The next day, however, I made the mistake of running a report on last year, and found that I had 2x the amount of people at the same time. And now that my 24 hour opening sale is off and people are just trickling in every few hours, I can safely say that I have only just about half the people I got on opening night last year. Ugh. That’s not good. It was a bit of a punch in the gut, honestly.
It could be attributable to many things - my theory is, after being burned two years in a row, people are more cautious and want to wait until later in the summer to decide if it’s safe and see if there’s any danger of me cancelling again. Coronavirus news at the moment is pretty bleak, with numbers up everywhere and new variants avoiding immunity all over the place, so if it were me, I wouldn’t be booking any events four months out. It could be a couple hundred right wingers mad at me for my vaccine requirement - I caught a few grousing about it on FB, and got one stupid letter from a Karen in San Diego saying no other businesses are still requiring vaccines so why am I (maybe because unlike a restaurant my event involves people exercising in each other’s faces for four days straight in a packed ballroom with crappy ventilation? Maybe?). It could be people can’t afford the flights which are 2x what they were last year. But my worst fear is people have just moved on. I think I may have to do more rebuilding than I’d thought, and that this return year, unfortunately, may be the one many choose to skip.
The F is convinced it’s because I never used my mailing list, and he could be right. Also, other events around the US and the world are kicking ass right now, with huge sell-out turnouts, so maybe I’m just a slow starter? Maybe when the two events at the end of this month wrap up people will turn their eyes to me…? Or maybe I’m just going to take a hit this year for a million reasons I have no control over that have nothing to do with the appeal or lack thereof of my event and I need to just deal with it. Or, everyone will sign up at the last minute.
Either way, with my price increase I’m doing about 80% of the money I had last year with only 50% of the people. So…there’s that.
The F and the boys spent the day Sunday suit shopping and got their outfits together for the wedding. I have my beautiful sister-made dress in hand now, and a friend will come tailor it next week, and after that I finally get to do a hair trial and have my two bridal showers. Things are moving right along.
All week all I can think about is being in the desert again. Unfortunately the new Marvel movie comes out Friday night so most likely the boys and the F will go see it and we won’t leave until Saturday, which leaves us just a few hours Saturday and Sunday and then we head back. But the main purpose of going there is to install security cameras so we can keep an eye on it over the summer, so if we just do that, that’s enough. I bought some black light headlamps so we can spot scorpions. I’ve never seen one in person in my life, but I think they’re going to be a part of our desert routine from now on.
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