As the state starts to reopen, large-scale events are still not possible.
“To plan gatherings of people is illegal right now and it’s sort of devastating for us in this industry,” said Courtney Church, the co-founder of Corinthian Events.
However, event planners are starting to find ways to make their work happen.
“On the non-profit side of things, often these fundraising events are their lifeline for next year’s budgets so to postpone is not really an option at all,” said Regina Burns of Rise Event Production.
Many planners have been helping clients choose between postponing, re-planning their events for a smaller crowd or going virtual. Burns said that there are some benefits to the virtual model.
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“I just attended, a couple of days ago, an American Cancer Society event; it was the Discovery Ball in Chicago and normally I would not be able to attend an event in Chicago right now,” she said.
Corinthian Events is known for large events across New England. They think they have found ways to continue to host some of those safely.
“What we are focusing on is some hybrid models and getting some live events happening in the sort of drive-in experience,” Church explained.
The drive-in experiences would be like the traditional movie setup but with speakers or performers. It’s just one example of what they say will be a new feel to events in the months to come.
“The key things that we are hearing is no travel, keep it local and the micro-meeting will be the new normal for the time being,” Church said. “Whether that’s a corporate event or non-profit event or social occasion where they can go to the Cape or Newport, where they feel like they are getting away with the social distancing, and we can still live stream it for those who don’t feel safe going out in public.”
They all said that they have been working hard to get the technology right and make it user-friendly. But a struggle since the start has been working under unknown guidelines.
It’s still unclear what the rest of the year will look like, but they said they are working with what they know now and getting very good at pivoting quickly.
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