Budgeting for a Successful Annual Event – It’s All in the Details

August 31, 2015

Be sure you know the maximum amount you’re willing to invest in your event before building the budget.

By Thelma Ramey

Having a razor sharp focus about the intention of your event is the ideal starting point for developing a budget. That purpose will drive how you build the budget while keeping the goal in mind. It will also determine how you spend within that budget to achieve maximum results.

Strategically determining the event location will serve you and your attendees well. There are many factors involved in this decision. For your convention, the geographical area of concentration of your franchisees is key. If the large majority of your locations are on the East Coast, doing a California event will not be economical for you or your attendees. If your brand base is large, rotating the convention to different locales is something your attendees will come to look forward to.

The time of year your event is scheduled will make a huge monetary difference. If possible, try to take advantage of seasonal prices in the hospitality industry. High traffic and off season dates make the price of a single sleeping room vary by hundreds of dollars. Warm weather sites are prime in the winter when northern attendees are grateful to get out of the cold. However, there are some great deals to be had if you can be flexible. (Convention staff probably knows highlighted jargon.)

The pattern of your event can also dramatically change the bottom line. The difference between a Sunday through Wednesday program and a Wednesday through Sunday one can make a real difference with hotels and resorts. The sleeping room rate is just one of the savings. Many times concessions are available in the form of hotel-hosted receptions or additional beverage breaks. The proximity of a holiday also factors in when the hotel is looking at the business.

When comparing hotels or resorts, don’t let the sleeping room rates drive your decision. The ancillary expenses are also a financial factor. Resort fees, service fees, airport transportation and even parking will add to daily costs for you and your attendees.

Convenient airport access is another benefit to consider in choosing a destination. It impacts the budget as well as the attendees’ expenses. Airfares can vary substantially in different markets and are usually substantially lower when you fly into, or near, a hub. This can make for more direct connections and more favorable options for flight times.

The largest line item on a convention budget is food and beverage. Smaller meetings require less of this, and audio visual equipment and labor may dominate. The type of event drives the majority line item. Start with the larger number and build around it with the amount of revenue you are planning to spend to support the entire event.

After over 20 years in the event planning business, I can offer this budgeting advice: know the maximum amount you are willing to invest in an event before you begin building the budget. Putting together a dream document is in no way related to the actual event. Sure, you may want ‘celebrity’ entertainment, but if that is not the most prudent (even possible) investment, move on and add quality to other avenues of your event.

Anticipating unforeseen expenses is one area where the advice of an experienced planner can be extremely beneficial. This can come in the form of either an internal staff member or an outsourced professional meeting management firm. There are some expenses that an experienced planner will automatically factor in that others may not even be aware of, and that unknown, unplanned for amount can add up quickly. A few examples:

Some hotels now add a ‘marketing’ fee for every sign you put outside of your meeting room space;
Food and beverage on the budget needs to include the servers, carvers and bartenders because that will be charged;
Factor in the “plus, plus” where it applies (++ = plus tax, plus gratuity);
Power for any segment of your event is not a given, but sometimes revealed only when the master bill is received.

Be cognizant of labor cost and times. Make every effort to schedule straight time to avoid additional overtime fees. Rigging is many times sold in four hour minimum blocks, so scheduling all of your rigging needs during one time frame will avoid purchasing multiple time blocks. The same applies to audio visual technical support. Technical rehearsals that are timed during the day, on a weekday will prevent paying for support at higher rates.

Staying on budget is something that my business partner, Rose Shiflett, and I deal with every day. Working alongside our franchisor clients, we track every possible expenditure. A helpful tool is a budget that includes a column for “expense committed” as well as a variance column. This allows for seeing the committed amount beside each line item and is a real-time document. Tracking in this way not only helps avoid over-budget line items, but also allows for reallocating funds if the expense is lower than the budgeted amount.

Some final advice … negotiate and customize.

Do not hesitate to negotiate with hotels, convention centers and venues. It could materialize as a cost reduction or an additional benefit in another area that would have had an expense attached.

Customizing meals has become a norm, so take advantage of it. Be flexible enough to allow the chef to choose fresh ingredients to be more cost effective. This also provides your attendees a taste of the local culture, and that is an added value to their overall event experience with no burden on your budget.

Thelma Ramey (shown here) and Rose Shiflett own Plan Ahead Events – Tampa Bay. Thelma has been a member of the Women’s Franchise Committee since 2010. She co-founded the Women’s Franchise Network in Tampa and has served on the Leadership Conference Task force for the past three years. Find her at fransocial.franchise.org