BJC 2001 Business Meeting report

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Subject: BJC14 Business Meeting Author: Rob Stone Date: 24 Apr 2001

Report on Business Meeting BJC 14, Cardiff 12:15 22/04/01

Brief report for those who couldn't make the meeting at BJX 14##

Chair: Rob Stone Sec: Lorri Reese (and helen!)

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Introduction:

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Rob introduced himself and Lorri and asked to make the meeting short so as not to bore people to death - keep meetings short we may increase the attendance. Also asked that we focus on events that can be usefully taken forward to future years and not concentrate on things dictated to by the venue

Orgs opened with a warm heart felt round of applause for the organising team, not all of whom could attend.

Mark Robson round up and answered a few queries ...

• approx 700 people turned up and paid,
• they broke even (cue applause).
• biggest problem was the showers and toilets breaking down
• venue problems were due to the fact that the orgs spent 3 months

working with their 1st venue only and had to drop it cos of unrealistic price. The 2nd venue then fell through and the 3rd venue was the last resort. With a choice of a-not-ideal-but-useable venue or no BJC at all, the orgs (after soliciting opinions) decided to go ahead.

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Feedback

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The meeting was thrown open to floor for feedback including ....

• The parade was great, right in the centre of town with loads of people

watching. Nice to keep it short with maximum disruption!

• Games highly rated by many people, excellent venue and weather !

• Suggestion to have the parade and games on different days to avoid

losing a whole day. Problems with that are: a) cost of buses to/from town b) games in town benefits the city and entertains the public, means city support c) Different days would solve the problem of a trade off between bringing kit to the games and costumes for the parade. General consensus with that was it's a choice you have to make! Can't leave stuff on buses as they do shuttle runs and security issues.

• Venue - large gym v small gyms. Differing opinions here, positive and

negative, ultimately it's up to the orgs and there's not a huge choice in venues when it's at such a late stage

• Clearly signed running water on site (s'one asked for running water,

not realising there was some no the hard court). Mark said there was plans to pipe it further on to camp but it fell through at the last moment.

• Suggestion for a 5 day convention but there's the cost factor. If the

orgs can find a venue for 5 days at a 4 day cost then go for it

• Dave Marchant asked if it would be helpful to arrive a day early and

help set up. Ali answered by saying it wasn't needed in their case

• Volunteers this year were good. Plenty of pre-organised volunteers

which helped, and Cardiff is a community based circus which meant plenty of volunteers

• more bins on site are recommended - this is a perennial problem.

• road signs were a bit lacking but website directions were good.

• previous years the separate chill-out tent where you could bring own

beer and music wasn't so loud was missed. Cost/space factor comes in, but it was felt a 24hr chill out space was a big thumbs up and perhaps could double up with workshop space ?

• Massive thumbs up to the community workshops. Mark (chester) expanded on this:

a) Thur & Fri were targeting What's in it for Cardiff, so play schemes used it and plenty of beginners workshops were held b) Lottery fast track grant enabled them to charge £1 for the community workshops, Ali knew about these sources of funding. c) They were very important for Cardiff as they're community based

• Public couldn't get access to the Traders as they didn't have passes.

Suggestion to have separate tokens to give them access, traders want access to public as well as attendees.

• Suggestion to have the Convention timetable on the web. The majority

of it was, except the workshop timetable. Website was praised and considered v. useful.

• Programme with some workshops pre-printed was appreciated.

• request for a programme for the show would have been nice, but very

often (last 3 yrs definitely) the running order isn't decided until the morning of the show

• Another big thumbs up to the distance between camping and noisy music

• Usual problem of noise vs sleep in campsite - hard to cure.

Concluded this section with more big applause for all the orgs (despite their protests)

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Future years

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• NEXT YEAR 2002 *

Stumpy tentatively raises his hand and promotes Whitstable in Kent, crowd appreciates the offer.

This is what has happened so far: a) It's again a community based event - with Kent Community Circus (?) involved.

b) Local councilors are very happy about it

c) Venue is sorted & provisionally held, 1 large hall (6 badminton courts), a small hall & gym. Renegade & camping to be on site. Marlow Theatre Cant. (1000 seat) for the show. Caravan park is less than 10min walk away. Stumpy has spoken to them and they're currently interested

d) Team will be Stumpy (who's been to all BJCs since '95 but is still young and enthusiastic!), Tina (who's an Arts Development Officer & trapeze artist) and a whole host of volunteers from the community workshops (~30)

e) Convention would probably be over the Bank Holiday, during half term. This raised the problem of losing people but it was felt it would also gain some people. Bristol had it over a Bank Holiday and said there could be a problem with extended licences, although this could be the way to get a 5th day

• Vote was quickly carried out and Kent was voted for 15th BJC in 2002
• Cue big applause for Stumpy

• 2003 and beyond *

Speculative offers from teams from

a) Brighton b) Tunbridge Wells c) Chester - interested in the future

all of these were in the rudimentary stage and not to be considered final, they need to scout venues, organising teams, local support etc.

• Advice was to book early. Plan early & book early makes it much easier

• Rob wittered on about not relying on these bids and encouraging others

to consider offering.

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Organisers support

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People asked about advice and help form previous teams. This prompted much discussion and some offers of help and offers of producing an "how to" pack.

specifically

• Nicole mentioned she had a list of things that need organising for

BJCs and Mark had a gant chart, Winston remindeed us of a folder with each persons job in which can be passed on, and it's currently in Rob's living room (oops!)

• Suggestion to put it on a website (Steve Carter volunteered to put info

on-line), but future discussion was recommended to go to a private meeting later on

• Suggestion for stats from previous years to be collected (& possibly

added on line) for future orgs use

• Mini & Nicole volunteered to do pre-reg indefinitely (ha ha!)

-- We have now set up a mail list for convention organisers to ask questions get advice etc see http://groups.yahoo.com/group/jugconorg open to all organisers.

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AOB

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• Traders gave over £1000 of kit to the Russian kids - cue massive

applause for the traders

• Charlie from Camb. spoke about the National Association for Circus:

a) Website with all details for traders, performers and hobbyists going to be/already(?) set up b) Leaflets were handed out c) Plans to make a magazine/leaflet for info d) Next year will do research on funding for Arts Council

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Conclusions

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• Massive applause to all, & the short (35min) business meeting

1. 1. once again we have maximum 100 people at the meeting, MANY of whom

are organisers and helpers from this and previous BJCs (many Yorkies, Durham and Cardiff people as well as familiar people who help out). How do we ever get to know what everyone really feels ?

-- Rob.

......................................................................... Rob Stone, Psychology, University of York, York, YO10 5DD. 01904 433161 remove NOSPAM to mail me .......................................................................