Gold Pass review - Showmasters

[SirGeeksalot]

I almost always get a Gold pass not to feel special or elitist but because I do LOADS of photoshoots and it really helps with giving me time between shoots. I did 14 last weekend, which is actually pretty conservative for me. Unfortunately I didn't get the value of the Comic Gold pass as on Friday I was told (incorrectly) on 3 shoots that Comic Gold pass holders didn't have priority, this was corrected for Saturday but on that day it was apparently too full in two of the queues for the pass I paid £195 for to give me the priority so I was expected to go to the back of the queue anyway.

 

The Gold pass has always been good value for me in the past but wasn't at this one.

 

- G

[UZI SUICIDE]

I've been reading these forums since Saturday night and I have not seen a single person blame Stan, I have seen dozens of people express thanks and pity for him. What made Sunday a shambles was the fact that nobody knew where Stan was, and this is frankly not good enough. Stans late, ring his manager and find out whats going on, then honestly explain that at the earliest opportunity so we don't stand around all day waiting for something that's not gonna happen, at least then we could have gone home or done something else.

 

The same thing happened at MK with Nichelle Nichols...she was very late back after lunch and nobody knew where she was for ages. Eventually it was rumoured she had gone off to do an interview or something without telling SM. The line was crazy by the time she turned up, and we very nearly missed getting a photoshoot. If a guest gets sick, gets fed up and goes home early, doesn't turn up at all....all of which have happened several times since I've been attending, the answers always "we don't know", and that's not good enough.

[homerj]

This was my third year with a gold pass and the worst. I did get everyone that I wanted and attended all photo shoots that I had, but the overall experience was pretty bad. The GOLD room was full of non Gold pass holders and only 5 chairs on Saturday and 3 on Sunday. Nothing on the tables and their was rubbish everywhere. The guests passed through the gold room and they must have thought that this area was a rubbish tip and not somewhere where people had paid a lot of money for.

 

There were 'friends of the crew' pushing in front of people in certain queues but the worst one was when I was in the queue for Ian Mcdiarmid and there was a 'dealer' who had around 30 autographs to be signed which was really unfair to everyone else that was queuing up. That made me almost miss my photo with summer glau.

I just hope that showmasters will improve the gold passes and the problems in the future that have occurred at this event.

[only_jay]

I did 30 photoshoots and didn't have a single problem

Wow 30 shoots? Impressive! Don't suppose you were the Lars from Denmark who was obsessed with Dina that I was talking to on Sunday Morning queing in the gold pass line for entry?

[PhantomMajor]

 

What distinguishes a "pit boss" from any other crew member?

Red shirt. Outnumbered by the blues.

 

i only saw 4 red shirts over the entire weekend, did the rest miss the bus to the event?

[sabre86]

My reasons for a gold pass:

Early entry for easier purchases.

Fast turnaround on photo shoots to squeeze them in.

Chance to sit down so my recurring slipped disc doesn't immobilise me.

FRIDAY

A team walked the queue handing out comic golds, then silvers. A little later they both walked the queue again. The crew handing out gold passes took a more leisurely approach. I found them near the door as regular ticket holders streamed in. I eventually got in at 6.15, so faced a 40 minute queue to buy photo tickets.

SATURDAY

At the Summer Glau shoot I showed my pass and was sent to the back of the "gold" queue. I knew there were a lot of passes this year so wasn't worried by the size. I eventually realised they were ignoring passes and just lumping us all together.

For my next shoot I insisted on being sent to the front. The crew member I spoke to had no idea what I was talking about and had to get help! They eventually set up a gold queue, but had to keep pushing regular ticket holders at of the way. I would like to say how good humoured the "regulars" remained during this bizarre dance.

Although this situation improved over the weekend, some photos areas were less than fussy when it came to checking passes. The biggest problem was at E, but this was not really their fault. Some idiot had come up with the idea of using a busy passageway as photo queue area. Not surprisingly the crews' biggest priority was keeping things moving. Hats off to them for that.

SUNDAY

As I mentioned earlier, I was amazed at how tolerant regular ticket holders remained. The same was not so of all crew. I struck up a conversation with one crew member queueing for autographs on Sunday. He didn't realise I was gold, and told me that whenever he saw a gold pass "pushing" his way to the front he wanted to tell them to F*** O**. Obviously £195 is not enough to warrant priority.

GOLD ROOM

What can I say. My back really appreciated having to clamber onto a table. There were a number of non-golds in there, but they had already been punished enough for their crimes. Being in the gold room!

CONCLUSION

The gold pass still made things easier, but not as much as previously. I do think that £195 is a bit much for a packet of crisps.

I do want to make it clear that my rant is NOT directed at the crew. Their training was not up to scratch, but that's the management's fault. Photo area E caused problems, but that's the management's fault. The gold room was a sham, but that's the management's fault.

Maybe the management should be sacked and the hard working crew take over?

[MiniDawson]

To be honest my real motivation for buying a Gold Pass was to ensure i would meet Stan.

 

as it was i could have bought a standard entry for Sunday rocked up on the early signing on Friday and bam done.

 

But as myself and my buddy had them we thought we might as well enjoy them, we were a little disappointed before the event (as i posted a little time after i bought the tickets) that it had had the Stan Lee talk removed from it when it clearly said all talks in the online shop, this was changed a little later, but hey thats one for trading standards I guess.

 

But the nice thing was i could spend the 3 days not worrying about the crowds, i managed to hit the gold pass room whilst i was waiting for my wife to come in on her early bird ticket on sunday, and actually opened a tub of sweets and had a couple. Spread out my autos across the 3 days, every single blue shirt i encountered under stood how they worked, that i could just join the back of any queue for autos, the only exception was one poor guy who thought i could just walk to the front of the q, i corrected him, he looked relieved.

 

My friend had a photoshoot with out any issue. and we rocked up on sunday about 11:30 and walked straight in. all in all glad i did it will be a while before i do it again unless SM some how manage to reanimate Harold Ramis, then im there!

[dr nick riviera]

 

 

The photo shoots didn't have a gold pass acess as advertised,

It should have been, and certainly was in one area on Saturday. Did you speak to the crew in the area concerned? And/or the pit boss (red crew shirt)?

I'm an idiot, I replied to this and forgot...... Edited July 15, 2014 by dr nick riviera

[MrsEllacott]

I've been reading these forums since Saturday night and I have not seen a single person blame Stan, I have seen dozens of people express thanks and pity for him. What made Sunday a shambles was the fact that nobody knew where Stan was, and this is frankly not good enough. Stans late, ring his manager and find out whats going on, then honestly explain that at the earliest opportunity so we don't stand around all day waiting for something that's not gonna happen, at least then we could have gone home or done something else.

 

The same thing happened at MK with Nichelle Nichols...she was very late back after lunch and nobody knew where she was for ages. Eventually it was rumoured she had gone off to do an interview or something without telling SM. The line was crazy by the time she turned up, and we very nearly missed getting a photoshoot. If a guest gets sick, gets fed up and goes home early, doesn't turn up at all....all of which have happened several times since I've been attending, the answers always "we don't know", and that's not good enough.

 

Go to the pinned post at the top, Jason has made a full explanation of every thing in regards to Stan Lee, for which most people have accepted and understood.

[Larsy]

 

I did 30 photoshoots and didn't have a single problem

Wow 30 shoots? Impressive! Don't suppose you were the Lars from Denmark who was obsessed with Dina that I was talking to on Sunday Morning queing in the gold pass line for entry?

That would be me :-)

[Cliffmas]

I have to say that I found a lot of the blue shirts were miss informed about gold passes on the Friday. I had to argue the fact that I'd paid extra to Que jump and was told first come first served and found this very frustrating .

On the Saturday and Sunday no problems gold pass worked like a dream . Thank you show masters for a great weekend

[Cliffmas]

I have to say that I found a lot of the blue shirts were miss informed about gold passes on the Friday. I had to argue the fact that I'd paid extra to Que jump and was told first come first served and found this very frustrating .

On the Saturday and Sunday no problems gold pass worked like a dream . Thank you show masters for a great weekend

[Cliffmas]

I have to say that I found a lot of the blue shirts were miss informed about gold passes on the Friday. I had to argue the fact that I'd paid extra to Que jump and was told first come first served and found this very frustrating .

On the Saturday and Sunday no problems gold pass worked like a dream . Thank you show masters for a great weekend

[Cliffmas]

Stupid bloody phone

[Alric]

Even with the gold pass I found the auto queues far more hassle this year then normal. In the end I gave up with the time that some of the queues were taking and in the end got 11 less than I had planned. Had we been able to have a rest I would have stayed longer to get more of them.

[GamerGraph]

i had no problem joining the back of signing queues just join the back and wait, its very good!

[User_name]

The Gold Pass room was beyond shocking. I was in there late on Saturday evening when some people from the Young Writers thing came in and started setting some stuff up. I asked what was going on, as it was just before 6pm and the con was closing. They said they were setting up for a party for the authors to do with their thing, which seemed nice.

 

They were putting really decent decorations up and covering all the tables with tablecloths - basically making the room a million times nicer than how it was when they came in. Sure, it costs money to buy even cheap tablecloths and decor for these things, and it may have been something separate to Showmasters which caused this to be all set up, but it doesn't take much to make things not disgusting.

 

The bins were overflowing and rancid smelling, the tables were left uncovered and ugly (sure, that's not the worst of it) and my God there were no chairs at all to begin with. Someone said there were at least benches last year, but seriously - there were people who were unable to stand with gold passes, and when the only way to get FIVE chairs was for someone to take them from somewhere else, you've got a problem.

 

I didn't expect much in the way of refreshments, so I won't complain about the piddly bowls of 1p sweets and multipack bags of crisps thrown on some tables, but everything else was awful.

 

There were people without gold passes in the room by the end of the weekend (can't speak for the Friday or Saturday as I didn't really notice) but on Sunday the sign on the door had mysteriously vanished so these people cannot be blamed for not knowing the room was """'""exclusive""""" to gold pass holders. We did get a peek into the room for the special guests which had ... the horror ... tablecloths! Food! CHAIRS!

 

Perhaps the focus was more on making as much money as possible and screw the complaints that come afterwards.

[Sheppy dreamer]

I have one request for pass holders if you have a pass when speaking to crew say where do the gold/silver etc passes queue not just hold your arm up and ask where to queue as it is possible to miss the wristband. When running the photo queues on Sunday I made sure that I always had a separate line for pass holders one for disabled guests and one for standard.

[Rockstar6662]

The Gold Pass room was beyond shocking. I was in there late on Saturday evening when some people from the Young Writers thing came in and started setting some stuff up. I asked what was going on, as it was just before 6pm and the con was closing. They said they were setting up for a party for the authors to do with their thing, which seemed nice.

 

They were putting really decent decorations up and covering all the tables with tablecloths - basically making the room a million times nicer than how it was when they came in. Sure, it costs money to buy even cheap tablecloths and decor for these things, and it may have been something separate to Showmasters which caused this to be all set up, but it doesn't take much to make things not disgusting.

 

The bins were overflowing and rancid smelling, the tables were left uncovered and ugly (sure, that's not the worst of it) and my God there were no chairs at all to begin with. Someone said there were at least benches last year, but seriously - there were people who were unable to stand with gold passes, and when the only way to get FIVE chairs was for someone to take them from somewhere else, you've got a problem.

 

I didn't expect much in the way of refreshments, so I won't complain about the piddly bowls of 1p sweets and multipack bags of crisps thrown on some tables, but everything else was awful.

 

There were people without gold passes in the room by the end of the weekend (can't speak for the Friday or Saturday as I didn't really notice) but on Sunday the sign on the door had mysteriously vanished so these people cannot be blamed for not knowing the room was """'""exclusive""""" to gold pass holders. We did get a peek into the room for the special guests which had ... the horror ... tablecloths! Food! CHAIRS!

 

Perhaps the focus was more on making as much money as possible and screw the complaints that come afterwards.

To be honest I rarely have time to go in the room and when I have in previous years, it's always been like that. Nice to have some space to go but honestly, no chairs? that's part of the point of it, to have somewhere to go sit. Should also have someone assigned to keeping it clean, fill up the water thingy, top up snacks and make sure that only pass holders go in. Ok, not the best job in the world but considering how much we pay for the pass surely rotating a few crew members around to do that isn't so hard. Just comes across as an afterthought.

[User_name]

Nobody seemed to actually know what a Comic Gold Pass meant. On multiple occasions I went to several queues and asked if the pass meant anything and I was told rather curtly "no".

I did this again when I was waiting for the (DEEPLY AWKWARD) Stan Lee photoshoot to start at 12. The guy was nice enough, but he said 'no the gold pass doesn't mean anything for this photoshoot, come back around 11.30 and you can queue then'. I came back to the huge crowd at that time, and he started calling numbers saying numbers 1-500 could queue, whereas 501-1000 had to come back in half an hour. I was about to leave, when he started asking for Gold Pass people. Luckily I was on the other side of the crowd and got to the queue of Gold and Silver Pass people and someone kindly let me into the queue. I really don't think I would have been able to do my photoshoot had I decided to walk away and come back in half an hour.

 

Stan was late that day anyway, but I was lucky in that everyone attending the con was very friendly and accommodating when it came to queues, even the angry people who had bad experiences were nice. Most of the staff were just 'okay'. Some were unnecessarily sarcastic or curt when asked questions, which sure, you're working a long shift, but you decided to take a volunteer job in customer service. If you don't like dealing with the public for extended periods of time - don't.

 

Not sure why the staff at the awkward photoshoot with Stan the Man were so rude - I understand that he's an old man, but the Showmasters staff made it awkward and impersonal when they were repeatedly shouting commands at customers (yes, customers since we all paid to be there) like we were stupid. Again, I understand that Stan is old - but there's probably a reason he doesn't like these photoshoots. I've seen other photoshoot pictures from earlier in the weekend where people were allowed to get closer to him, but the staff at the one I went to on Sunday barked about how we weren't to touch or even get too close to him. Do not hug him. One person claimed to have been shouted at for simply speaking to him, when they asked him to do the Spidey hands - something he was happy to do. I got the impression it was Showmasters flexing their muscles trying to make people do their bidding in order to get more and more people through in less time - thus making the experience deeply awkward for all those involved - Stan, the people having photos with him ...

 

Stan was very nice and polite, as were his people and his security. This wasn't their fault. Everything that was chaotic all weekend seemed down to Showmasters, and Showmasters alone.

 

I only hope this was a brief moment of madness on their behalf - I have been to other Showmasters events before and they've been great (even though those events came at the price of killing other smaller Comic Cons in the area) - because of Stan Lee's presence and the prospect of making money was more important than safety, cleanliness and general politeness.

 

Hopefully that will be gone by next year, but based on the horror I witnessed in the Gold Pass room, I doubt I'll be going out of my way again.

[Avengers7]

The Gold Pass room was beyond shocking. I was in there late on Saturday evening when some people from the Young Writers thing came in and started setting some stuff up. I asked what was going on, as it was just before 6pm and the con was closing. They said they were setting up for a party for the authors to do with their thing, which seemed nice.

 

They were putting really decent decorations up and covering all the tables with tablecloths - basically making the room a million times nicer than how it was when they came in. Sure, it costs money to buy even cheap tablecloths and decor for these things, and it may have been something separate to Showmasters which caused this to be all set up, but it doesn't take much to make things not disgusting.

 

The bins were overflowing and rancid smelling, the tables were left uncovered and ugly (sure, that's not the worst of it) and my God there were no chairs at all to begin with. Someone said there were at least benches last year, but seriously - there were people who were unable to stand with gold passes, and when the only way to get FIVE chairs was for someone to take them from somewhere else, you've got a problem.

 

I didn't expect much in the way of refreshments, so I won't complain about the piddly bowls of 1p sweets and multipack bags of crisps thrown on some tables, but everything else was awful.

 

There were people without gold passes in the room by the end of the weekend (can't speak for the Friday or Saturday as I didn't really notice) but on Sunday the sign on the door had mysteriously vanished so these people cannot be blamed for not knowing the room was """'""exclusive""""" to gold pass holders. We did get a peek into the room for the special guests which had ... the horror ... tablecloths! Food! CHAIRS!

 

Perhaps the focus was more on making as much money as possible and screw the complaints that come afterwards.

 

You had crisps! All I saw was small plate full of white sweets that didn't look very good.

[User_name]

 

The Gold Pass room was beyond shocking. I was in there late on Saturday evening when some people from the Young Writers thing came in and started setting some stuff up. I asked what was going on, as it was just before 6pm and the con was closing. They said they were setting up for a party for the authors to do with their thing, which seemed nice.

 

They were putting really decent decorations up and covering all the tables with tablecloths - basically making the room a million times nicer than how it was when they came in. Sure, it costs money to buy even cheap tablecloths and decor for these things, and it may have been something separate to Showmasters which caused this to be all set up, but it doesn't take much to make things not disgusting.

 

The bins were overflowing and rancid smelling, the tables were left uncovered and ugly (sure, that's not the worst of it) and my God there were no chairs at all to begin with. Someone said there were at least benches last year, but seriously - there were people who were unable to stand with gold passes, and when the only way to get FIVE chairs was for someone to take them from somewhere else, you've got a problem.

 

I didn't expect much in the way of refreshments, so I won't complain about the piddly bowls of 1p sweets and multipack bags of crisps thrown on some tables, but everything else was awful.

 

There were people without gold passes in the room by the end of the weekend (can't speak for the Friday or Saturday as I didn't really notice) but on Sunday the sign on the door had mysteriously vanished so these people cannot be blamed for not knowing the room was """'""exclusive""""" to gold pass holders. We did get a peek into the room for the special guests which had ... the horror ... tablecloths! Food! CHAIRS!

 

Perhaps the focus was more on making as much money as possible and screw the complaints that come afterwards.

 

You had crisps! All I saw was small plate full of white sweets that didn't look very good.

 

 

Yes the crisps went very quickly - when I got there on either Friday or Saturday (it's all merged into one now so I'm not sure) there were a few packets left around, but the crap flavours. I saw the staff chucking new bags around the tables a couple of times, and they were devoured very quickly probably due to the fact that food and drink was extortionate if bought from the hard standing stalls inside Earls Court!

 

The white sweets were mints I think. Someone's idea of good, tasty refreshments ... :/ They did have Gummy Bears, white cola bottles, fizzy ones and egg sweets but they were the ones that went very quickly too.

Edited July 15, 2014 by User_name

[Avengers7]

Well I never saw any thing. That makes me even more cross and I was in the room quite a bit.

[SirGeeksalot]

SUNDAY

As I mentioned earlier, I was amazed at how tolerant regular ticket holders remained. The same was not so of all crew. I struck up a conversation with one crew member queueing for autographs on Sunday. He didn't realise I was gold, and told me that whenever he saw a gold pass "pushing" his way to the front he wanted to tell them to F*** O**. Obviously £195 is not enough to warrant priority.

That's disgraceful and also a bad reflection on Showmasters that someone on their staff (volunteer or not) harbours that kind of attitude towards, not only paying customers, but also customers willing to pay a premium.

 

There's no excuse for anybody to be unnecessarily rude to anyone. No excuse for staff to be rude to customers and no excuse for customers to be rude to staff. Being rude to anyone only creates a negative and hostile atmosphere. I experienced unnecessary rudeness on Friday and Saturday. The first was from a 'blue shirt' on one of the photo shoots on Friday when I tried to use my Comic Gold pass on a photoshoot. I was told I didn't get priority. When I pointed out that other photo shoot areas had given me priority she told me "well, everyone else is wrong and I'm right!" LOL This was while another guy was telling her that Comic Gold DOES get priority.

 

Then on Saturday a 'red shirt' (Pit Boss) was rude to me when I was told (yet again that day) that there was no room for Gold pass holders at the front so I'd have to go to the back anyway. I pointed out that I'd paid £195 for a Comic Gold and was not getting the service I'd paid for, at which point she said (while turning away) "well, you've only done one photo shoot anyway". I then pointed out to her that I'd actually done NINE prior to that. I also witnessed that particular individual being rude to other customers on a couple of occasions while I was in that queue.

 

I have friends that have worked on these shows so I know that people like the ones above are definitely in the minority and, as I've pointed out countless times (and will continue to do so) the majority of these volunteers work hard, are friendly, polite and go the extra mile to help when needed. Unfortunately, when you get someone that is rude, rightly or wrongly, it reflects on everyone else in a lot of people's eyes so Showmasters need to reinforce to this minority that, out of respect for their colleagues and customers, they need to learn not to be rude to customers and treat them with the respect that they themselves would expect to be treated.

 

I appreciate it isn't always easy. I worked for years on a helpdesk where I'd get people constantly being rude so I know it can be difficult not to take it personally and want to say something back or get in a bad mood which then gets vented on other customers.

 

- G

[Avengers7]

I thought the crew were great considering the amount of pressure they were under. I must have been lucky then.