Week Five - 28/02/11 - 06/03/11

This week for the showcase module a meeting was held in which the venue discussion cropped up. During this discussion on the venue to possible locations were put forward. The first location was the Lincoln University campus located across the road from Hull College, and the second venue being Fruit.

Lincoln Uni:
The location was selected as a possible venue due to it having a cinema complex on campus which was available to students. Though I was not present at the investigation of the location, the group was impressed with the facilities available. Also with it being located closer to Hull College would be beneficial in that it would allow for minimal transport for any extra equipment.

Fruit:
The fruit space although located a bit further away from the college is a dedicated venue space designed for putting on events (whereas Lincoln is just a cinema complex). Also it sports a bar serving alcoholic and non-alcoholic beverages which may be beneficial in persuading people to attend. The facilities at fruit are also more designed to be flexible i.e. lighting rig, movable stage, and a professional PA system.

After considering both the pros and cons of both venues the group looked at the costs of both venues and what was made available at these costs.

Fruit would cost £250 to hire the space and all the equipment available, also it would pay for bar staff and for a bouncer to man the door. Also they would allow us to make changes to the space for our event. Lincoln university would cost £335 just for the cost of the cinema complex not including any other areas, or staff for the projector. It would cost an extra £200 to use the other facilities (an exhibition room) and to staff the projector. This combined with the lack of a bar, catering, and bouncer’s means that Lincoln University is too expensive for our budget.

This left only the Fruit venue which certain people in the group had disagreements with. However when this was put to the vote the majority voted on Fruit being the venue for the showcase.

Upon reflecting on this process of events it shows that although it has taken longer than expected to choose a venue for the event it has shown that we have considered all the options available to us considering distance, cost, capacity, catering/bar, space, and availability. Instead of simply jumping on the first ship we researched exactly what we wanted which has finally paid off in that the event now has a venue that will suit the style and feel of the event.