Transworld Charging!!

[UnDeRTaKer313]

the seminars are my complaint. i paid $60 PER seminar last year and i was not happy with them. the ones that i went to were just around an hour and during one of them we just watched a video the whole time that is available online anyway to watch for free. charge for the showfloor and let the seminars be free.

[zombietoxin]

"Growing pains" I suppose.

Some of the trade shows I attend for my "other job" have fees to attend UNLESS you are an association member- then its free (but that is an ugly can of worms in itself). Still others charge as much 5-600 for association + 200 for show entrance.

In both instances, members are getting some other benefit for what they pay, besides admission.

The TW? Not aware of any other perks, and I too would like to know what the money goes to- in fact in an association ALL of the fees- vendor and buyer- are usually published somewhere. The lack of this transparency does make you wonder- just a bit.

Anyway- I'm certain the vendors will like and benefit from this arrangement for the most part, but I do know for a fact that I had actors expressing real interest in attending in order to select silicone masks and catch a show discount. I like the fact that my actors want to involve themselves even more! But I'm pretty sure the additional cost will throw cold water on their enthusiasm. We'll see.

I'll still be there either way, but the scale has just tipped a bit to the sketchy side- until TW makes me feel like I'm still getting value.

[Allen H]

Im Sure the money "goes to" transworld, they are a for profit company. Im sure they are charging in order to increase the profitability of the show- thats their right. Damn its starting to sound like "Occupy Transworld" in here.
They are hurting because the party/costume side is being eaten up by the January Houston show- they need to make up that loss of revenue- makes sense to me. Im sympathetic to both sides, but it is their business to run how they want- we can help alter their policies by using the power we have- to attend or not to attend. I will be there, the $50 is a drop in my tax write off bucket and it helps ensure a good tradeshow for my industry in the future.
Allen H

[HauntedPaws]

Also $50 a ticket keeps out the mister and misses "I'll be back" who waste the vendors short time and allows qualified buyers to get that time and make a big purchase.

[Matt Marich]

Show costs

So you all know, it cost our company, Edge Designs, roughly $ 25,000.00 to do the show from Phoenix. Thats for 4 booths. Trucking, Labor, Hotels, Travel, Food, Printing, show costs. But it costs about another $ 30,000.00 to build a new product line every year, materials, overhead, labor. So you can see it's quite expensive to do this every year. But it's worth it, I for one supported this cost, but will give you back the $ 50.00 if you spend $ 500.00 or above with us. You can see that we all, us vendors, have real cost issues, If I make a large animation, and sell none, I loose that money.

We are all in this together, and I do agree this might eliminate some of the looky lous, this is our #1 marketing tool for the year. Transworld truly cares about us, we would be in deep trouble trying to do a show this spectacular with out them!

Matt and Ann Marich
Edge Designs

[Gore Galore]

Vendor Perspective.

Believe it or not. Transworld has been considering this for a couple years now.
But they waited till this year to do so.
They were also needing to raise the Vendor booth cost but it is already $1200 per booth, and an additional $100 per corner booth.
We will be doing 8 booth this year. So that is alot of dough.
I would think a percentage of the $50 admission partly goes to help keep vendor booth costs down.
And it was discussed that some vendors would refund that admission when orders of fair amount were placed.

So as Matt said, Gore Galore will also discount your $50 admission fee for an order of $500 or more.

[HauntedMemphis]

My question on charging to get in...what took so long?

I know there was some debate about charging last year and some surveying done. They decided not to charge last year. I for one was in favor of charging. They are adding in a seminar, so you could more think about it as "forcing you to buy one seminar" instead of charging to get in if that makes you feel better.

I wonder what the seminar topic will be, or if there will be choices of seminars in that early bird slot.

Side note: Having gone to Hauntcon last year, and Transworld for 3 years now, I have to say, I loved the model of paying to get into the show, and then having free seminars. Doing cost/benefit analysis on individual seminars leaves me disappointed in the costs of many of the seminars at TW. (Others, are more than worth their price. however, so it's hit and miss.)

[jenbraverman]

Follow-up from TransWorld

Hello-

I appreciate everyone taking the time to write in to this forum and give your thoughts. This was a very hard decision for TransWorld to make. I spoke to numerous vendors and buyers about this topic. Here is the realty…. Our expenses in St. Louis have gone up. Unions continue to raise their prices. This is an issue across the country, even in these tough economic times. TransWorld did not want to cut back on the quality of show we produce. We feel we owe it to our buyers and exhibitors to produce the best show we can and give the best show experience!!! We take our jobs very seriously. For those of you who do not know me, my name is Jen Braverman. I work 365 days a year on this show. I eat, drink and breathe haunt. I would never want to do anything to hurt this show. We just needed to add this charge to cover our raising costs. I tried to add additional value by making the opening night party bigger and better. We also added 2 free seminars - one Saturday morning that is an early bird class and one industry expert panel discussion, moderated by Ben Armstrong, which will take place after the show hours on Saturday. I hope everyone appreciates our position. We look forward to seeing you in St. Louis.

Thanks for taking the time to read this e-mail. If you have any further questions please feel free to e-mail me at jen@tweshows.com.

[drfrightner]

Couple things... and let me say upfront just trying to type this post is giving me a headache. I don't want to debate such topics anymore. However I'm going to try because I've been the biggest advocate of TW charging in the first place. Its really no different than people telling me we couldn't have our own show because we are to small not big enough... guess what they all got it wrong. We are!

The issue here is that this is what is best for the buyers believe it or not... in fact it would be better for you to pay even more like $100 maybe even eventually $200 per person. When you go to IAAPA you pay like $300 or more dollars to go to the show... this merely off sets the show producers costs so they don't have to push everything onto the vendors.

If costs go UP for vendors they will spend LESS on booth space which is the same thing as spending LESS on new products for you see. Do you want that? Trust me that is how it works... if vendor costs go UP they spend LESS, and as a buy you want the vendors to spend MORE so you can see more, or have more options for your business.

Someone has to pay the vendors or the buyers... you want to contribute so the show continues to grow, which makes it more worth your trip to see the show. There are many costs on your part to see any show... travel, hotels, food, it really doesn't change much no matter what show you go to unless its like Rosemont where they rape you blind. LOL.

I agree $50.00 is a small price to pay to see a show like this, and it adds to TW's ability to throw parties, events, and more. I wouldn't be surprised to see this charge go up over the years maybe eventually hitting $100 and still its not much when you think about what a date to the movies cost... or better yet one of your haunted houses. LOL.

Trust me as buyers you want your vendors to be encourage to purchase MORE booths and SPEND MORE on product development NOT less because the costs to attend shows go UP!. What is shocking to me is TW was able to not charge this long... I think what they wanted to do was make sure the show could get established first. Kudos to them!

Larry

[MorgueofDoom]

Thanks Jen. All that for $50? Sounds like a steal to me. I personally think the entrance fee is within reason. I've been to other horror/haunt shows who charge far more than that for less perks. I'm looking forward to the 2 seminars as well. I drive from Texas to this show and $50 is just not an issue to me. The quality of show Transworld provides is very much worth the entrance fee. Thanks Jen and all who are involved in providing a convenient and educational show. It's wonderful to have everything in one place. It's the only way we shop. All our purchases for the year are done at Transworld.

[HauntedPaws]

I'm sorry but stop the bitch'in about charging it's $12.50 a day. If you can't afford that how are you running a haunt? It's like 5 patrons. As Kevin said he'll refund your ticket price if you spend over $500 too. It's an excuse to buy gore-galore which you probably were already planning to do anyhow. Heck if you buy 10 things each vendor might refund you $50 so you make out even more!

Though I wouldn't mind seeing a sales point where if you spend X amount Transworld refunds your travel expenses as most are roughly $1000 for 2 people. I suppose if your a good talker you can save much more then $1000 with the vendor anyways.

As a new haunter I expected a convention fee anyways,

[graystone]

Fee.....

Jen called me this morning and I encouraged her to come and make a statement and she did just that. As I made mention what's $50.00 a good meal, a night in a cheap ass motel, some beers and smokes at the bars. I don't see this is a make or break thing for anyone. As I said to Jen I don't think it would have been an issue at all had she posted it and made mention of the events that lead up to the decision before someone see it. Now we know and now we can move on to the cool things at TransWorld and what it has to offer like Larry's tours, my party, the city museum, hanging out at the bars telling stories and seeing old friends and making new ones! I still think it would be so cool to offer this show in a different city each year but that's just my opinion. Shane and it's oh hell come on you know you don't want to miss out on the fun! Shane

[Slain]

If the price is too high for Transworld to put on the show then let MHC take over or just move it to Nashville or somewhere where all will win..
I do realize it is all about the $$$$$.. If there is a 1000 haunters that come to the show that is $50,000.00 dollars extra...
I have never heard of anyone going to a trade show and paying an entrance fee to buy stuff..
Giving a "FREE" party for the haunters with some cheap beer and some chips is pretty sad..
I'm like the others If I bring 10 people to the show ($500) I'd like that kind of a discount from the vendors..

[Dalloween]

Transworld is the only professional tradeshow I know of that has been totally free in the past. I echo the comments that most trade shows cost upwards in the hundreads of dollars. 50 bucks really is a small price to pay to keep a really great show going... and Allen is right, it's a business expense which can be written off on taxes anyway.

Thanks to the vendors who have offered to give a discuont, that is extremely generous. Your value for customer services is noted and appreciated.

Jim
Haunt 2013, LLC
Dallas, TX

[Front Yard Fright]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't Transworld charging people last year to sign up? But they ended up ditching the idea shortly after and made the show free?