Time is one of the world’s most cherished commodities, and when attending a conference, time is one thing you wish you had more of. Because of that, we’re offering VenueConnect attendees several sessions and interactive round tables that are short on time but big in content.

Let’s take a look at some selected sessions.

Sodexo Composting Mini Session
Saturday, August 1, 5:10-5:25 p.m.
IAVM Membership Booth
Mike Tully, national executive, Sports, Entertainment & Gaming, Sodexo
Sustainability is about protecting the world for future generations. Food waste is a growing global problem of breathtaking scope and is the single greatest contributor of American landfills. Visit the IAVM Membership booth to learn how composting can be part of the solution to solving the food waste crisis.

Green Sports Alliance Mini Session
Sunday, August 2, 12:20-12:35 p.m.
IAVM Membership Booth
David Muller, membership director, Green Sports Alliance
The Green Sports Alliance Greener Cleaning Playbook is designed to help sports facilities reduce the health and environmental threats associated with cleaning sports venues. Beyond protecting health, the cleaning industry uses significant quantities of chemicals, paper products, cleaning equipment, plastic liners for waste receptacles, and other supplies. Visit the IAVM Membership booth to learn how your venue can reduce operating expenses and health risks to cleaning staff, athletes, and fans by greening their cleaning program.

In addition to the mini sessions on the trade show floor, attendees are encouraged to participate in Spark: Small Tables, Big Topics. These interactive round tables take place on Monday, August 3, 8:30-9:45 a.m. Attendees can move from table to table based on their interests. Here is just a sampling of the many topics to be discussed:

Cloud Based Parking Technologies
Dance Flooring
Motorized Rigging—Pros and Cons
Selling Your Alternative Space
Measuring the Effectiveness of Your Leadership

You can view the full lineup on the VenueConnect schedule. See you in Baltimore!

“The only thing you take with you when you’re gone is what you leave behind.” — John Allston

The IAVM Foundation Legacy Project offers you the opportunity to work together with your industry peers to leave a lasting legacy of caring and support in our host city.

As chair of the IAVM Foundation Legacy Project, I invite you to join us as we make a difference in the Baltimore community. We’ve teamed up with the United Way of Central Maryland for a “Stone Soup Event.”

As the Stone Soup story goes, a stranger enters a village. After being told by all the villagers that there is no food to eat, he puts a pot of water on a fire to boil and places a big stone into the pot. The villagers grow curious. One by one, they begin contributing one ingredient each, until they have assembled a hearty soup for all to feast on.

The United Way movement was founded on this concept: that each one of us can give, advocate, and volunteer to improve conditions in our communities.

This year, with the record-breaking number of volunteers already signed up, VenueConnect attendees will be making over 200 casserole dishes that will create 1,600 individual servings and feed up to 125 families. This IAVM Foundation Legacy Project couldn’t happen without your compassion for giving and serving others—thank you. It is not too late to join us. If you haven’t yet registered, please contact Sarah Rogers with the IAVM Foundation to sign up.

I’d like to give very special thanks to our outstanding sponsors—Aramark, Centerplate, Portland’5, Spectra, and Sodexo. These companies already generously feed the spirit of the venues and communities they serve, and we are blessed by their willingness to step up and support the IAVM Foundation Legacy Project. To all of you, thank you—we admire and honor your servant leadership and appreciate your loyalty to IAVM and its members.

IAVM Foundation Legacy Project Event Details:
Event Location: Matthew A. Henson Elementary School
Date + Time: Friday, July 31, 10 a.m. – 2 p.m.
Bus Transportation provided for all attendees.

For questions regarding the project or to sign up, please contact Sarah Rogers at sarah.rogers@iavm.org.

This week’s spotlight of recipients in the IAVM Foundation’s inaugural class of 30|UNDER|30 are asked, “As a future leader, what areas do you deem necessary for future success in this competitive industry?”

Kelsey Metzger Covart
Sales and Event Manager
Ames Center
Burnsville, Minnesota

“I think it’s important to keep up with the ever-changing trends as well as having a firm foundation of what built this industry. Things like VenueConnect—and other continuing education opportunities—are important, because it gives us a chance to work with the industry’s leading professionals and to network with our peers to see what works for them and other best practices. It’s also important to stay connected to the communities we serve, whether that is working with the convention and visitors bureau, the chamber of commerce, or just being involved in the community. This truly lets us see what the community wants in terms of programming and products. One also has to have a strong passion for this industry to succeed. It’s such a crazy, ever-changing industry that without a deep love for it one can’t be successful.”

Sari Feinstein
Events Supervisor
Wells Fargo Center for the Arts
Santa Rosa, California

“A motivation to learn from those around you is necessary for future success in this competitive industry. Future leaders need the spark to continue to grow with the times, look at those venues around us, and learn from their successes and their downfalls. One venue does not have all the answers, and curiosity is essential.”

Nikki Lekhy
Program Associate
Cultural Tourism DC
Washington, D.C.

“We are a flexible and adaptable industry, and I think it’s necessary to use our comfort in change as an opportunity to change the role that we play in the communities we serve. Future success in this industry takes a willingness to try new things and to create opportunities that affect more than our own bottom line.”

Andrew Shreve
Assistant Box Office/Parking Manager
Global Spectrum – Greater Richmond Convention Center
Richmond, Virginia

“I believe one key to staying competitive is seeking out traditional and non-traditional marketing tactics, utilizing social media such as Facebook, Twitter, Foursquare, and maintaining user-friendly content. It’s a great way to promote an upcoming show, an upcoming convention, or even the venue itself.”

We’re having fun producing our monthly podcast, The Venue, and we hope you join us this Friday, July 24, at 2 p.m. (CST) for another episode.

You can register at this link: https://attendee.gotowebinar.com/register/50090377894186342

We’ll be joined by our guest host, IAVM Chair Kim Bedier, CFE, and we’ll discuss a variety of topics, such as SMART goals for part-time/front-of-house employees, John Oliver’s editorial on publicly funded stadiums and arenas, VenueConnect, and bacon-flavored seaweed.

We hope you join us on Friday by calling in or listening, and please take a moment to listen to the first episode and the second episode.

Sometimes there are great articles online, and that’s where I come in to point you in their direction. This is one of those times, for you see, The Guardian over in the U.K. is running a series titled “How to Put on a Mega-Gig” and it’s told from people directly involved in the process, such as the venue manager, the security guard, and the promoter, among others.

Here’s the lineup, along with a few choice quotes from each article.

The Booking Agent
“Once, with Pink Floyd in Italy, we couldn’t get their mirrorball into the stadium. We couldn’t drop it in by crane – which we’d done before – because the streets were too narrow to get a giant crane down. The only way was to destroy the entrance where the footballers walk in. We destroyed it, got the mirrorball in, did the show, rebuilt it and got out. The fans had no idea. Neither did the stadium until we did it, but they were very happy – they had Pink Floyd.”

The Promoter
“The biggest priority and main focus for any event producer is always the safety of the public. We work so hard along with all of the involved parties – like the emergency services, stewards, licensing – to ensure our events are staged to the highest standard.”

The Band Manager
“The bands don’t generally check out the venues before a show, but we did go and take a look at Manchester Arena to get a feel for the place before the Courteeners first played there, because we live nearby. You want to know what it looks like from the stage and where the screens will be. It’s such a big venue, and it looks much bigger from the stage than it does when you’re in the seats.”

The Roadie
“You’ve got to fix things in the heat of the battle – we’ve got guys 100 feet in the air, fixing things. We’ve had a generator go down before and you lose the power, but usually when something is wrong only we notice. We try to fix it as soon as possible. But the average concertgoer wouldn’t even notice and it doesn’t affect the concert.”

The Lighting and Show Designer
“Brian [May] once said to me that they never made any money out of touring until they reached the Wembley stadium era, because they used to spend it all on lights and stuff. So they have this tradition of it being huge. But that show would be nothing without their songs, so the ideal is to make a great spectacle that hopefully suits the music very well. You want people to have a really special evening.”

The Venue Manager
“The number-one priority is safety. People want to enjoy a big night out and aren’t thinking about safety, but we are their custodians. The show requires specialist technical knowledge, from power requirements to the load-in space and times needed for equipment. Everything is risk assessed – especially where there are pyrotechnics or hydraulic platforms.”

The Security Guard
“I’m a stand-in-the-shadows guy. If you see a picture of me, I’ve screwed up. If I’m in the photo, the person I’m protecting isn’t far away. It’s a feather in my cap when nobody knows I’m there. At gigs, I need to be within six strides of the band because it will take eight strides for someone to get on stage.”

(Image: Kmeron/Creative Commons)