Talking Regional Tourism & Events

This is a brilliant conversation with Janie Jordan, President of the Scone Literary Festival in New South Wales. Prepare to be inspired as Janie shares her treasure trove of event planning tips and strategies, accumulated through years of enriching experiences in the industry. Key Takeaways: Essential event planning tips Audience perspectives and feedback Budgeting, fundraising and revenue streams Strategic thinking and planning Collaboration and community engagement This episode is your gateway to event planning excellence, infused with the wisdom and passion of Janie Jordan. Join us for a journey through the art and heart of crafting unforgettable events.

This is an enlightening conversation with Vicki Lowry of the Deniliquin Ute Muster in New South Wales, talking all things accessible and inclusive events. Uncover the strategies for gathering attendee data, setting accessibility priorities, and embedding inclusivity into every facet of event planning. Key Takeaways: Evolution of accessibility Inclusive event planning Addressing diverse needs Communication and feedback Advice for other events planning for accessibility This episode is a testament to the power of empathy, foresight, and innovation in creating events that embrace diversity and leave no one behind. Join us and be inspired to make your events accessible and inclusive for all.

We sit down with Tom White, the manager of the Murrumbateman Field Days, as we delve deep into the remarkable world of volunteer management. Explore the challenges of recruiting and coordinating over 700 volunteers and the ingenious solutions implemented to navigate the post-pandemic volunteer landscape. Key Takeaways: Volunteer engagement and evolution Community collaboration and local insights  Innovating with communication and induction Overcoming challenges and proactive planning Advice for other events managing volunteers This episode is a treasure trove of insights and strategies for anyone involved in event planning and volunteer management. Tune in and let the Murrumbateman Field Days' volunteer journey inspire you to create unforgettable community experiences.

From jazz to jumpers, blues to soul, Pam unveils the secrets behind this quirky winter festival, which has been enchanting audiences since 2004. Discover the festival's journey of growth, the impact of community involvement, and the focus on delivering unforgettable experiences. Key Takeaways: Attendance, Growth & Evolution Community Connection Debriefing Insights Listening to Feedback Advice for Smaller Events Tune in and let the magic of Jumpers and Jazz Festival inspire your event planning journey! 

In this episode of Talking Regional Events, Linda speaks with Pam Burley from Warwick Jumpers and Jazz in July. This conversation was first recorded in 2021.

In this episode of Talking Regional Events, Linda speaks with Meegan Jones from the Sustainable Events Australia. This conversation was first recorded in 2021.

In this episode of Talking Regional Events, Linda speaks with Greg Donovan from the Outback Music Festival Group. This conversation was first recorded in 2021.

In this episode of Talking Regional Events, Linda speaks with Dale McIver from Alice Springs Event Management. This conversation was first recorded in 2021.

In this episode of Talking Regional Events, Linda speaks with Chris Griffin from Tourism Northern Tasmania. This conversation was first recorded in 2021.

In this episode of Talking Regional Events, Linda speaks with Cathy Treasure from the Parkes Elvis Festival. This conversation was first recorded in 2021.

In this episode of Talking Regional Events, Linda speaks with Bruce Wright from Prime Field Days. This conversation was first recorded in 2021.

In this episode of the Talking Regional Events podcast, Linda speaks with Andrew Squires from the Noosa Alive Festival. This conversation was first recorded in 2021.

Adina was founded in 1971 by Australian watchmaker and current managing director Robert ‘Bob’ Menzies. A determined businessman, Bob had a dream to create a watch capable of withstanding the rigours of the Australian lifestyle. Today the business has grown from one dedicated man to a staff of twenty, including Bob’s son Grant, building the craft of quality Australian watchmaking through the generations. Each year Adina produces over 40,000 artisan watches from its Brisbane factory, available in over 300 retail outlets across the country.In this podcast Grant talks with us about what sponsors expect and look for when sponsoring an event. He provides some great practical tips and insights that will support events of all sizes when they next commence their sponsorship campaign.

Blerter is a simple, easy-to-use platform that helps you centralize your communication, operations and safety processes - connecting your entire event team in one place. It allows events of any size and scale to manage risk, streamline delivery and increase engagement at their event.We understand running major events involves juggling complex, dynamic environments along with managing a diverse workforce and the public in mass. Inadequate technologies haven’t succeeded in meeting these challenges. Until now.With Blerter, you can reduce your response time to operational issues, by deploying resources faster, reacting to situations as they arise and keeping your events team informed.

Today I have the pleasure of talking with Vern Kimball, CEO of Calgary Stampede Canada from 2006 to 2015 following 20 years in other positions in the organization – that’s a total of 29 years with the Calgary Stampede.The Calgary Stampede is a not-for-profit community organization that preserves and celebrates western heritage, cultures and community spirit. Led by over 2,300 passionate volunteers, the year-round events, programs and initiatives invest in youth, support agricultural programs, celebrate western culture and make a lasting economic impact on the city.Each year, Stampede Park hosts over 1,200 business, tourism, sporting, hospitality and community events and welcomes more than two million guests. These year-round events create thousands of jobs and contribute more than $400M to the local economy.Today Vern shares with us the process of renewal of Calgary Stampede and how they rebuilt the brand and reinvigorated the entire event. With new purpose and vision statements, Vern and his supportive and passionate board were on a mission…and what a story of success.

In this episode I talk with Nathan Bennett from the Perth Festival on sponsorship and alternative funding models for festivals and events. Nathan shares great tips and insights into how events can develop sound propositions for partners, both corporate and philanthropic.

In this episode we talk to our international friends about the importance of effective operation and logistic management to better manage risk and incident at your event. Anthony and Warwick share their insights and tips on how events can be more efficient and streamlined with operations, logistics and on site communications, and how this can assist the event with improved risk management and mitigation strategies.

In this episode I speak with Greg Donovan, the founder and organiser of the most remote music festival in the world, Big Red Bash. Greg shares his insights into the power of events to promote and build a brand for a destination, providing tips on how other regional events can more successfully market their event and build the profile of their destination. He talks about undertaking your ideal attendee and what he believes to be the most effective marketing channels for his event.

Having received multi year record state government funding in 2019, event manager of the quirky Henley on Todd event Dale McIver talks about how they achieved this and how other events can learn from this process. Dale shares tips and insights into how regional festivals and events can be more successful in achieving grant funding to support growth and development.

In this episode I have the pleasure of speaking with Jeff Curtis, the CEO of one of largest festival organisations in the US – Portland Rose Festival, based in the City of Roses Portland Oregon USA.With a festival budget‎ of over $3 million and attendance by over 1.2 million event attendees, I will be exploring with Jeff the topic of FINANACE and how such a large festival remains sustainable and rides out the tough patches.In the early 2000’s the committee, the volunteer non-profit Portland Rose Festival Association, created a strategic plan that challenged traditional thinking and gave the festival a new vision. The plan didn't cut the budget or program elements but raised revenue with new program elements and by investing in core elements, using the festival’s strengths. It also included an aggressive strategy to increase the city government’s support of the festival.

One of regional Australia's most successful festivals believes that the post event review process is the most important part of their event management process. In this episode we talk to Cathy Treasure from Parkes Elvis Festival about the importance of visitor feedback and event review to the growth and development of their event. Cathy shares great tips and insights into how they manage this process and the outcomes they have achieved as a result of a thorough and strategic post event review process.

In this episode we talk to Glenn about the importance of data collection for regional events. A key message from Glenn is that whilst events need to find out how they can attract more visitors to their event, just as important is how they can encourage them to spend more at the event. With tips and insights galore, this episode will leave you excited about data collection and what it can help you achieve for your next event.

Today we are talking with the inspiring and bubbly Karen McBride, the Citizenship Manager (aka volunteer manager) of the amazing Woodfordia – organizers of the Woodford Folk Festival, The Planting Festival and Festival of Small Halls.The annual Woodford Folk Festival is the largest of the three events, which requires a small army of over 2,700 volunteers (including 150 department heads and an org structure that will blow your mind!).The Woodford programme features concerts, dances, street theatre, writers’ panels, film festival, comedy sessions, acoustic jams, social dialogue and debate, folk medicine, an entire children’s festival, an environmental programme featuring talks, debates and films, art and craft workshops, circus performances and workshops, late night cabarets, parades and special events including a spectacular fire event.Karen talks to us about the Woodfordia philosophy of empowerment and gratitude, the innovative volunteer software they’ve created called ‘Venus’ and how she ensures supreme efficiencies in everything they do by having robust systems and good tools. Karen’s number one tip in recruiting and retaining volunteers is MAKE THEM LOVE YOU.

Risk management is something many event committees avoid. ‘Those things will never happen to us,’ they say. I call BS. Risk can happen to any event, no matter what size or scale. I believe it is the lack of awareness around what risk is for events that creates this apathy.Risk is so much more than the health and safety of event attendees – think environmental risk, financial risk, marketing or reputational risk.Understanding all of the different types of risk for an event can be overwhelming and quite frankly may make you reconsider running the event …but with simple systems and processes in place to manage risk you will be fine - it does not have to be as scary as it sounds!In this episode, Linda shares a four-step process to effective risk management.“I’ll try hard not to scare you. There is a fine balance between being aware, addressing risks and still delivering an amazing experience. Risk management is not about not-having parts of your event; it’s about making sure you can deliver a quality experience for your attendees safely.”Highlights:1:37 The four-step process to effective risk management1:58 How to identify your event’s risks3:39 How to work out the level of risks5:17 How to mitigate and prevent medium and high risks7:08 Contingency plans7:55 The goal of risk management8:37 Post-event debriefing9:02 A template for your event’s risk management plan and risk action plan9:25 Your committee’s legal responsibilities and getting legal advice10:23 Insurances12:22 Licenses and approvals13:08 Traffic management14:19 Who is responsible for managing risk – committee member or a professional?14:52 Terrorism

Following on from episode 3 where we looked at financial sustainability of events lets dig deeper into one of the core funding sources for all events – sponsorship and grant funding.We love it and we hate it right?! In this episode, Linda shares about• How you can be more efficient and effective in attracting funding support for your event• Systems and processes to use in securing sponsorship and grant funding• Practical tips to get better at securing the right partnerships for your eventHighlights:1:23 Getting clear on what you need and want sponsorship and grant funding for3:02 Identifying your perfect sponsor match3:39 What your event can offer sponsors4:24 What sponsors want to achieve5:20 Your sponsorship tracker spreadsheet5:38 Pitching6:16 Making an initial contact and researching (never pitch cold!)7:41 10 tips for applying for grants9:37 Grant Opportunities toolkit10:08 Pitching process10:52 Servicing your sponsorship agreement12:07 Over deliver where you can12:18 6 tips for sponsorship partnerships14:18 Renewing sponsorship agreements is far easier than developing new ones

In Episode 3 we are going to look at the pathway to financial sustainability, to help you transition your events to be financially-viable and self-sustaining just like many other regional festivals throughout Australia and the world are.Having a clear and focused pathway to financial sustainability will support the success of your event. This pathway will dictate the strategy of your event and should form a large part of your decision-making.It does not matter how small your event is or if it is a community event – an event is a business and it needs to be treated that way. We would not run our businesses without sound financial management and budgeting, so we should not ignore this for our event.In this episode, Linda shares aboutThe four stages on the pathway to financial sustainabilitySetting the event budgetThe responsibilities of the TreasurerIncome and expensesUseful toolsHighlights:1:19 Your financial drive – your reason for raising funds1:56 Pathway to financial sustainability2:08 Four stages of the pathway:Stage 1: Seed-funding new eventsStage 2: Becoming financially viable in 2-5 yearsStage 3: Moving to self-sustainability – 5 years+Stage 4: Optional: commercialization3:02 What stage is your event in, and where would you like it to be?3:33 Setting your event budget – in an efficient and effective way3:57 Committee’s risk appetite4:52 The Finance Coordinator/Treasurer’s role5:13 Regular budget monitoring – tracking expenses5:46 Do you set your income or expenses first?7:06 Expenses: estimates, monitoring actuals7:40 Portfolio managers to manage their own budgets – and not overspend!8:49 Income: benchmark ratios, breakeven point10:10 Scenario planning: targets (e.g. ticket sales) for best case, worst case, break-even and other scenarios (e.g. big headline acts)11:26 Revenue streams to replace reliance on grants and sponsorship, including year-round revenue stream examples13:13 Ticketed vs free events13:44 Last minute and unplanned expenses15:02 In-kind sponsorship that reduces expenses15:49 Useful tools for financial management: Xero, Stall Manager, Local Tickets and similar, online banking, rEvents Academy templates

The pre-planning stage is the golden nugget that all event committees need – a way to systemise their event and create plans and processes that will empower the team.This stage is the most critical in terms of being more efficient and reducing unnecessary pressure and stress.Setting milestones, deadlines and key dates for the overarching event plan allows you to better delegate tasks and reduce the stress for all committee members. Stop overloading your mind and document the process!In this episode, Linda shares practical tips and advice on how to effectively pre-plan for your event to save time and stress in the entire planning process based on these 5 steps:1. Setting up the overarching event planning timeline2. Updating your strategic and operations plan3. Ensuring you have the appropriate team within your committee and equipping them with the tools they need to get on with their job4. Setting up efficient and effective meeting processes5. Setting up online collaboration systemsHighlights:2:05 The 5 steps of event pre-planning2:50 Step 1: Your 12-month planning timeline - the executive group’s Bible4:11 Step 2: Using your strategic & operations plan5:24 Step 3: Ensuring you have the appropriate team within your committee and equipping them with the tools they need6:08 The most effective event committee structure7:09 Step 4: Setting up efficient and effective meeting processes8:37 Communication methods for the committee9:49 Setting up effective online collaboration and record-keeping systems11:11 Setting up efficient communication systems11:35 Setting up email addresses11:56 Setting up a mobile phone12:13 Setting up a shared calendar12:38 Setting up an online discussion board13:19 Where to find DIY tools and templates for pre-planning – and how to get them for free

The first step in planning your event begins at the end!Who is in your tribe? Do you engage with your tribe in order to grow and develop your event? In this podcast we will talk about the importance of the post review phase in the event planning cycle, providing practical insights and take aways to assist you in ensuring that you event is successful and sustainable.