Improvements For Next Year

[Too Tall]

Hi I have some suggestions on making the event run more smoothly the first is instead of everyone being let in and running and having a stampede to get there virtual tickets how about crew members walk past the cue before hand (before opening) and hand them out that way so this prevents running and people missing out, and the people who cue early get the low numbers etc and everyone who wants one gets one.

 

I'd Love that idea. If you had two crew for each person. One with odd VT's and the other with even VT's. One then goes down the line for pre-paid enterance and the others then go down the line for non pre-paid enterance. This will cut down the big rush at the start because everyone will have what they want! No pushing or barging will be involved! Fantastic idea. You may want to limit the max people can have to about 5 but it will work really well!

I think it's a bad idea.

 

It's unfair on people later in the main queue.

 

Let's say Person A is number 1 in the main queue, and you are number 300.

 

Person A wants Guest X, Y and Z.

You want only Guest Z.

 

In the currect way:

 

Person A: Goes in and gets ticket 1-10 for Guest X, they then go and get ticket 50-100 for Guest Y (some people went straight to Guest Y, and got tickets 1-50) and then they go to Guest Z and get ticket 150-200 (because again some people went straight to Guest Z and got tickets 1-150).

 

You: It takes you a couple of minutes to get in, then you go and get Ticket 50-100 for Guest Z.

 

In your new way:

 

Person A: Gets Ticket number 1 for Guest X, Y and Z

 

You: Even if only half the people in front of you want Guest Z, you are going to get Ticket 150.

 

Is that fair? I don't think so.

 

It gets even worse if you are number 2000 in the main queue. In the current system you can go straight to a guest and get maybe ticket 400-500, in your new system the chances are that person would get ticket 1500+ for all the guests they want. Again not fair!

 

It also causes a problem with queue management. Because at first we put up the VTs 1-30. But the same 30 people have numbers 1-30 for all the guests they want to see. They can't be in all the queues at once. Trust me it will not work!

 

The other problem it will cause is that People will take tickets they don't need to give to friends/sell them, it will be too easy. I know it happens now but this would make it so much easier. If you are number 50 in the queue you can get all the guests ticket 50 with no extra hassle. You don't have to stand in an extra queue, you just ask for them.

 

We are trying to think of ways to stop the scrum first thing but giving out tickets in the queue just will not work. As explained above it's not fair and it will cause us huge issues with queue management inside the event.

Edited September 10, 2007 by Too Tall

[nicky]

We are trying to think of ways to stop the scrum first thing

How about only letting a few people in at a time like they do in bars etc?

[Too Tall]

Some signs saying when guests will be back from lunch etc. because last time some of the guests didn't even have signs saying anything, so it would be helpful to know when they'll be back rather than keep walking in the direction of the guest's queue to check if they're back yet or not.

This does usually happen it was one of the things that feel between the cracks as the crew was so busy. It'll be back for next time

 

I think the most important thing is to make the numbers visible.

This is being looked at and we have some interesting ideas. May happen for G-Mex but will definitely be done for next years shows.

 

 

Please no more parallel photo sessions

This was a one off because of the last minute Heroes photo shoot. It shouldn't happen again.

[Too Tall]

We are trying to think of ways to stop the scrum first thing

How about only letting a few people in at a time like they do in bars etc?

We tried that before. You still have the same issues.

 

What happened when we did it last time was we let 50 people in and left 30ish seconds between groups, but people still tried and run past the group in front.

 

The only way around that is leave a big enough gap for the first group to get to the guests, say 2 minutes. The issue with that is those first 50 people then have time to go and get most of the guests tickets before the next group get there. Again you get the situation were all the low tickets 1-50 are with only 50 people, so we get queuing issues whe we open the queues. Also with 6000 people as we had at London if you leave 2 minutes between each 50 people that will take over 4 hours to get those 6000 people in. And there were another 9000 people still to come in at 11am.

 

And you can't make the groups bigger as even with groups of 50 the people at the back tried to get to the front of the group of 50. The problem is some people will run if they think it will get them in front of only one person.

 

Please don't anyone think I'm just sat here poo-pooing all these ideas. There are some great ones please keep them coming. It's just that some of these are ideas we have already had and have been though the logical fors and againsts and have have decided they will not work. I'm just explaining why they will not work and why we've discounted them, I'd rather that than just say, "no that won't work"!

 

We are looking for a solution to both the running and the morning scrum. We have some solutions which include barriered queues to go down to get the VTs to stop the scrum, but we're still looking for idea as to how to stop the running but let people in as quickly as possible, I'm sure one will come.

Edited September 10, 2007 by Too Tall

[DavidB]

You don't pay for virtual queue tickets though, and it'd be a lot of hassle if a guest cancels.

[Noddy]

Clarity about guest attendence/signing times.

Set number of tickets for photo shoots as it eats into signing times.

More crew members for very popular guests to manage the Q's

[sazzra]

We are trying to think of ways to stop the scrum first thing

How about only letting a few people in at a time like they do in bars etc?

We are looking for a solution to both the running and the morning scrum. We have some solutions which include barriered queues to go down to get the VTs to stop the scrum, but we're still looking for idea as to how to stop the running but let people in as quickly as possible, I'm sure one will come.

 

How about speed activated booby traps to trip up all those who run? Anybody who runs at that time of the morning desrves to go flying, it should be illegal to move faster than a crawl before 10 am

 

Thinking about the queue jumping/morning scrum outside, how about numbered pre paid tickets? Then you can enforce several smaller sections, as it would be easy to check - although I guess it doesn't solve the problem of the running to get past the group in front.

 

OK, I give up

[Psychosis]

 

How about speed activated booby traps to trip up all those who run?

 

We have a winner!

[DavidB]

I'd be quite happy to take up a new role as a crew member, and stick out random things to trip people up

 

Or roll bowling balls towards them and see how many I can knock over

 

It could be fun!

[Queen_Sindel]

Yes...Mr Luthor - could you please stop writing all caps?

I know you are trying to put emphasis on what you write, but it makes reading your posts extremely hard.

 

I like your idea about the pre-paid autographs, but unfortunately it isn't perfect either.

 

Basically there's similar problems that TooTall pointed out with handing out tickets outside of the building. There's still plenty of people who can't order online (either no Internet or no credit card). Some people are not comfortable with using their credit card online. Others may only be able to decide on rather short notice if they can come to a show or not.

 

That system is unfair for a rather large group of people. And before someone tells me the morning run isn't fair either: yes, I know - I'm not exactly a long distance runner myself. I have a number of friends who don't like to order online though, so I realize that this is a rather common problem, too.

Edited September 10, 2007 by Queen_Sindel

[nicky]

Anybody who runs at that time of the morning desrves to go flying, it should be illegal to move faster than a crawl before 10 am

All this talk about no running is making me think of school. If we get caught running do we have stand in the corner or write sides of writing or will we get the slipper?

 

Seriously though I don't think you can stop people running. Perhaps the only way you'll stop people running is making everyone take off their shoes and cover the floor in broken glass a la Die Hard (1988)...oh hang on, that didn't stop Bruce from legging it though did it? How about making it an obstacle course like in the TV show Gladiators complete with backwards treadmills?

 

I've never crewed and don't intend to but I'd love to see this mass stampede that people talk about. Must be quite a sight!

[sazzra]

New suggestion - this from my mother, so explains where I get it from!

 

You should shackle everyone in the queue outside, so everyone would have to go in in order and noone could run.

 

Da DA!!!!

[Too Tall]

How about being able to buy virtual tickets for autographs online along with the photoshoots that way you arriive with all you need, then theres no need to push in or casue a stampede.

 

THIS MAKES SENSE THERE IS NO FAULT WITH THIS.

I think you'll find there are a number of faults with it:

 

1: As QS has said above it's not fair to a lot of people. A lot of people come to the shows and have never seen the website let a lone the forum or the on-line shop. They just see the flyers and come along.

 

2: It would cause huge issues for the SM servers with the huge influx of traffic every time a big guests was announced, with everyone trying to get their VTs on-line.

 

3: People would request the lowest tickets they could, but not turn up until late. They'd get number 1 if they could but then knowing they have ticket number 1 they would then not bother to turn up until maybe 11am (getting in cheaper) knowing they have their VT and can join the queue as soon as they get there. If all the people that have tickets 1 to 200 do this, we'll have a guest sat there from 9am until 11am with next to no one seeing them or we put the numbers up to 300+ to get people in the queue but then suddenly at 11am instead of having 30-40 people in the real queue we'd have 200+.

 

4: People would order them and not use them. We could have 1000 tickets ordered on-line but we'd have no way of knowing how many of those people are actually at the show. OK it happens now were people take tickets and don't come back, but even at 4pm it's only 20% max that don't come back. If you could easily order them on-line people would order them "just in case" they were going. As I say we'd have no idea how many of the 1000 were actually going to come to the event. We do use the number of tickets gone out as a gadge as to how fast we need the guest to sign.

 

5: On-line there is no way of limiting it to one per person. How do you stop people getting more than one. Everyone has to get their own? What about children? A family of 4 has to have 4 different orders, one for each member of the family? How could we prove that it's not just someone coming up with a fake wife and 2 children's names? We have to have a limit of one per person or people would get 4, 8 or 12 tickets and then sell them.

 

6: It could start a whole black market in VTs. Even if we could limit it to one per person, you can't tell me that if someone has VTs 1 for let's say Orlando Bloom, that someone isn't going to pay a lot of money on eBay to get it. People would get to know this and we'd have people waiting on-line to get a low VT that have no intention of going to the event, they just want to try and get a low VT for a big guest to try and sell on. It's a no loss situation for them, the VTs are free so they loss nothing by trying but could get £5-£20+ for a VT. As I say someone would pay £20+ for a number 1 to 30 Orlando ticket.

 

Trust me giving out VTs in advance of the show would be a nightmare.

 

The whole point of the VTs is that it's your position in the queue on the day. It's first come first served on the day. Doing it before would screw up the queue management and start a black market in VTs. Not good for anyone.

Edited September 11, 2007 by Too Tall

[sparks]

i had you down as more of a narna than a plum sparks

 

 

I'd happily be a narna if it was a narna dakkkarrriii!!!

[Too Tall]

OK, I give up

Now you can see why it's not so easy to come up with a solution that is fair to everyone and stops the issue.

[Too Tall]

New suggestion - this from my mother, so explains where I get it from!

 

You should shackle everyone in the queue outside, so everyone would have to go in in order and noone could run.

 

Da DA!!!!

I do like this

 

But can we find a set of shackles for 2000 people by CM Manchester

[Dinobore]

How about being able to buy virtual tickets for autographs online along with the photoshoots that way you arriive with all you need, then theres no need to push in or casue a stampede.

 

THIS MAKES SENSE THERE IS NO FAULT WITH THIS.

I think you'll find there are a number of faults with it:

 

1: As QS has said above it's not fair to a lot of people. A lot of people come to the shows and have never seen the website let a lone the forum or the on-line shop. They just see the flyers and come along.

 

2: It would cause huge issues for the SM servers with the huge influx of traffic every time a big guests was announced, with everyone trying to get their VTs on-line.

 

3: People would request the lowest tickets they could, but not turn up until late. They'd get number 1 if they could but then knowing they have ticket number 1 they would then not bother to turn up until maybe 11am (getting in cheaper) knowing they have their VT and can join the queue as soon as they get there. If all the people that have tickets 1 to 200 do this, we'll have a guest sat there from 9am until 11am with next to no one seeing them or we put the numbers up to 300+ to get people in the queue but then suddenly at 11am instead of having 30-40 people in the real queue we'd have 200+.

 

4: People would order them and not use them. We could have 1000 tickets ordered on-line but we'd have no way of knowing how many of those people are actually at the show. OK it happens now were people take tickets and don't come back, but even at 4pm it's only 20% max that don't come back. If you could easily order them on-line people would order them "just in case" they were going. As I say we'd have no idea how many of the 1000 were actually going to come to the event. We do use the number of tickets gone out as a gadge as to how fast we need the guest to sign.

 

5: On-line there is no way of limiting it to one per person. How do you stop people getting more than one. Everyone has to get their own? What about children? A family of 4 has to have 4 different orders, one for each member of the family? How could we prove that it's not just someone coming up with a fake wife and 2 children's names? We have to have a limit of one per person or people would get 4, 8 or 12 tickets and then sell them.

 

6: It could start a whole black market in VTs. Even if we could limit it to one per person, you can't tell me that if someone has VTs 1 for let's say Orlando Bloom, that someone isn't going to pay a lot of money on eBay to get it. People would get to know this and we'd have people waiting on-line to get a low VT that have no intention of going to the event, they just want to try and get a low VT for a big guest to try and sell on. It's a no loss situation for them, the VTs are free so they loss nothing by trying but could get £5-£20+ for a VT. As I say someone would pay £20+ for a number 1 to 30 Orlando ticket.

 

Trust me giving out VTs in advance of the show would be a nightmare.

 

The whole point of the VTs is that it's your position in the queue on the day. It's first come first served on the day. Doing it before would screw up the queue management and start a black market in VTs. Not good for anyone.

 

Another thing here, if people were to buy (actually pay for, through Showmasters or elsewhere) a virtual ticket, people (some / most?) would expect to meet the star whose ticket they have purchased, which would cause more problems.

Especially if a guest is at an event for a short period of time (example Patrick Stewart).

Edited September 11, 2007 by Dinobore

[Neurie]

Hand out virtual tickets in the que out side the venue soa s you wlak in you can be asked what people your here to see and be given a ticket. Its not hard to organise and then it really does benefit epople who buy a early bird ticket or que up.

 

Not every one coems for the signings.

 

And limit the singings to a reaosnable number

 

Also, get a better photographer, have mroe interactive stuff like computer companies maybe ven some representatives from some of the toys makers/prop makers, better quality stalls, the london film and props store wasnt even there this year.

 

Better security, BETTER LAYOUT.

 

I think the first one I attendened was at thw embley exhibition center and it was sooooooooooo much better as it had a completely seperate area for the singings and tonnes of stalls on wide isles.

 

I'd also like to see some consideration for the mobilty impaired and handicaped, they should be allowed to que jump(not right ot the top) but they should have special consideration.

[nicky]

I'd also like to see some consideration for the mobilty impaired and handicaped, they should be allowed to que jump(not right ot the top) but they should have special consideration.

What's to stop people from faking a disabilty? Anyone could get crutches or a wheel chair.

[Queen_Sindel]

Hand out virtual tickets in the que out side the venue soa s you wlak in you can be asked what people your here to see and be given a ticket. Its not hard to organise and then it really does benefit epople who buy a early bird ticket or que up.

 

TooTall has already explained why this won't work.

 

It's unfair on people later in the main queue.

 

Let's say Person A is number 1 in the main queue, and you are number 300.

 

Person A wants Guest X, Y and Z.

You want only Guest Z.

 

In the currect way:

 

Person A: Goes in and gets ticket 1-10 for Guest X, they then go and get ticket 50-100 for Guest Y (some people went straight to Guest Y, and got tickets 1-50) and then they go to Guest Z and get ticket 150-200 (because again some people went straight to Guest Z and got tickets 1-150).

 

You: It takes you a couple of minutes to get in, then you go and get Ticket 50-100 for Guest Z.

 

In your new way:

 

Person A: Gets Ticket number 1 for Guest X, Y and Z

 

You: Even if only half the people in front of you want Guest Z, you are going to get Ticket 150.

 

Is that fair? I don't think so.

 

It gets even worse if you are number 2000 in the main queue. In the current system you can go straight to a guest and get maybe ticket 400-500, in your new system the chances are that person would get ticket 1500+ for all the guests they want. Again not fair!

 

It also causes a problem with queue management. Because at first we put up the VTs 1-30. But the same 30 people have numbers 1-30 for all the guests they want to see. They can't be in all the queues at once. Trust me it will not work!

 

The other problem it will cause is that People will take tickets they don't need to give to friends/sell them, it will be too easy. I know it happens now but this would make it so much easier. If you are number 50 in the queue you can get all the guests ticket 50 with no extra hassle. You don't have to stand in an extra queue, you just ask for them.

[BluebizzieB]

Letting in the early bird people 15-20 minutes before the other que. I got an early bird ticket which normally gets me low numbered tickets such as 100 but this year i got 500+ which meant the Early Bird Ticket was pointless.

 

Once everybody (the Early Bird folks) has the VQ tickets the people who has been waiting outside are allowed in then the folks who has high ticket numbers should be shown a waiting area.

There should be a LARGE white board like Milton Keynes where you can see which guest are at a certain number and not just trying to push and shove into the large mass of people to see which number the guest are currently at.

 

Also there should be a place to sit down (not on the floor)+a waiting area for the high numbered folks, there is only a certain amount of times you can walk around stalls before you go mad. The amount of times people has suggested about a sitting area and nobody has listened. I just don't like it when you just sit on the floor and people walk past you and my photos could get damaged and it is not healthy on the floor, germs etc

Edited September 11, 2007 by BluebizzieB

[Psychosis]

Also there should be a place to sit down (not on the floor)+a waiting area for the high numbered folks, there is only a certain amount of times you can walk around stalls before you go mad. The amount of times people has suggested about a sitting area and nobody has listened. I just don't like it when you just sit on the floor and people walk past you and my photos could get damaged and it is not healthy on the floor, germs etc[/b]

 

This was addressed by Showmasters in a post of its own in the LFCC forum

[mpharris]

Letting in the early bird people 15-20 minutes before the other que. I got an early bird ticket which normally gets me low numbered tickets such as 100 but this year i got 500+ which meant the Early Bird Ticket was pointless.

 

Once everybody (the Early Bird folks) has the VQ tickets the people who has been waiting outside are allowed in then the folks who has high ticket numbers should be shown a waiting area.

There should be a LARGE white board like Milton Keynes where you can see which guest are at a certain number and not just trying to push and shove into the large mass of people to see which number the guest are currently at.

 

Also there should be a place to sit down (not on the floor)+a waiting area for the high numbered folks, there is only a certain amount of times you can walk around stalls before you go mad. The amount of times people has suggested about a sitting area and nobody has listened. I just don't like it when you just sit on the floor and people walk past you and my photos could get damaged and it is not healthy on the floor, germs etc

But the other queue were also Early Bird people, they just (for whatever reason) hadn't pre-bought there tickets, why should they have less priority even though they are paying the same amount for entrance?

 

High ticket number holders being "Shown a waiting area"? - Apart from the minor detail of locating an area in which to herd the people with higher numbers, I don't think the dealers would be too pleased if half the attendees had been located in a specific area and told to wait there until there number was called! If you just mean an area set aside for people to wait if they have finished browsing etc. then basically that just ties in with there being adequate seating and announcements made of what ticket numbers are being seen (either via boards or a tannoy)

[Queen_Sindel]

and my photos could get damaged

 

That's what folders are there for: so you can put your photos in and they are protected.

[Too Tall]

Letting in the early bird people 15-20 minutes before the other que. I got an early bird ticket which normally gets me low numbered tickets such as 100 but this year i got 500+ which meant the Early Bird Ticket was pointless.

 

Once everybody (the Early Bird folks) has the VQ tickets the people who has been waiting outside are allowed in then the folks who has high ticket numbers should be shown a waiting area.

Never going to happen. It's unfair on the people that are paying on the day. They are paying for early bird too.

 

There should be a LARGE white board like Milton Keynes where you can see which guest are at a certain number and not just trying to push and shove into the large mass of people to see which number the guest are currently at.

These went missing at LFCC. It was a mistake one that usually would have been sorted but due to the show being soo busy the people that would normally sort that out were running about doing crowd control etc. This will be sorted for the next show.

 

Also there should be a place to sit down (not on the floor)+a waiting area for the high numbered folks, there is only a certain amount of times you can walk around stalls before you go mad. The amount of times people has suggested about a sitting area and nobody has listened. I just don't like it when you just sit on the floor and people walk past you and my photos could get damaged and it is not healthy on the floor, germs etc

As others have said, this has already been covered. There will be a seating area at the next show. There was meant to be at this show but due to the last minute Heroes guests the space was used for them instead. NExt time we'll be in EC2 and there will be more than enough space for a seating area.