An easy way to Arts Marketing – critically analysing marketing and if Arts can influence the understanding of marketing

Traditionally marketing is market focused; aiming a product to the market and promoting it in a way that customers feel that they need or want this product. Marketing is constantly in our faces, TV adverts, computers, magazines are full of them; Spotify adverts, posters around university or work and in the local supermarket. They all require you to want something that you didn’t have before or the need to upgrade.

Arts can be thought of as older people going to view the opera through their small magnifying glasses up high in boxes (Pretty Woman, may spring to mind). Or watching the pantomime with your 7 year old siblings shouting, “he’s behind you!!!”

But arts is much more than these examples, the younger generation (such as mine) may have long forgotten the arts as being fun, unique and expressive events. Or even forgotten how broad the arts’ world actually is and that we actually love the arts but never thought of it as something we would actually consider going to without Simon Cowell making money of us.

Marketing within the current market is more constant and with technology becoming more and more advanced; marketing has had to change with the lifestyle shifts. Arts, has had to change too and with it, more studies into what is the ‘arts’ exactly, why people should still attend and how to market the arts successfully.

This blog is going to delve into the world of arts marketing and how marketing has to be adapted to complement the arts entirety to make sure beautiful performances such as ballet, opera, dance and theatre are buzzing with atmosphere and experiences that will last in customers minds.

But can arts marketing influence the way we see and understand marketing itself?

One could argue that arts marketing looks at concepts of how different sectors can manipulate the traditional views on marketing to create newer, more efficient methods to attract more customers.

Additionally, to take a step further and produce an entirely new outlook on marketing, just for arts organisations.

Another view could be that arts are essentially within the business sector and therefore, traditional marketing methods should be transferrable for all business types. But is this view too simple for the large vast of art events?

All three different views on marketing the arts give an insight into the different kinds of literature there has been throughout the years.

Marketing

The one main significance of the traditional marketing is that it is market focused. Marketing consists of creating a product for a sector of potential customers who have a particular need or a want for said product, and through using the marketing mix effectively will help to aim at the selected market (Baines et al, 2008).

The traditional marketing method is:

1.    Market

2.    Market research

3.    Creating the product needed

4.    Marketing mix for the market

The marketing mix consists of 4 or 7 P’s: Product, Price, Place, Promotion, People, Process and Physical evidence. This is no different in either traditional or arts marketing however, the elements within the P’s should be adapted to work within the chosen organisations.

Arts

It has been difficult to define the arts’ as it is a broad area made up of many components such as theatre, museums, film, music, art pieces, opera and dance. However artists that create such art for the different components can be described as Buck (2004, p.22) said, “Artists can be seen as highly efficient micro businesses, which, often on the slenderest of means, are able to convert creative value into commercial worth.”

There are many great advantages of arts marketing, the main one being to create experiences with customers and to help people have a better understanding of the arts through their experience at an event. A quote from Kotler and Scheff (1996) stated that “If the essence of art is the relationship between the artist and the audience, the arts organization must be vigilant in pursuing both the artists' and the audiences' best interests.”

Whether it’s an anticipated ballet performance or an interactive family Christmas show, having the customer’s experience creates a value-in-experience. It depends on the customer to be able to co-create this kind of experience of an event (Prahalad and Ramaswamy, 2004).

Definitions of Arts Marketing

The arts are ‘production-led’ because they provide a service. The original marketing models need to be adjusted to focus more on the services and customers than on the market itself. Mokwa et al. (1980) stated that the marketing of arts have to match the artist’s creations to an appropriate audience, which is in itself, is a special case of marketing as it doesn’t follow most marketing tools. Traditional marketing has to be moulded and re-evaluated to be able to fit in with arts.

One definition of arts marketing from Hill et al. (2003, p.1): “an integrated management process which sees mutually satisfying exchange relationships with customers as the route to achieving organisations and artistic objectives.”

This aims to build a relationship with current and potential arts customers to create a arts experience as well as, integrating all organisation objectives around the customer to constantly learn and evolve with the arts.

A personal definition of arts marketing is: re-adjusting and re-creating the marketing models to produce a more definite and accurate process to effectively encourage customers to experience the world of art.

This signifies how arts/ culture organisations can take the original methods and make them their own to achieve more effectiveness and efficiency. Nevertheless, throughout this blog there are constantly different versions of what makes arts marketing and so, this personal definition needs improvement as my personal development of arts marketing increases.

Arts Marketing Processes

Arts Marketing Model

Re-creating the traditional marketing model for the arts consists of more steps to building a successful arts marketing plan. Being that the arts is not market-led and more product/ services based, the arts marketing model starts with the company or the product (which would be a play, opera or ballet performance) as its first step. Steps two and three is the research into the market and finalising which market is the correct one to aim to. After, more research into the market and the start of marketing. The company will then look into the objectives, planning, customer experience and other elements in hopes of being able to co-create with the customer. At last, the marketing mix is implemented into the process and the final step is getting the product out to the chosen market (Colbert, 2007).

The steps of the new Arts marketing model, therefore will be:

1.    Company/ Product

2.    Research

3.    Market

4.    Research

5.    Company

6.    Marketing mix

7.    Market

Maslow’s Hierarchy and the Arts

Another example, the well-known Maslow Hierarchy (1943) and his pyramid of motivation have been adapted to fit the motivation to attend the arts.

Maslow’s hierarchy sees people wanting to satisfy basic needs instead of the marketing norm of creating needs and wants. Through this arts related hierarchy, there is explanation that arts can indeed satisfy on all levels contributing to the overall arts experience.

5. Physiological – The facility brings comfort, warmth and refreshments

4. Safety – Having confident staff with knowledge into the attraction

3. Social – Conversational and participation opportunities with others

2. Esteem – Enhancement/ self-image

1. Self-Actualisation – Knowledge/ education

Criticism

Butler (2000) critiques that popular textbooks such as Colbert (2007) and Hill et al (2003), identify why arts marketing is so different however, uses the traditional textbook marketing highlighting the marketing mix and planning processes. This is the assumption that all marketing can be transferrable throughout many different sectors as stated earlier in this blog. Butler also states that since there is not a full understanding of the arts as a marketing context then all previous literature is untrue. Having said this, he mentions that arts overlap with services, non-profit and public service contexts.

Which would somehow contradict his previous statement as this would question why couldn’t traditional marketing methods overlap with arts too?

In contrast to this, the arts marketing incorporating Maslow’s theory is very interesting within the four levels of product in arts experience because it highlights that a customer can be satisfied on each level. Equally, it emphasises that re-adjusting traditional marketing does indeed work and can be quite effective.

Conclusion

All authors from Hill et al. (2003), Baines et al. (2008) and Colbert (2007) make good conclusions on why arts’ marketing is unique to traditional marketing. In spite of this, Butler makes a good argument that arts’ marketing does need more than re-modelling traditional methods. However, marketing has always been about evolving the standardised meaning of marketing and making something new and more exciting out of it to attract new customers and to engage them. One could argue that this is what arts’ marketing does too.

This blog has focused on adjusting the traditional methods to create useful newer models for arts marketing and arts organisations. There has been criticism of these methods however, it seems to be successful for organisations as it looks at arts experiences and customers needs and wants too. Therefore, combining arts within marketing should be used for now until there is a more unique way to sum up arts as a marketing context.

(1536)

References

·      Baines, P., Fill, C. and Page, K., 2008. Marketing. USA: Oxford University Press.

·      Butler, P., 2000. By Popular Demand: Marketing the Arts. Journal Of Marketing Management [online], 16 (4), 343-364.

·      Bucks, L., 2004. Market Matters: the dynamics of the contemporary art market [online]. London: Arts Council England.

·      Colbert, F., 2007. Marketing Culture and the Arts. 3^rd ed. Montreal: Presses HEC.

·      Hill E., O’Sullivan C. and O’Sullivan, T., 2003. Creative Arts Marketing. 2^nd ed. Oxford: Butterworth-Heinemann.

·      Kotler, P., and Scheff, J., 1996. Crisis in the arts: The Marketing response, California Management Review [online], 39 (1), 28-52.

·      Maslow, A., 1943. A theory of human motivation, Psychological Review [online], 50 (4), 370-396.

·      Mokwa, M.P, Dawson, W.M. and Prieve, E.A., 1980. In Hill E., O’Sullivan C. and O’Sullivan, T., 2003. Creative Arts Marketing. 2^nd ed. Oxford: Butterworth-Heinemann.

·      Prahalad, C. K. and Ramaswamy, V., 2004. Co-creating unique value with customers. Strategy and Leadership [online], 32 (3), 4-9.

Re-blogging a Blog: Mumblings, Musings and Rantings...: Internships: One

A great mate and now a great blogger!! Have a read..


Mumblings, Musings and Rantings...: Internships: One: I figured a good starting point for my first real blog would be about Interns and Internships since I am one and I'm on one.... In two p...

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Never do a buffet on a Sunday..

Functions... when I agreed to be on this placement I knew this was going to be hard. I don't study functions at university and I sure as hell wasn't being taught it on my Event Management degree.

So now that I'm thinking about it, why on earth I even picked it is beyond me... But Jayne, the be all and end all of Function Managers, made it look so organised and smooth that the thought of me messing up on a regular basis seemed so far-fetched. I'm so organised. I have notepads for just about everything and my training went so well, I wrote everything I possibly could down in those three scattered days. I even trekked to Chislehurst!

However, as the old saying goes: saying something and doing it are completely different things. Because once I actually started to work as a Function Coordinator (I don't say Manager because I'm nowhere near there yet) and as soon as that happened.. it went downhill a bit.

My to-do lists became two pages long and took three weeks to complete, I wasn't spending all my time on Functions. I have done at least six functions in the three months I've been here. But I've also been the barmaid for a month, in the restaurant for a few weeks, a part-time receptionist and run-around for everyone since June. So, you can imagine, when I did have functions it would get put to the back of my mind. 

But although it sounds like I'm complaining or making excuses - I'm not. This is me learning about my place here at The Dukes Head, this is me learning about my placement and how it's COMPLETELY different to my studies. This also shows me that I'm better at events than at functions.

You may be wondering why I have a slightly strange but oddly fitting title but that's because 45 minutes ago I was told that we should never have a buffet on a Sunday because the kitchen has too much prep work for that day. I don't know about you but... I had no idea. Plus, it didn't help that with everything that's been going on lately, I totally forgot to tell my kitchen about this buffet. I'm not in his good books anyway.

So, I've come to this easy conclusion for myself and everyone else: it won't happen again. 
This week alone has been an absolute eye opener for myself and the world of functions. If you get it wrong, you really get it wrong. But cast your eyes back to the first paragraph. I didn't know anything about functions three months ago. Three months ago I was more worried about how I pronounce my words during interviews. And if I would be able to still go out drinking once I started placement (for the record: you don't.).

In conclusion, and in a way to finally feel better about myself so I don't go home crying at how crap this week has been, if I've only messed up a couple of times three months in then I'm doing okay. I'm not bad at this job and I know I can get better and learn more as the months fly by - the damage was small enough that it could be rectified quickly and noone died. I'm doing okay. As long as it's now and not on Christmas Day - we're all good!!!

So never do a buffet on a Sunday folks. Apparently in the World of Functions - that's a huge no-no.


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Placement so far..

I haven't blogged in what feels like years.

I miss blogging.

I have literally had no time for blogging. It sucks.

I'm sure you'll want to know what I've been up to! It's going to take a long read and a couple of posts but I will fill you in. Hopefully, you will learn from my silly mistakes and mishaps on everything I've done and been through.

I'm writing this because my 40 weeks of placement are over. I started, I tried, I conquered (somewhat) and now I can put up my boots and bow to the crowds.

But... I didn't sign up for a 40 weeks placement, I signed up for a year. But I feel like it's pretty amazing that I've survived 40 weeks being in a work environment without really knowing what to do, how to start and being pushed into the deep end of being in the Events/ Hospitality Industry.

Fellow Placement students will know how hard it is, you sit in the lectures when they tell you about the trials and tribulations but you roll your eyes and say "of course it's going to be hard."
But you really don't get it. You can only live it to realise.

Because it's bloody hard. And I'm exhausted.

So to congratulate myself and show you lot how hard this placement has been; Over the next couple of weeks I'm going to be posting blogs I've been trying to start and never finished on all things placements, working and me.

Stay tuned.

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Reading Festival!

If I said this was my first festival experience, I would be lying. I’ve done V Festival and LeeFest (see my post on volunteering). But I’ve done nothing like Reading Festival.

So first off I spent way too much on essentials, tent and clothes – obviously. I’m a girl.

I finally learnt how to pitch my tent like two days before from my mother who came to get me beyond excited as I was sulking that I couldn’t figure out how to pitch a tent, to see said tent standing upright and looking how it actually should look. I haven’t been that surprised in a LONG time.

Deaf Havana

Packed, excited, said all my goodbyes at work, I sat at Clapham Junction for an hour waiting for my little cousin. I love that girl with all my heart – she makes me laugh and she’s bloody great but OMG. I wanted to throttle her. I people watched for a while though (sorry to say all the fit blokes were taken).

We couldn’t really agree on food. I think that’s one of the worst things about festivals. Food. What the hell do you eat – if you even eat (we all know most of the time you’re drinking). I personally think we had a good idea going (apart from the doughnuts and maybe the cereal choice… And of course the sausage and tuna pasta, that wasn’t the best idea).

Alt-J

Getting there was fine. It all went downhill from the moment we started walking from the cab to the festival. Because as girls going to a festival we bought too much. We stopped all the time – no, my cousin stopped all of the time. In my head once I stopped it became clear that I was in serious pain. I had four heavy bags plus two bags filled with food, before I offered to hold more because my cousin was trailing behind. It took near enough and hour and fifteen until we reached the White camp from Red. Now if any of my readers know Reading Festival, they’ll know that that’s a long ass walk. And that was made thrice as long because there were drunks and other people walking just as slow. So you can imagine I was not happy. I got the tent up only to find the vodka had spilled. THE VODKA HAD SPILLED. My night was ruined. My poor cousin having to put up with me and I’m trying to be as nice as possible without being rude but I’d already had a long day and it was like nearly 10pm and now the vodka had spilt all the way down my back and on my clothes.

Our Food

Another little thing… why are tents so small? Why can we not stand up in tents and I am so glad ours was waterproof. If I do another festival with tents I am making sure I can stand up because getting changed and moving around is an absolute chore. Plus, the bigger ones are so much cooler. Yes, heavier but cooler.

FRIDAY

Friday was different. I had to get used to the coldness of being in a tent, the feel of the festival, what we’d do for the day etc. Also, using the disgusting toilets. I walked into a shack like cubicle and for unknown reason looked back (I can vomit just thinking about it. That image will never ever leave my mind). I have a question for all festival-goers and festival organisers… how? And more importantly, WHY??? There must be another way surely!? If you have ever seen the scene in Slumdog Millionaire with the toilets… it was EXACTLY like that.

We saw about 13 different bands from Hadouken!, Friends, Palma Violets, Random Hand (they were the biggest surprise of the festival – so good), Deaf Havana, some Coheed and Cambria, Angels and Airwaves, You Me At Six, Bombay Bicycle Club, The Courteeners, Foster The People (had a mini panic attack no biggie) Paramore and The Maccabees (who were better than expected).

I was involved in a crowd Avalanche where you feel a whole load of force push you to the ground and when you finally realise you’re not watching Paramore anymore but on the floor crushing some girl’s legs. It’s pretty weird instantly helping others around you to get up before you can actually get up yourself. When it happens again though, you do freak out a little especially when everyone else is getting up apart from you. You’re still on the floor as you see others help each other up bar you. Yeah, peed my pants a little at that.

SATURDAY

Saturday I was more in the swing of things. I was used to just casually walking around – I felt that you had to know who were going to see so you didn’t miss anything but that feeling went pretty quickly. I could relax, drink even. But whoever gets used to those horrific toilets? I swear I watched a man walk to the toilet shack, take a deep breath looked at me and crossed his fingers. I laughed for about ten minutes waiting for my cousin to come out of the toilets who herself was trying not to be sick from the stench. God awful things.

At Lower Than Atlantis!

We walked around everywhere. We even sat and watched Green Day make an appearance through sheer luck! We didn’t exactly make it inside the tent but we heard them from outside and watched them on the big screens!

So that day we watched some Modestep, Doc Brown (he’s amazing), Max Raptor (new band, quite good), Jaguar Skills (so so good), OFWGKTA (Odd Future Wolf Gang Kill Them All), Lower Than Atlantis (love!), The Vaccines, At The Drive In, Florence and The Machine (accidently got a guy on my shoulders – don’t ask), Katy B, Metronomy (also better than expected).

During Flo & The Machine

We were meant to watch The Hunger Games and then Chronicle the film when they turned one of the tents into a small film tent but the amount of energy that is taken out of you - when we got into the tent I was out like a light!! I hadn’t even had a proper drink!

SUNDAY

We made it our business to do everything on Sunday. Ate loads, drank more (but not lots because the toilets just ain’t worth that), even made it to the Silent Disco tent which was a hell of a lot better and emptier than anticipated.

We experienced Holly Walsh, Stephen K Amos (in tears crying he was so funny), some of Gaslight Anthem, Bullet for my Valentine, Good Riddance, Kaiser Chiefs, The Black Keys, Foo Fighters.

Another thing I’m not too keen on is being in the middle of a crowd. I’m not technically claustrophobic because I can be in tight spaces but when everyone is pushing everyone for no god damn reason it gets tiring and you get so agitated. Another crowd avalanche happened during Black Keys which meant even though I was near the front of the crowd and I could see Patrick and Dan (so cool!!) it also meant I wasn’t really paying attention because I had idiots around me pushing. And a silly Welsh girl who talked too much and who also liked to fists pump to The Black Keys, nearly punching me in the face. Little bit gutted I couldn’t really enjoy The Black Keys as much as I wanted, but that just means I have to see them again. Also I had a go at some 18year old that was pushing his butt into my side and I meant, really? It’s never that.

But then again, we did push ourselves to the front-ish on purpose so we could see the Foo Fighters up close. Unfortunately only one of us really got to see the Foo Fighters up close because I decided that being in the middle of the crowd being pushed in every direction was just not worth it. So I pushed my way out – to everyone’s dismay. Until finally I found a good enough spot by the huge screen and speakers that I could sing loudly and dance around a bit.

Damm Foo Fighters were amazing.

I’d just like to say an apology to Daniel also for being kind off-ish but you caught my attention as I was coming out of the toilets. I was in such a shock from the toilets (I will never forget the sound *shudders*) and from seeing you at 11am in the morning when I have make up all the way down my face that I didn’t even consider getting my hand sanitiser out of my bag. Which is wrong. So wrong. So yeah… Next time I might actually hug you back and not tell you not to touch me…

I had a drunken cousin Sunday night which was funny and I completely rinsed out my phone battery life through playing music shuffle, which I’m delighted I won, then using the Flashlight on my phone to have a rave in the tent. Good idea at the time…

No idea who he is..

Silent disco dancing

We talked to some of the others around us but we mostly kept to ourselves. My cousin is so much better at talking to strangers than me as I sort of go into defence mode and can be rude (because you know, they’re strangers… Stranger Danger and all that… it’s what they teach you in Primary School) so I left talking to people to her but we did have small talk with everyone and of course smiled at funny little things that happened around us. And there was always funny things happening from the costumes to people shouting to “FENTON!! JESUS CHRIST FENTONNNN!!” or the usual favourites, “ALAN?? STEVEE??!! ALAAAANNNN”

So just to say I had an amazing time. I saw bands that surprised me, that I loved and that I didn’t ever think I would ever see live.

However, if I do that again, bigger tent or V.I.P (not kidding), prepare for the coldness at night and I always forget a pillow. Plus, I will invent something feasible as a toilet situation other than a she-pee and human cat litter called the Travel John Disposable Toilet so it’s got to be better than that (honestly have a research, it’s a brilliant idea).

Food for thought...

Everyone goes on about what to eat when your revising such as lots of vegetables, smoothies, lots of water and all that..

Why can't be reward ourselves with chocolate? With coffee?

Does anyone REALLY and I mean really, stick to just eating vegetables and salads when your revising? Do you really only touch water in the weeks up to the exams and don't touch some sort of energy drink, coffee or tea?

If you are one of those people who are super healthy when revising then I applaud you but... you're crazy!

If I'm revising, my head hurts, I'm people watching and I've eaten all my snacks in my bag - where am I going to go? The vending machine and the cafe for a cafe latte or maybe I'll journey for a Starbucks.

Let's be honest here;
A) it's a break and a walk around - plus, it's a sneaky little chance to look at the fitties at the library - please don't pretend like you don't do it, we all know you do
B) it's a little reward to ourselves because we're actually in the library, we are honestly trying to revise and we need a lil pick-me-up.

So you know what?, I'm sitting here with a lovely medium Costa Mocha in my hands, practicing a past paper exam (I should be writing because I'm supposed to be timing myself but this just popped into my mind), I've done my little walk around and rewarded myself so I feel better instead of crunching on boring ol' carrots telling myself that I will feel less stressed if I eat them.. because I feel real good with my Mocha right now.

Plus, if we're going on a money thing - it's costs just as much for a bag of carrots as it does for a Mocha. I know which one I'd rather pay money for and I'm broke.

Right, back to revision.

Go treat yourselves to something nice guys, you're revising and revision sucks.

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Being in the library.. it's that time of year again

Who can actually say they've spent more than two hours or until closing time at the library this year?

First year, I did everything I could not to be in the library all together; not take out any books, any journals, no way was I walking about the floors for half an hour looking for a empty computer.

However, if your an avid reader of my blog, you know that my course is a little harder than I was first prepared for. Even though I didn't exactly get out any books/ journals in first year, I had definitely spent a good enough time in the library around this time of year... REVISION TIME. EXAMS. HELL.

Yes, Hell. Revision for exams for university is unlike any pressure than at high school or college and I can never really understand why. We've been doing exams most of our lives, so why is it that when it comes to university we still have no idea what to revise or have the slightest clue how to do it.
Why is it that there's so many ways of revision from cue cards, to quizzing one another, podcasts, past papers and every year all students doss about saying "I cant be assed to revise yet mannn." (literally my own quote).
If I'm honest I cannot revise to save my life, a part from maybe writing lecture slides out so many times it just sticks but that is sooo unbelievably boring that instead I write mind-maps and simple theories around the house so every time I walk past I have to read it.

I guess as well, it's a daunting thing because it's the end of yet another year. At the end of May, that's the end of my second year of University. For some people, it's the end of four years or the start of four years or the start of a year in placement (like me!) and we're all really... nervous.

Right now, I'm in the library in a somewhat secret room (but you couldn't really tell by the amount of people in here). I've been stuck in this room for the past three days revising whilst a friend has been going over our latest assignment trying to get that out of the way! We have assignments on top of exams and feedback questionnaires (don't get me started), finance revision classes and final seminars/lectures because that's it for my second year. As of June I go off to Placement and I don't come back until September 2013. Scary stuff eh?

So what are my tips for revision in the second year, you say?
I have literally no idea; hope for the best, attend the sessions, read around the subject, get up past papers, revise with a friend, stock up on goodies, get comfy in the library and prepare not to leave for a while because it will be your home for a month or so.
But don't worry, I'll be doing the exact same thing for the whole month of May.

I think when your falling asleep and you feel as if at least one thing has been learnt for the day - then it's been a good day and if you feel like you haven't, trust that the next day you'll probably be twice more likely to have something sink in.
Plus, I always try my best - and if I fail, I've failed (and I've done it in just about over a handful of exams). But I know that it's not the end of the world because I can always retake. Sometimes it's all anyone can ask for.

Good Luck!

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Budgeting Sucks...

No one really likes to budget, especially me. But as students we have a limit on how much we can do with our money. Savings from over the summer plus, grant/ loan money and maybe the part-time job is all we have to keep us going for a year.

Personally, I’m going to start of budgeting for each week even if budgeting each month will save me more money; I’m one to spend, not save.

I had been thinking of doing a budgeting blog post for a while (but it seemed too hard), so when SaveTheStudent.org asked me to one - I had more motivation to actually do it.

Second Year

As a second year I:

• Can’t control my rent and my utility bills will vary month to month – which throws a spanner in the work.
• Have to cut back on my nights out due to my very hectic schedule this year. (A lovely looking fourth year told me to go out as much as I can at the start of the year because second year gets hard and gets hard fast. A hint for all you first years’.)
• Save money on travelling into university as I can now walk it in.
• Will be doing all my food shopping online to resist the temptation of getting snacks.
• Must only buy things that I can justify on; my best examples of this is when I go out shopping and come across something I want (i.e. a dress), I think of all the possible reasons for buying it and how much I will use it. If I have up to 5 good, proper reasons: Dress = bought. 
• Made myself a money jar to save up for my placement year in 2012. All those coins must add up over time… 
• Am trying to find myself a job…

Breakdown

Money coming in: My loan comes in every term, money saved from working over the summer and a lovely overdraft.

Money going out: clubbing (incl. taxi’s to and from, entry fees, drinks), food (incl. alcohol), rent, bills, travelling home, getting snacks on campus.

Goals

I’ve also decided to have goals this year. It just means that I know for myself what I’ll try to cut back on.

1. Trying not to spend much while on campus. A very limited budget of £4/ a meal deal a day – or rather, just under £10 a week. 

2. Food. I personally, cannot get my food shopping bill right. I try but I always fail. So I want a limit of £30 for two weeks’ worth of food, and that will include alcohol.

3. To spend a maximum of £20 on a night out. But before you gasp on whether you think that’s high or low, this covers my taxi’s (to and from), pre-drinks, entrance fees, and for that very drunken night, a cheeky subway.

4. To allow myself 4 takeaways a month (gasp!). Yes, this does mean the cheeky drunken subway too. 

5. Beauty/ clothes: to spend under £30 a month on all things beauty and clothes.

So, I plan ahead.

Budget for week commencing (10/10/11 – 16/10/11):

Monday – Campus – 70p

Tuesday – Campus – £0-4

Wednesday – Beauty – £5, clubbing – £20

Thursday – Campus – £0-4

Friday – Campus – £0-4/ travelling back home – £5/ Meal out – £30

Saturday – Clubbing – £40 (including pre-drinks, drinks out, entry fee)/ Travel – £10

Sunday – £0

= +/- £100

Real Budget:

Monday – Campus: 70p

Tuesday – University supplies: £3/ Drinks out: £5

Wednesday – Travel, beauty, food, clubbing: £30/ TV license: £24

Thursday – Campus: £0

Friday – Meal/ Travel: £30

Saturday – Travel: £5.30

Sunday – Meal: £10

=  £106… (oops)

Analysis

Looking back on the week, I spend most of my money on nights out but I already knew that.

I shouldn’t have spent that £5 on Wednesday on food (chocolate, tissues, fish fingers, milk) and I won’t have to think about the TV license again

Saturday was my most expensive night out because it was a birthday so I won’t be doing that again for a while which also means that I can justify it.

You know, this budgeting thing might just work out after all….

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My Event (part. 2)

Our event is over and done with, now a couple of weeks ago I gave you a low down on my 90’s themed event and here is my newest post telling everything that it’s over!

The 90’s night was, thankfully, a huge success – even though we were up against Bedlam – and now here is my chance to actually give you in full detail how this night came about.

According to my group mate, this idea came about by watching the Spice Girls on a laptop and from getting very excited about our childhood and what we remembered from it, Voila! The 90’s night was born – under the original name of “Death of Pop!” It was meant to celebrate the year that Pop died… but as time went on and the confusion of others, the name changed to “I <3 Pop”. Unfortunately, this had to change again to the final “Saturday Night – born in the 90’s.” Expressing the Whigfield classic (don’t act as though you don’t know the dance…) as well as giving the obvious information about the event, it was going to be held on a Saturday and of course, born in the 90’s the main theme.

Promotion and marketing went hand in hand together and for our event our main aim was to bring back nostalgia to students. We bought rainbow dust, ultra violets and lollipop sweets as a giveaway when handing out leaflets.

We held a promotion day with a gazebo in the middle of our university campus blasting out very cheesy tunes from the gym next to us and with hand-made t-shirts (made by our very own marketing manager and her boyfriend) spent most of the day handing out flyers and dancing along to tunes (see pictures). I’m not going to lie to you, I would like to say everyone got involved but it was just me handing out flyers… everyone else was cold and it was freeeeezing!!

We had 8.45am starts handing out flyers at the gate to university, promotion flyerring on the various club nights held at our venue and every night selling tickets at the university halls.

Then, came getting people to come. Now, as we all know, Saturday is a day of doing nothing for the fellow student and we are rarely seen out on a Saturday, unless it’s a house party or there is something ‘Student special’ going on, or, you have money and like a Saturday night out. So, when the news that it was a ‘Reading week’ for a lot of students (which means a week of students all going home) did frustrated us, especially when our whole group trekked around all of halls to sell tickets (myself and a group member getting escorted out because it was deemed as “business” – don’t worry we talked to the warden the next day and she let us come back in).

We had 300 tickets available at the Student Union shop, 100 online and then another 100 or so with us at all times. We hardly sold any tickets with a week and a bit to go. We were stressing, plus, it didn’t help that our lecturers were starting to worry too.

But not to fear, we knew that like a Friday night out most students only ever bought tickets a day or two before the event and most of them would probably get them on the door. However, for our event we had hardly sold 300 in the student union shop two days before our event. Everyone would pop into the shop to ask how many were left or constantly refresh the online ticket page just in case it ever went down.

As luck and life would have it, Thursday saw us go down to 50 tickets online and we put another 100 up by 1pm that day – it did annoy us at first because, naturally we wanted it to go down to a lot less before we put more up, but by that evening it had gone down to under 100 which resulted in us having to put more up on Friday when we realised we had sold just about 400 tickets.

By 8pm on Saturday, our group could only put just under 100 tickets online. Can you believe our luck – I couldn’t explain how it all happened from selling just over 200 on a Wednesday to the Saturday being able to say that throughout the day our total had risen to 700!?

We had spent Saturday dragging our friends/ boyfriends who had come down for the day, redecorating the whole of the club in bright neon cut-out words, CDs, 90’s CD cases and bright coloured cassettes. V.I.P sections decorated with sweets, our brilliant posters and pictures of the 90’s.

Leaving the venue at 5.30pm and coming back for 8.30pm we waited anxiously for our first lecturer to assess us and that was even before everyone else turned up! Thankfully, she was overly impressed with our group – I have to admit, truthfully, we do get on together really well, because we all wanted the same thing - for the event to be a success. If there were ever anything we weren’t happy about, we could always talk about it.

So imagine, 800 of your peers once hearing the song that was a big hit, everyone knew the words to because it was a guy and a girl speaking about a popular girls toy (huge hint)… would you say that everyone erupted with joy and screams and shouts or that everyone turned their head in disgust?

Because if you wanted to go for the latter; you wouldn’t have come to our event. Every so often a classic song would come on and everyone would erupt with excitement! It was crazy!!

Unfortunately again for our group, we couldn’t drink and though we enjoyed the night we couldn't exactly go out on the dance-floor and boogie on down like we desperately wanted to.

By the time our second and final lecturer came to us, it was 1.30am – yes! I’m being serious – I was the one in charge of showing him around the venue and keeping him entertained until he left. There was no way I could not dance to Take That – Never Forget and out-right told my lecturer that I simply loved this song there was no way I could'’t put my hands up when the chorus came on. My lecturer however did not mind at all claiming that the 1990’s were his Master years and he would go out clubbing to the 1990’s music. Result! He even volunteered to come to our event.

He left at 2.15am. Champagne hit our table at 2.19am.

The night ended to us hugging, chanting in joy and congratulating ourselves. We had pulled off a sell-out event!

I’m not going to say that I went to bed that night exhausted but happy but tired and I collapsed in bed with a smile on my face. OH NO! I came back to my house – everyone asleep from already been and gone to my event – shouting at how great my event was. I walked into my bedroom my best friend who had come down just for me in my bed sleeping – I woke her up screaming at how well my event had been, how my lecturers had said to me congratulations to me and was very happy with his stay!!

I WANTED TO SCREAM ABOUT IT! I WANTED TO JUMP ABOUT AND TALK AND TALK AND TALK!!

I had even driven my cab driver crazy talking to him about what he had done, how it had gone and the wreck the venue was after everyone had left.

It was surreal over the next couple of days where our peers are still organising and stressing about their events yet to be put on and ours was over and done with!

The next meeting with our client was the most anticipated… he loved what we did, he came down to see our event and was astonished at the outcome, and more than that, he wanted us to do it again!

Us, second year events students, and a real client wanting us to recreate our event again so more people can come, more profit, more 90’s!

Our client had said to us that he was already going to make profit with his bar sales so the ticket sale profit could go to us. We were almost at the point of fainting we were so happy!

And that’s where our story gets a little confusing because, most of the second year events are for charity and the profit made would go straight to them. But this was different and even though our client said we could keep the money – University laughed at the idea; of course we couldn’t keep the money it’s the clients!

So we’ve been pushing to have the profit of the ticket sales invested into the next event – which is what our client suggested.

Its' not our fault and it's not exactly my university's fault either. According to our client, any of the events that have been put on at this particular venue has never made enough profit to cover its budget. So, this has never happened before - which we all need to take on board as a huge compliment - however, we're all still buzzing off this amazing news and this amazing night that we organised and ran as successfully as we could. We've had heated discussions with administrators who is completely clueless and because we are too - we're all going around in circles because they are leaning towards giving all of our profit away to charity – which is all well and good but not when we can half that money to invest and the other half to a chosen charity of ours.

We've got to wait until Monday so she can figure out what is best. From the talk I had with her, the profit that was made is wholly the clients and so what they do with it is completely up to them. Which then makes us say – then why can’t we have it, because he said he could have it!? But as a university, again, they’re saying “oh my! Oh no! Of course you can’t have it for yourselves…” but then they get stumped… to which we want the rest of that sentence and they can’t give it to us. Legal stuff, contracts, permission etc., it’s all in the way.

So we wait until Monday.

If you wanted to ask me what I learnt from this, it would be that I really think I can do this as my profession. Which sometimes as students I think that’s hard to say. We study a degree in something we like and are good at, something we are interested in but really it’s not what we see ourselves doing in fifteen years’ time. But as an event management course, it’s not something you can just say that you didn’t want to do for the rest of your life because it’s not that kind of course; it’s like a marriage or I guess, more permanently, a tattoo. As well, it’s your personality as I think event managers as much as they can be taught – it’s a hard profession to get into and the person has to be willing to do it.

So what I’ve learnt is that, I cannot wait to do this event again with some great people and hopefully with some money to help us. I’ve learnt to overcome my fear of being in charge of finance  and even though, I’m very slow with numbers and it takes a while to get my head around calculations etc., etc., I think, personally, I’ve done really well in keeping it all together and working out everything in a way that everyone can understand and not lose any money!

I’m overwhelmed at how well we have actually done, I had given up hope of a sell-out event (even though I made a £5 bet that it would), I was happy with about 350 people so we could break even. And I guess as well, for university to know what to do if this sort of situation ever happens again.

That, all our effort, our good team work and just the hard work and thought process we put into every single detail of the event, paid off in such a exploded way that has seemed to dumbfounded everyone; us, the client, our university and now it’s all about how we can all go about this in the correct way that we all win.

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