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Feedback 2015

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Pinky:

--- Quote from: Ghostbear on 24.08.2015, 19:59:10 ---The only (hopefully constructive) criticism I have was the charity auction.
Namely how the painted Charity bottles, filled with homemade cherry liqueur were handled (and another auction with some pictures that were auctioned off together instead of seperately).
We never really could see the artwork on the bottles (which was great by the way), the artists sadly were never stated and they were auctioned off together...resulting in a quite low bid.
We (so everybody on the con) collected so much money ... but it could have been more. I remembered the charity auction from I think EF19. There was a clock with several pictures of different artists and things were handled in a similar way, resulting in a similar low bid.
I know time was running out and Kage got rushed, because of other items that took more time. Still maybe it's a good idea for the future to plan a lil more time for charity. I think everybody who gives out art or items for the charity auction should have their gifts treated with enough time to get the most of it for charity (especially if people spend a lot of time to create those things).
Just as a lil and (hopefully) friendly suggestion  :)

--- End quote ---

Hi Ghostbear

The charity auction is the result of cooperation between a lot of departments and even some people who are not in any department or officially work for the convention (such as Kage). Therefore, I cannot address all your points, but I will try to address the ones I can, the ones that relate directly to the charity department.

The artists were never stated: Let's go through the possible causes one by one. When the bottles were submitted, were the artists mentioned there? If not then we have no way of knowing who they are. We make a description for each item, and they have to be short. So possibly the artists might have been omitted there. It could also be that they were submitted and put in the description, but that Kage didn't mention them due to time pressure or having to deal with so many items. Sadly I wasn't at the auction as I had other things to tend to, so I don't know how things happened.

Items were bundled: We sometimes bundle items since we can only have a few items at the auction. Either it can be smaller items that together make up a big enough item that it merits one of the few auction slots. Or it can be similar items where instead of only selling one via the auction and the others through the lottery, we decide to bundle them to "wow" people and make the bidding go high. Yes there is a chance it might make less money than unbundled, but we also sometimes see the opposite effect, that the price goes higher for a set than the individual pieces could have gotten. These things are hard to predict, it really depends on the crowd. Plus, we might only be able to auction one item then, the others would go to the lottery.

Incidentally, let me just say that if something goes to the lottery, that could very well be exactly because it is an awesome item which will help us sell lots of lottery tickets because everyone wants it. I heard one or two people ask why their items were lottery items and not auction items, and I just want to say that there is no pattern of size of impressiveness to that. We need "eye-catchers" for the lottery booth too. And this year, we sold out of lottery tickets at the lottery booth! That never happened before. (You guys rock so much!)

Lastly, you brought up two very good points which I have already discussed with some other departments and we will also have a meeting about internally in my team. The first was time for the charity auction. Right now we basically get what time is left after the general auction. But we could have a fixed amount of time like in some previous years. I will look into the pros and cons of that. The second point was treating donated items with respect. I think we do that already, we really try to sell them for the highest amount (remember this is also in our interest). But we will have a general discussion about Donors' Rights, i.e. how much of a say donors get in what happens to their items. I honestly don't know what to say or think about it right now as I'm dead tired and need to hibernate for a few months like your species does  ;)  But it's certainely worth discussing, which we will.

I want to thank you for your feedback. I hope you are generally satisfied with us. I am taking your points seriously, so even if you do not get a 5-page report on decision outcomes or anything like that, I want you to know that I have heard you and I am listening.

See you next year I hope.

Ray Liehm:

--- Quote from: Ghostbear on 24.08.2015, 19:59:10 ---The only (hopefully constructive) criticism I have was the charity auction.
Namely how the painted Charity bottles, filled with homemade cherry liqueur were handled (and another auction with some pictures that were auctioned off together instead of seperately).

--- End quote ---

As the person directly responsible for the Charity Auction, I feel that I need to add my two cents here (I apologise if I repeat a few things that have already been said). The problem with the Charity Auction is that there is only a limited amount of time in which to sell the items, given the two hour timeslot and that the time has to be shared with the general Art Auction as well. Because of that, we can only accept a certain maximum number of items to Charity Auction, and sometimes this means that items have to be grouped together, in order to fit them in and to give them the best chance of raising as much money at Auction as possible. I did my best to let the donators know that their items may be grouped this way, and the donator of the bottles was informed that they were likely to be auctioned off together (along with the advertising panels that were also donated later). They made a natural set together, and it allowed more items to make it to Auction overall.


--- Quote ---We never really could see the artwork on the bottles (which was great by the way)...
--- End quote ---

All items accepted to Charity Auction are displayed in their own special area of the Art Show in the days before the Auction, so that anyone interested in bidding on them on has a good opportunity to see them beforehand. Given the size of the bottles on stage, it would have been impossible for the entire audience to get a good look at them during the Auction itself (short of calling for the runner to bring the bottles closer), but their images were displayed on the large projector screen over the stage as they were auctioned off, which is the best we can do under the circumstances.


--- Quote ---...the artists sadly were never stated...
--- End quote ---

The artists who contributed to the art on the bottles were listed on the projector screen, and unfortunately there were so many artists who contributed to the advertising panels that it was impossible to list them all on the screen. Uncle Kage was given full information about the artists on both the bottles and the panels on an auction runsheet, but due to the interruption from the audience during the sale of those items which forced the auction to be split in half, and the fact that he had less than 2 minutes to sell each item in the Auction overall, I really can't blame him for thinking on his feet and skipping the runsheet in order to keep things running on time. I agree that it is unfortunate that the artists were not acknowledged, but this was not our intention, and in a live, fast-paced event like the Auction, mistakes do sometimes happen.


--- Quote ---and they were auctioned off together...resulting in a quite low bid.
--- End quote ---

As others have said already, sometimes bundling items together can actually raise the amount for which they are sold (as in, they sell for more than they would have individually). For example, the Furry Fantasy CD set was originally donated as two separate CDs, but together they sold for 550 Euros. Deciding which items to group and which to leave separate, and which items to accept to Auction and which items to turn down can be a very tricky process, as it can be hard to know what the audience will like. We do our best to give every donation the best chance it can get to raise as much money as possible, but sometimes the crowd just doesn't bite.


--- Quote ---Still maybe it's a good idea for the future to plan a lil more time for charity.
--- End quote ---

This is a good point, and it is definitely something we'll be thinking about during our planning and review for next year. I would personally like to see more time given to the Charity Auction, but we will need to see what our options are and whether it is possible.


--- Quote ---I think everybody who gives out art or items for the charity auction should have their gifts treated with enough time to get the most of it for charity (especially if people spend a lot of time to create those things).
--- End quote ---

Please know that we value and appreciate every donation of prizes that we receive for the Eurofurence Charity Auction and Lottery Booth. It's in part because of these donations that Eurofurence is able to raise as much money for our charity each year as we do, and we try to give every donation the best chance of raising money for charity as possible (I think I already said that, but it bears repeating). In fact, we had so many impressive donations this year that we even added an improvised Charity Panel to the Art Show so that some of our donations that wouldn't fit into the regular Charity Auction could still have a chance to sell on a silent bidsheet along with the other items in the Art Show. This is another possibility we'll be looking into repeating next year.

In closing, thank you for giving us your feedback. We'll take on board as much as we can to improve for next year, and I hope that we've been able to clear up some of your concerns.

BlueBerry:
I'm quite relaxed at cons, so a lot of things do not bother me. The one thing that really bothered me was the preparation of chairs and the projection on the canvas at enter the arena. If you did not was sitting in the first two lines, then you could not see the dance floor. Standing did not help to see anything. To look at the canvas was pointless, because due to the light and fog nothing could be seen. So either next year the fursuiter dancing on the stage or you build grandstands.

Hurga:

--- Quote from: djem on 25.08.2015, 13:42:29 ---- I had no EF Prime at all in Wing 3 floor 2, nothing at all :p
--- End quote ---
As far as I know, no one had a working EF Prime in Wing 3 - and that would be my biggest complaint about this EF (I had a blast otherwise). I've been told it's been the hotel's fault, and I really hope EF gets a discount on the price of using the TV infrastructure for that (so they have an incentive to fix it for next time).

Runo:

--- Quote from: Vector on 25.08.2015, 15:33:57 ---Dog permit : some of my friends were really pissed off to see that some VIPs & people from staff were allowed to bring their dogs (although they're not obviously guide dogs for blind people). They were missing their dog and they had to find a solution to find a place and someone to take care of it during the convention.

--- End quote ---

The frustration is understandable. It's just that with a few people, EF has the options of either negotiating a special permit for their dogs with the hotel, or have them not come at all. And since they're usually quite important for the convention, there's not really a choice. On the other paw, a general permit for dogs is not possible any longer either, it just didn't work out well in the past. So there's really not much EF can do about this point, unfortunately.

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