craighmandy Posted June 19, 2015 Share Posted June 19, 2015 OK, so last year, the outside queue on Saturday was a mess. It was mostly my fault for not realizing how busy Stan Lee was going to be, and arriving around 1045, I didn't get in till 1630. I still enjoyed myself either way. Now with the move to Olympia, I have my concerns and would love someone from Showmasters to give us some idea of what we can expect in the way of queue management for the weekend. I'm not asking for detailed plans just some pointers on what is planned. Firstly the positives. The ticketing system for only prepaid is a dream come true, at least you know before hand figures. The actual Olympia building is a much better building than Earls Court in regards to size and also the upstairs balcony. The negative? The main area outside for queuing is tiny! We only have that one slip road coming out of the Olympia tube. I can foresee queues merging, the sheer amount of people moving about is going to be horrendous. I implore Showmasters to have a cast iron plan on how to move people about and how you are going to queue manage. Most reasonable people are happy queuing for extended periods but when its hot, you have kids (I don't) screaming, I can only imagine how tough it must be. Showmasters, please don't reply with "the outside of the building is not our responsibility" because it is, we are your customers, your fans, we don't want a bad experience before we get in the building. Last year all I saw was a handful of scared volunteers being abused and shouted at because nobody knew what was going on. Please Showmasters: - Have people walking the entire queue, shouting at the top of their lungs, from top to bottom informing people of estimated wait times, - Have people looking out for queue jumpers - Have plenty of signage up, too much is not a possibility. - Have barriers up to secure bends in queues so they dont merge Please dont take these as negatives, I love the cons Showmasters put on but as these things get bigger and better (just like any good sequel) you have to have the infrastructure in place because its no longer just hardcore geeks who go to these things but the general public and I would hate for it to turn into a disaster. Me personally I am only going on the Friday (I am lucky that I have booked off work). Will be queuing from say 11am and am not expecting to meet any of my guests. That way when I get in on time and meet my guests and everything runs smoothly I will come on the forum and praise Showmasters to high heaven. This post is not for me, its for the people who don't visit the forum, have no understanding of how busy Saturday is going to be. I wont be going on Saturday anymore as its just too overwhelming. The guest line up this year is out of this world, keep up the good work Showmasters! :) 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SciFiRob Posted June 19, 2015 Share Posted June 19, 2015 Since attendance figures are bigger and more people will turn up for 9am entry you are right...on Saturday outside space is a premium and would be chaos... What they need is to use olympia grand to queue people 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
craighmandy Posted June 19, 2015 Author Share Posted June 19, 2015 I agree, that small road is going to be chaos if its not handled and managed properly. A couple of years ago when they had an event there, I bought early bird tickets and the queues were a sea of chaos, all snaked up and merging. It was horrible and seriously stressful. Not why I go to these events for. I go to have fun! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SciFiRob Posted June 19, 2015 Share Posted June 19, 2015 I remember it well, and the event back then was about 1/3rd the size of how big this LFCC is going to be :) You can't have 10,000 people (at least) trying to queue outside Olympia before 9am, there's no space. A few thousand and the area becomes heaving...10,000 and people will be queuing on top of the tube trains! So....if you had booked the West/National/Central halls for the event and knowing how many people will turn up, you'd hope you might need to book the Grand as an effective place to queue people and manage queues... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
craighmandy Posted June 19, 2015 Author Share Posted June 19, 2015 I'd love Showmasters to have the Grand as a holding area but alas I don't think so:( Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Queen_Sindel Posted June 19, 2015 Share Posted June 19, 2015 Jason has tackled a lot of points in his debrief last year: http://showmastersonline.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=85464 Some of the main areas of concerns are gone due to various reasons - no more different doors, no more pay on the day sales for Saturday, only one entry time. So Saturday will only have one queue, plus Gold Pass. The concerns from last year have definitely been taken into account. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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