----- Original Message ----- From: John Mead <[email protected]> >I guess what I'm wondering is if IOLI has any type of regional rotation on where the convention occurs? ... Are there areas that just will never have a chance to see IOLI unless they travel mega miles? I'd guess the upper mountain states are on their own, but is Minneapolis possible?...
>How bad is it, in regard to certain areas never being within daytrip range of IOLI? What is the average attendance? I'm hearing the figures of 12 and 24 hours for classes, which I'm presuming are spread out over several days, because I'm not up to 12 hour days any longer, and I'm only 52, so how many hours/day are we looking at? Do people sign up for multiple classes, or just one? And are there smaller, regional conventions? What's the break even point, in regard to attendance staying at the venue? And the accessibility needs?. ------------------------------------------------------------------ IOLI depends on a group hosting the conference... finding a location, planning the activities and classes, etc. Groups that wish to host apply to the board or a conference committee (I forget which). The board(?) then selects the location. They like to vary the area from north to south, east to west to middle, etc, but are limited on which groups are applying. They do a fairly good job of rotating the areas within this limitation. Occasionally two years in a row are on the same coast but not often. Los Angeles was 2009, Portland was 2010, Minneapolis 2011, somewhere on the far East coast in 2012, and Salt Lake City this year. Next year is Sacramento. I would guess that 2015 will be on the east side of the USA but I don't think it's been announced. Areas that don't have an active group will not see a conference in their city so there could be lacemakers who always have to travel a distance to attend. In the past, there have been conferences in San Diego, Puerto Rico, Calgary, Costa Mesa. Seattle, Tulsa, Denver, Chicago.... you can see that they are spread all over. As I mentioned before, attendance varies from 125 to 300. It's hard to predict. Classes are usually Mon, Tue, Thur Fri.... either 3 hours or 6 hours each day. Wednesday is usually a rest day from class.... trips, shopping, special short classes, lectures, etc. Sometimes a particularly difficult class series will go all 5 days of the week for 30 hours of class. A person can choose how many hours a day they want to spend in class. I usually suggest to lesser experienced lacemakers to take only one class and spend the other half day making progress on their lace. If they really want to take two different classes, make them very different... like one bobbin lace and one tatting or knitting or lace finishing. Yes, there are regional conferences at times. There's a yearly on in New York in early October, I think. Clay has sponsored the Sweet Briar Retreat week in Virginia for several years now. (I got to go twice.) The Northwest groups have a regional conference every five years or so... whenever one of the groups decides to host one. (Next one is in 2015.) Costa Mesa has a February Winter Retreat (been there twice, also). I read about retreats by the Heartland Lace Guild, and sometimes other groups. A group just has to decide to do one, book a location and a teacher... and go for it. Usually at the regional and smaller retreats, a person takes only one class and spends 6+ hours a day on it. The break-even point on a conference can vary with the venue. A teacher is needed for each 10-12 students. A small workshop of 40 people would have 4 teachers. A large conference of 300 would need about 28 teachers. Teachers have to be booked for the maximum students possible, and then reduce the number of teachers to reflect the actual attendance. The teacher's contract reflects this possibility, and the teachers don't buy their plane tickets until their class has been assured. Generally the classes will pay for themselves. The student fees will cover the teacher expenses. The snag with large hotels is the guaranteed minimum fee they charge to reserve the tentative needed rooms. The hotel contract usually needs signing by January, but the reservations don't come in until February. It can be really scary for the person whose credit card was used... but now IOLI itself assures that fee, so the host group is not facing the debt if attendance is low. Hotels often have a required number of bedrooms to be rented to let the group have meeting rooms at low or no cost. If the number of people staying at the hotel falls below that minimum, then classroom rental fees may be in effect. If a large proportion of attendees stay somewhere else, it can really affect the cost to the host group. That's why you often see an extra fee for a non-resident attendee. A similar thing is often true about the food service catered to the group. Hotels may require a certain volume of food served in order to have the use of the large dining rooms. This does NOT include purchased meals at the hotel restaurant, only catered food. At our conference, we came up short on the food requirement. That's why we booked a free box lunch one day for all participants. The room benefits we got more than offset the cost of the box lunches. Also, realize the all equipment you use at the hotel has a fee... microphones, exhibit tables, and so on. Unless you have worked on a host committee, you may not have any idea the number of requirements, rules, and technical hoops you have to deal with. Accessibility is usually not a problem with a big hotel. They are set up to deal with all kinds of situations... ramps, wide doors, handicap rooms, and so on. This may be more of a concern at a non-hotel location, such as a campus. The local college we use is level and has no steps at the entrances to the buildings, has a fully handicap accessible dorm room, and even has a golf cart transport if a person can't walk the short distance to the classroom building. We consider these benefits outweigh the fact the dorm is old and does not have in-suite bathrooms. But where else can you get housing for $20 a night? It helps make the cost feasible. Hosting can be a lot of fun, but it's also a lot of work. A very knowledgeable and capable chairman is a must. And the whole group should be willing to participate. The basic plans can be set up by one person, especially at a smaller retreat, but it's much better if several people work together and share the chores. Join IOLI, and watch the calendar in the Bulletin. It will list the various workshops/retreats planned by the various lace groups. You may find one in your area... or near enough to be worth the trip. Alice in Oregon ... where I plan to return to my lace pillow - To unsubscribe send email to [email protected] containing the line: unsubscribe lace [email protected]. For help, write to [email protected]. Photo site: http://www.flickr.com/photos/lacemaker/sets/
