MattBrady
07-28-2006, 02:52 PM
<img src="http://www.newsarama.com/SDCC06/SDCC06Logo.jpg" align="right">Was it only a week ago?
Another San Diego Comic-Con has come and gone, leaving a memories and a crowd of tired Convention employees in its wake. One of those people is David Glanzer, Director of Marketing and Public Relations for Comic Con International. We caught up with Glanzer to talk about the show that was, crowd guesstimating, and turning off the ticket machines.
<b>Newsarama</b>: Let’s start with the biggest ballpark picture we can – generally speaking, how did this year go compared to years previous?
<b>David Glanzer</b>: I think it went well, all things considered. There were things that happened during the weekend that we’d rather didn’t happen, of course the biggest of those was having to stop both online and onsite ticket sales on Friday and Saturday, respectively. That’s something you never want to do, obviously, you don’t want to promote a show that people can’t go to. It’s a disappointment, and we really wish we didn’t have to do that.
That being said, we were certainly able to honor people who had pre-registered, which was one silver lining out of that, and then on Sunday, things seemed to be back to normal, so we were glad for that.
<b>NRAMA</b>: Do you have a feel for the numbers that you saw this year?
<b>DG</b>: Not really – it looks like we’re up from last year, but also, it was uncharacteristically warm in San Diego this year, and I think this year, we saw a lot more people hanging out in the lobby than we normally do, and that made it hard to tell if that’s because there were so many people in the exhibit hall that they spilled out into the lobby, or if those people in the lobby would’ve normally been across the street, grabbing a drink or a meal at a restaurant. So, until we get our actual numbers, we won’t actually know, but just from eyeballing it, it looks like our numbers were up.
<b>NRAMA</b>: And last year was over 100,000, right?
<b>DG</b>: Right – 104,000 total, counting exhibitors and pros.
<b>NRAMA</b>: Going back and talking about the ticket situation. First was Friday, and you stopped the online ticket sales around 1:00 – what helped you make that decision?
<b>DG</b>: We decided to do it just based upon how the sales were doing, so that we wouldn’t get into a situation where we had to close the building on Saturday. As it turned out, we didn’t have to physically close the building, which was very good. A good way to look at this is to compare the way the situation was handled in San Diego as opposed to the way the situation was handled in San Francisco ( http://forum.newsarama.com/showthread.php?threadid=59454). We’ve been in San Diego for 37 years, and have a very good working relationship with both the city and the Fire Marshall as well as the building officials.
In San Francisco, that show’s been around for almost 20 years, and we’ve only been “in” San Francisco for a few of those years, so I don’t know that the city recognizes, and probably rightly so, our ability to handle crowd control. Somebody can tell you that they can do well, but if you don’t have the experience with them doing that, then you’re taking a risk.
In San Francisco, the Fire Marshall thought the hall was to crowded and shut the doors, and basically stopped all sales, so people couldn’t get in for a period of time. In San Diego, we work very closely with the Fire Marshall and city officials, and they had expressed a desire to know what plan we had were our numbers to get too big, and the two things we did was to stop pre-sales and to stop on-site sales, so that we could still accommodate people coming into the building, whether they were people that had pre-registered, or letting a few people in as others left, so there wasn’t a danger of an actual shut down of the building.
We also worked very closely with local media, both broadcast news and radio that they were able to get the word out that we’d be stopping on-site sales, so hopefully that mitigated some people coming down, and not being able to come in.
<b>NRAMA</b>: That said, you did have to turn people away, right?
<b>DG</b>: We did. We ended up closing down on-site sales on Saturday, so people who were in line were told that we didn’t know how long is was going to last, and that as of the present time, we were no longer selling admissions to the show. Some people got out of line, and some people didn’t. Some of those who took their chances did end up getting in. I don’t know how long the on-site sales were closed, but I believe there were periods of time where people could get in. But we always honored those who pre-registered.
<b>NRAMA</b>: And just to be fully clear on this – there was never a danger of the exhibition floor closing, due in part to people being spread out throughout the entire convention center?
<b>DG</b>: Right. We’ve always had methods of moving people around, and that existed in San Francisco as well, but unfortunately in San Francisco, we were never given the opportunity to implement that. I think had we had the Fire Marshall from San Diego, the hall never would have been closed on Saturday of this year. I think we would have had to have done some things to make sure it didn’t get overcrowded, but I don’t think we would have had to have shut the building down. Again, that’s because the Fire Marshall in San Diego has worked with us for so many years.
But no, we were not at capacity for the floor.
<b>NRAMA</b>: In reflecting back on it, what were some of the highlights that brought the people in this year?
<b>DG</b>: That’s a good question. I don’t know. We had a huge guest list this year – probably more than we’ve ever had on our list before. When you have Amano at the show…Ray Bradbury’s always a huge draw…and all these others; and it’s always been a meeting place for pros in comics and film. I think all of that created a lot of buzz early on. We normally don’t advertise our celebrity appearances until closer to the show, so I think the guest list really was responsible for generating a lot of excitement early on that never really let up.
<b>NRAMA</b>: We spoke about this last year – the changing dynamic of the audience. You’re seeing the attendance grow each year, and yet, are you getting a good feel on who these new people are that are coming? Are we talking just more comic fans from farther away, or a broader swath of locals who are pushed past their tipping point, or some mix?
<b>DG</b>: I think we’re seeing a lot of people who are realizing that this is going on. What we’re noticing, and we’ll have a better idea after this year’s show, is that a lot of people return to the show the following year, and bring other people along. It doesn’t necessarily mean they travel together, but a lot of word of mouth goes into the success of this show. It seems that not everybody returns year after year – although there are a significant number of people who do – there are people who come every other year or every couple of years. If they’ve had a good time, they go back and tell people, and chances are good we’ll see the people they told the following year.
A great example is a gentleman who’s been coming to the show for a while, and comes every year – he’s a huge comic book fan, and wanted to bring his new wife along. She didn’t know if she was going to attend, but she did on Preview Night, and then ended up coming on the rest of the days and having a really good time. But at first, she didn’t think that it was something she’d really be into at all.
You can see pictures of Comic-Con, you can read reports of Comic-Con, but it’s very different than actually being at Comic-Con. The first time people who come there realize that, and we seem to have a lot of those people return.
<b>NRAMA</b>: And the people find that it has become its own entity, it’s own classification. You can’t hold it beside other things – it’s no E3, it’s not ShowWest, obviously, because it’s open to fans…there’s really not much else to compare it to, aside from a FanFest, but that’s not quite it either.
<b>DG</b>: I think that’s true. One of the things that we try to do, and catch some flack for not doing more of is people asking us why we don’t toot our own horn more. You have to let people know about the event, and know what’s going on, but I tell you, there is no substitute for word of mouth. When people start talking about the show in a positive way, it helps to promote the show in a certain manner, and we’re grateful for that. Likewise, if there are issues about the show in a negative manner, those are effective too, and will keep people away from the show – those are things that we certainly take to heart and try to address after each year’s show.
<b>NRAMA</b>: Looking ahead then – when do red flags start to kick in when you start thinking of years to come. It seemed that last year, we were talking about the possibility of off-site events this year…is that a worry at this point?
<b>DG</b>: Yeah, that’s always a concern. You want to try to have people in one location, and there are methods that can be implemented to alleviate some of the situations that are of most concern. The facility was not closed down this year, and we recognized that potential early on. Maybe next year, we need to look at it from farther away and be a little more prepared for that.
With that said, there are other ways of dealing with crowd issues – there are things that we can do, and probably will next year that alleviate some of the stress and congestion in certain areas. One of the things we need to do now is have our annual debriefing, and that will include members from every department within the show, the convention facility, and with the city so we can address situations that need to be addressed.
<b>NRAMA</b>: Speaking of the show and its relationship with the city, the week of this year’s show, the <i>Union-Tribune</i> ( http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/features/20060716-9999-1n16comicon.html) had an article about how the city views the show, and it seemed to be a relationship that’s evolved, and there was almost a sense of pride towards the show from the city. Have you felt the change in your relationship with the city?
<b>DG</b>: I have to tell you – I think we were all very pleasantly surprised by that revelation in the paper, and were incredibly honored to have the mayor come to the show, and take part in the stamp ceremony that was held on Thursday. The mayor was there to take part, and welcome everyone to Comic-Con and talked about how he was a collector as a kid, and how he takes pride in the show.
This is a new mayor, and I don’t know if we’ve ever felt that before. His attendance at the show was a pleasant surprise. So – has there been an evolution? If there has, it started a week before, when we started taking to the Mayor’s office.
But I do hope they realize that this and event, and something that we have always known – it’s an amazingly diverse crowd made up of people who are incredibly bright, who spend a great deal of money both on items outside the show and at the show, and it’s a shot in the arm to any city lucky enough to have it. We’ve been here for 37 years, and hope to stay here forever, and it’s good to know that the city seems to be taking notice of us.
Another San Diego Comic-Con has come and gone, leaving a memories and a crowd of tired Convention employees in its wake. One of those people is David Glanzer, Director of Marketing and Public Relations for Comic Con International. We caught up with Glanzer to talk about the show that was, crowd guesstimating, and turning off the ticket machines.
<b>Newsarama</b>: Let’s start with the biggest ballpark picture we can – generally speaking, how did this year go compared to years previous?
<b>David Glanzer</b>: I think it went well, all things considered. There were things that happened during the weekend that we’d rather didn’t happen, of course the biggest of those was having to stop both online and onsite ticket sales on Friday and Saturday, respectively. That’s something you never want to do, obviously, you don’t want to promote a show that people can’t go to. It’s a disappointment, and we really wish we didn’t have to do that.
That being said, we were certainly able to honor people who had pre-registered, which was one silver lining out of that, and then on Sunday, things seemed to be back to normal, so we were glad for that.
<b>NRAMA</b>: Do you have a feel for the numbers that you saw this year?
<b>DG</b>: Not really – it looks like we’re up from last year, but also, it was uncharacteristically warm in San Diego this year, and I think this year, we saw a lot more people hanging out in the lobby than we normally do, and that made it hard to tell if that’s because there were so many people in the exhibit hall that they spilled out into the lobby, or if those people in the lobby would’ve normally been across the street, grabbing a drink or a meal at a restaurant. So, until we get our actual numbers, we won’t actually know, but just from eyeballing it, it looks like our numbers were up.
<b>NRAMA</b>: And last year was over 100,000, right?
<b>DG</b>: Right – 104,000 total, counting exhibitors and pros.
<b>NRAMA</b>: Going back and talking about the ticket situation. First was Friday, and you stopped the online ticket sales around 1:00 – what helped you make that decision?
<b>DG</b>: We decided to do it just based upon how the sales were doing, so that we wouldn’t get into a situation where we had to close the building on Saturday. As it turned out, we didn’t have to physically close the building, which was very good. A good way to look at this is to compare the way the situation was handled in San Diego as opposed to the way the situation was handled in San Francisco ( http://forum.newsarama.com/showthread.php?threadid=59454). We’ve been in San Diego for 37 years, and have a very good working relationship with both the city and the Fire Marshall as well as the building officials.
In San Francisco, that show’s been around for almost 20 years, and we’ve only been “in” San Francisco for a few of those years, so I don’t know that the city recognizes, and probably rightly so, our ability to handle crowd control. Somebody can tell you that they can do well, but if you don’t have the experience with them doing that, then you’re taking a risk.
In San Francisco, the Fire Marshall thought the hall was to crowded and shut the doors, and basically stopped all sales, so people couldn’t get in for a period of time. In San Diego, we work very closely with the Fire Marshall and city officials, and they had expressed a desire to know what plan we had were our numbers to get too big, and the two things we did was to stop pre-sales and to stop on-site sales, so that we could still accommodate people coming into the building, whether they were people that had pre-registered, or letting a few people in as others left, so there wasn’t a danger of an actual shut down of the building.
We also worked very closely with local media, both broadcast news and radio that they were able to get the word out that we’d be stopping on-site sales, so hopefully that mitigated some people coming down, and not being able to come in.
<b>NRAMA</b>: That said, you did have to turn people away, right?
<b>DG</b>: We did. We ended up closing down on-site sales on Saturday, so people who were in line were told that we didn’t know how long is was going to last, and that as of the present time, we were no longer selling admissions to the show. Some people got out of line, and some people didn’t. Some of those who took their chances did end up getting in. I don’t know how long the on-site sales were closed, but I believe there were periods of time where people could get in. But we always honored those who pre-registered.
<b>NRAMA</b>: And just to be fully clear on this – there was never a danger of the exhibition floor closing, due in part to people being spread out throughout the entire convention center?
<b>DG</b>: Right. We’ve always had methods of moving people around, and that existed in San Francisco as well, but unfortunately in San Francisco, we were never given the opportunity to implement that. I think had we had the Fire Marshall from San Diego, the hall never would have been closed on Saturday of this year. I think we would have had to have done some things to make sure it didn’t get overcrowded, but I don’t think we would have had to have shut the building down. Again, that’s because the Fire Marshall in San Diego has worked with us for so many years.
But no, we were not at capacity for the floor.
<b>NRAMA</b>: In reflecting back on it, what were some of the highlights that brought the people in this year?
<b>DG</b>: That’s a good question. I don’t know. We had a huge guest list this year – probably more than we’ve ever had on our list before. When you have Amano at the show…Ray Bradbury’s always a huge draw…and all these others; and it’s always been a meeting place for pros in comics and film. I think all of that created a lot of buzz early on. We normally don’t advertise our celebrity appearances until closer to the show, so I think the guest list really was responsible for generating a lot of excitement early on that never really let up.
<b>NRAMA</b>: We spoke about this last year – the changing dynamic of the audience. You’re seeing the attendance grow each year, and yet, are you getting a good feel on who these new people are that are coming? Are we talking just more comic fans from farther away, or a broader swath of locals who are pushed past their tipping point, or some mix?
<b>DG</b>: I think we’re seeing a lot of people who are realizing that this is going on. What we’re noticing, and we’ll have a better idea after this year’s show, is that a lot of people return to the show the following year, and bring other people along. It doesn’t necessarily mean they travel together, but a lot of word of mouth goes into the success of this show. It seems that not everybody returns year after year – although there are a significant number of people who do – there are people who come every other year or every couple of years. If they’ve had a good time, they go back and tell people, and chances are good we’ll see the people they told the following year.
A great example is a gentleman who’s been coming to the show for a while, and comes every year – he’s a huge comic book fan, and wanted to bring his new wife along. She didn’t know if she was going to attend, but she did on Preview Night, and then ended up coming on the rest of the days and having a really good time. But at first, she didn’t think that it was something she’d really be into at all.
You can see pictures of Comic-Con, you can read reports of Comic-Con, but it’s very different than actually being at Comic-Con. The first time people who come there realize that, and we seem to have a lot of those people return.
<b>NRAMA</b>: And the people find that it has become its own entity, it’s own classification. You can’t hold it beside other things – it’s no E3, it’s not ShowWest, obviously, because it’s open to fans…there’s really not much else to compare it to, aside from a FanFest, but that’s not quite it either.
<b>DG</b>: I think that’s true. One of the things that we try to do, and catch some flack for not doing more of is people asking us why we don’t toot our own horn more. You have to let people know about the event, and know what’s going on, but I tell you, there is no substitute for word of mouth. When people start talking about the show in a positive way, it helps to promote the show in a certain manner, and we’re grateful for that. Likewise, if there are issues about the show in a negative manner, those are effective too, and will keep people away from the show – those are things that we certainly take to heart and try to address after each year’s show.
<b>NRAMA</b>: Looking ahead then – when do red flags start to kick in when you start thinking of years to come. It seemed that last year, we were talking about the possibility of off-site events this year…is that a worry at this point?
<b>DG</b>: Yeah, that’s always a concern. You want to try to have people in one location, and there are methods that can be implemented to alleviate some of the situations that are of most concern. The facility was not closed down this year, and we recognized that potential early on. Maybe next year, we need to look at it from farther away and be a little more prepared for that.
With that said, there are other ways of dealing with crowd issues – there are things that we can do, and probably will next year that alleviate some of the stress and congestion in certain areas. One of the things we need to do now is have our annual debriefing, and that will include members from every department within the show, the convention facility, and with the city so we can address situations that need to be addressed.
<b>NRAMA</b>: Speaking of the show and its relationship with the city, the week of this year’s show, the <i>Union-Tribune</i> ( http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/features/20060716-9999-1n16comicon.html) had an article about how the city views the show, and it seemed to be a relationship that’s evolved, and there was almost a sense of pride towards the show from the city. Have you felt the change in your relationship with the city?
<b>DG</b>: I have to tell you – I think we were all very pleasantly surprised by that revelation in the paper, and were incredibly honored to have the mayor come to the show, and take part in the stamp ceremony that was held on Thursday. The mayor was there to take part, and welcome everyone to Comic-Con and talked about how he was a collector as a kid, and how he takes pride in the show.
This is a new mayor, and I don’t know if we’ve ever felt that before. His attendance at the show was a pleasant surprise. So – has there been an evolution? If there has, it started a week before, when we started taking to the Mayor’s office.
But I do hope they realize that this and event, and something that we have always known – it’s an amazingly diverse crowd made up of people who are incredibly bright, who spend a great deal of money both on items outside the show and at the show, and it’s a shot in the arm to any city lucky enough to have it. We’ve been here for 37 years, and hope to stay here forever, and it’s good to know that the city seems to be taking notice of us.