Atlantic City, New Jersey

“I was a grad student at Temple University, and I was working for an arena there. While I was working, I got bitten by the bug and I never looked back. It’s something that I’m very passionate about.”

Ashley Keen
Technical Director – Ikeda Theater
Mesa Arts Center
Mesa, Arizona

“I got involved in the industry when I was given the amazing opportunity to be part of the team that put together the CNN Republican national debate.”

McKenzie Rowley
Premium Seating and Suite Sales Manager
SMG – NRG Park
Houston, Texas

“The thing that influenced me the most was definitely my undergraduate degree. Students were encouraged to get experiences through internships and co-op opportunities.”