Oh, snap. We're Eventing Again!

No more zoom rooms. I'm so past the chat. Virtual is so 2020.

When I'm not writing, doodling, or momming... the majority of my time is spent at work. Lucky for me, I absolutely love what I do. It turns out they were right when they said "If you love what you do, you'll never work a day in your life." Well may be that was a slight overstatement... but you get it.

My springs are usually super busy with events. I'm an event planner by trade and by nature. And while my job is not really full-time event planning anymore, a lot of the events I do are in the spring. This spring brought year two of a virtual gagla.... I mean gala. It's not that the event wasn't great (brushing that dirt off my shoulder), but it's just not how engaging and meaningful events are supposed to be. You know when they make that announcement at the beginning of an amazing broadway show to turn off your phones? Well that doesn't happen virtually. And while I've always been accustomed to a 10% drop off in attendees, virtual no-shows are reported to be 3.5X that! And while there is an industry behind planning virtual events, and ensuring that all is amazing, there are no tech issues and 100% show up... it's not full proof. So this event planner is glad to be getting back to in person soon (Thank you vaccines!).

As I look back on the last 15 months of virtual engagements, events, and tours, I have to recognize the growth and development we've made - the new skills, techniques, and experiences. It's great to know there is an always an option to go virtual for those that can't travel or to cast a wider net by not limiting events to a physical location. And I truly have been impressed by the ability to make a trade show virtually, or create a cocktail party setting online, or send hundreds of guests perfectly branded swag boxes, or even all the virtual games and engagements out there.

But for many of us event planners (who are often times extroverts who live for bringing groups of people together), I think we are all relieved to have gotten to the end of this dark tunnel. For millions of personal reasons, and now a few professional ones too.