Unfortunately there's not a lot of money to be made in ultimate, otherwise I'd have quit my cushy IT gig ages ago. But things are changing - AFDA employ people, and QUDA are going to as well. League directors, coordinators, and coaches are getting paid for their services, so there's some opportunity to get some coin. The boys at Cultimate in the States seem to be getting by on running tournaments for profit.
So I've thought why not try it here?
This weekend I'm running the Golden City Classic up here in B-Town. In the past when I've run tournaments, I've always broken even, but the tournament is a very basic setup (there's the fields, you'll get lunch at 12-ish, have fun). This time we're making a profit. Not heaps, but enough to justify the effort. But with that statement being made, players are going to expect a better service. And I'm going to. There'll be shade, spring water at each field, catered lunch, lined fields and other little perks.
The biggest thing at the forefront of my mind is that I'm more likely to get negative feedback than positive. It will take just one thing to fuck up for people to have a negative experience. Management at Disneyland tell their staff about the "1 In 74 Rule", which says that the average Disneyland patron has 74 interactions with staff in a day out, and it would only take one bad experience to ruin their day. But sometimes things aren't always in their control.
Look at Mixed Nats 2006 - the weather was shit and that's all I heard about. Nothing about the fields, the food, the party, the merchandise...just the weather. Now to one degree, if that's the only thing they complained about then everything else must have been alright. But people are far quicker to highlight the bad parts than highlight the good parts.
On RSD this week, Cultimate have been savaged for some bad parts of the Trouble In Vegas tournament. It may only be a couple of people complaining, and the rest had fun, but the ones complaining are the ones speaking out, and those who weren't there are hearing only the negative.
Now this weekend I'm confident I have all bases covered. If I hear positive feedback, then fantastic! If I hear no feedback, then that's also good, because it means that everything was satisfactory.
Wait, where was I going with this?
Ah yes, making a profit. I'm sure that folk out there don't mind we're making a profit, as long as an excellent service is provided. If it's not, then it appears that we've made a grab for cash at the expense of players, and people won't come back next year. If we do a good job, then people will come back. And the positive word of mouth they spread will ensure more teams will come. And when we run other tournaments, teams will be willing to come.
Dammit, now I'm all nervous about Saturday.
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3 comments:
Hey Simmo
One thing I really try to do in Ultimate is emphasise if something is being run at a profit, or if it is being run at a surplus.
If you are running an Ultimate event and you are intending to take money out of Ultimate (say for example to pay for your new Jag), then you are making a profit.
If you are intending to take money out of the event but put it back into Ultimate, then you are running a surplus.
The important thing to do is to be clear to people which of these you are doing. And if you are running a surplus, it can help you a lot if you can identify where this surplus is going (ideally to a particular activity people view are desirable, but its fair to go into "Ballarat Ultimate General Revenue".
There's a shitload more to say on these topics - I'll try to get to it sooner rather than later.
Hey Pissy, you're alright :)
I says take the monies and run!
Here in the ACT, we are almost chomping at the bit to give money away to volunteers on the provision that they actually do something.
I don't think we ought to worry about organisers making money out of a competition. (Within reason of course) Long before the player base has any hope of becoming professionalised the admin structure of the sport should be. If we could have paid adminstrators doing all the work, people like me could laze around even more so.
I yearn for the day went I could be a volunteer president that directs a crew of paid admin lackies in the ACT...
During the 2008 nationals season, Firestorm ran intentionally at a surplus due to the fact that it was a cheap nationals year for us (no flights). This was only really done through rounding odd amounts up (ie. uniforms cost $113.50 and players paid $115) and also through the fact that our fields invoice was about $1000 less then our budget.
That being said, this year we are providing subsidies for players training and nationals campaign, and will be running in a deficit.
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