Kim Bedier, CVE, former chairman of IAVM and current dean of the Leadership Institute at VMS, is leaving Honda Center and OCVIBE, Anaheim, Calif., where she has been SVP and General Manager, effective May 3.
The announcement was made public while Bedier was assisting her husband, Richard Andersen, CVE, as keynotes at IAVM’s Region 7 meeting, appropriately themed “Breaking New Ground,” in Phoenix April 14-16. They taught there on team building. Two weeks earlier, they had taught life/work balance at Region 6 in Oklahoma City April 1-4. Bedier will be teaching again at VMS in June.
As questions boiled up throughout the industry about the why and what now of Bedier’s exit, she steadfastly insisted she had finally decided to “take my own advice for a change. I’ve never taken any time off and jumped from job to job. This industry isn’t easy. Now I have a new mantra – Self-care is not selfish. You don’t even do that for yourself. You do it for the people around you.”
Researching and putting together their life-work integration presentation “really solidified my decision and choice,” Bedier told Venue Professional. She is not, however, advising everyone to quit their jobs. “I’ve learned, especially from the younger generation, they have a better perspective. They want to make sure they have life-life as well as work-life. I wish I’d learned it sooner.”
Now, she is in a unique position. “I can do this and not everybody can. I’ve been given a bit of a gift, and I’m going to take it and make the most of it and figure out what I want to be when I grow up,” she said with a chuckle.
Besides continuing to do some work with her husband, though she’s not committing to that as a full-time job as of now, she intends to remain open. “I’ve always identified myself through my job. It’s not a crisis of identity, but it will be a mental shift, which is a good thing. I get to be whoever I am authentically… I don’t necessarily want to have a building again, but who knows? It’s all I’ve ever done. I want to stay open to opportunity, and it’s nice to have that luxury.”
She is proud of what has been accomplished at the 30-year-old Honda Center over the past three years. “It needed a little bit of reinvention. It’s going to get some incredible renovation [a $4B mixed-use development project, to be complete in 2032] coming up. But, also, just reestablishing it in people’s hearts and minds as a great venue to play and really making sure people understood it’s not in LA. Orange County is a strong, standalone market. We’re seeing things now like four Usher shows at the new Intuit Dome [Los Angeles] and Honda Center has two.”
On the other hand, she will also remember forever arriving in Anaheim during the pandemic when Honda Center was literally a testing site. One of her worst experiences was the last event before total shutdown – Disney on Ice. “It was horrible testing all those poor little toddlers [for Covid], and everyone was crying and mad at us.” One should not forget the pandemic and the toll it took on industry talent.
When teaching at Region 7, she noted, “It’s amazing how excited people are for me…Everybody is a bit tired I think.”
Kim Bedier, CVE, with Gwen Stefani at Honda Centers 30th anniversary concert this past September. From left, the arena’s Erika Muir and Tom Alexander, Stefani and Bedier.
She has been on the ground floor of planning a couple of new venues that will come on board at OCVIBE, including a 5,700-seat concert hall concept, to open in 2026, and a 2,000-cap club. “We’ve literally been able to influence from the ground up as operators. How often do you get that golden opportunity?”
“It will be exciting to watch those come to fruition and not have to do the work,” she said.
As to who will do that work, she noted there are some great people on the team left behind, including Tom Alexander, who she brought in from her former venue in Tacoma, and Bill Dwight from Live Nation who Alexander recruited to help book shows.
When Bedier arrived in Anaheim, she initially answered to Tim Ryan. When he left, she reported to Morell Marean, Chief Operating Officer of OC Sports and Entertainment. The current plan is to re-assign report-to’s on the organizational chart when she leaves.
“We appreciate the many contributions which Kim has made to our organization,” Marean said in a press release. “Her work has enhanced our guest service experience, reshaped our programming and concert business, and assisted in the strengthening of our team through the acquisition of key talent. Kim will certainly be missed, and we wish her all the best in her next chapter.”
Bedier came to Anaheim from Tacoma, Wash., where she worked for the city managing all sports and entertainment venues, including the Tacoma Dome, convention centers, theaters, and ball parks. “I wanted to know about all the venue types,” she said of that gig, which spanned the years 2012-2021.
Before that, she managed the under-construction arena in Everett, Wash., now known as Angel of the Winds Arena, for Global Spectrum. “It was fun to be part of an opening and create a strong team.” As is her modus operandi, she took some of that team with her to Tacoma.
It’s a special thrill to be part of a new building or major renovation project. She got a taste of that on a grand scale in Toronto, where she was on the team that transitioned from Maple Leaf Garden to the new Scotiabank Centre (then known as Air Canada Centre).
That was Bedier’s second grand opening, having started in the early 90’s when Grande Prairie in Northern Alberta recruited her, while working in recreation for the city and officed in the community ice rink, to open and manage the Crystal Centre (now Bonnetts Energy Centre) to host junior hockey and the upcoming Canada Winter Games. That building opened in 1995, the same year Bedier joined IAVM.
How has IAVM impacted her life and career?
“My career and my life are intertwined with IAVM: the incredible support I have received along the way, the phone calls and questions answered, the opportunities presented. More than anything, I value the deep relationships formed. Ultimately, it is the IAVM universe that connected me with the love of my life, Richard Andersen. I clearly owe a lot to this organization.”
