MBAL Students Help FestivALL Officials
- Release Date:Tuesday, April 27, 2010
FestivALL to attempt more accurate head count
By Kathryn Gregory
Charleston Gazette staff writer
CHARLESTON, W.Va. FestivALL officials will be keeping better track of attendees at the wide-ranging Charleston event this year with the use of manual tally clickers, aerial photos and both online and event surveys.
In the past, FestivALL organizers and the city have estimated how many people have attended the events and tried to determine a possible economic impact, but without a clear-cut formula, it's almost impossible to get an accurate answer.
"FestivALL is unique in our region because of the combination of ticketed events and others that are free and wide open for people to come and go as they please, so determining how many people attend our events has been difficult," event director Larry Groce said Tuesday.
To help officials solve their numbers problem, Adam Craft, Paxton Jarrell and Neha Rana, three University of Charleston leadership MBA students, developed a preliminary plan to track attendees.
For ticketed events, it's easy to count how many people attended if you assume one ticket is sold for each person attending, and that everyone who went to the event attended only once, Jarrell said.
However, potential problems with that model are that complimentary ticket holders may not be counted and no-shows may be counted, he said, skewing the numbers.
To alleviate the confusion of relying on ticket sales, or for events that are free and do not require a ticket to enter, the three students suggested using volunteers who would use manual clickers to count attendees.
Of course, Jarrell said, there is always the possibility of human error, but the manual counters will generate a good base number for attendees.
In conjunction with the counters, aerial photos will also be used to capture a view of large events that don't have clearly defined entries and exits, such as the Wine & All That Jazz and the Blues, Brews and BBQ events.
For example, volunteers can be stationed on the ground at a Live on the Levee concert and count attendees while someone else takes a picture of the event from the top of the Chase Bank Building on Virginia Street. For a concert that lasts three hours, the students suggested that the turnover rate could be 1 1/2 hours, so a photographer should take two photos to get a relatively accurate head count.
However, "there is no way to get an accurate turnover time for this year's FestivALL," Jarrell said, and volunteers will have to estimate.
Finally, the students suggested using both event and online surveys to gather information on the economic impact each event has on the city, including how much money attendees spent at the event, how long they stayed at each event, where they traveled from and how many events they attended over the full 10-day period.
"We just want to get a better handle on how many people are attending the 80-some events," Groce said. "We have this responsibility to the city and county and sponsors who fund this event and we would like to be as accurate with our reporting as possible."
Craft said the total numbers could be released as early as one week after FestivALL wraps up.
Even so, the students reminded everyone that "there is no correct way to measure attendance or economic impact," and the model they developed is merely a building block for future FestivALL events.
FestivALL will run June 18-27 at venues throughout Charleston.
