Introduction
Event management is the application of project management towards developing large scale event like festivals, ceremonies, conferences, conventions and concerts (Kim and Cuskelly 2017). Erncia Events London Co. has selected an event operational manager, who will suggest best venue option for organizing an event in UK. A 21st birthday party will be arranged in the selected even venue. In this event, there will be 100 attendees, who will be from different age, nationality and regions. The event will be associated with various fun and entertainment activities along with dinner.
In this report, two venues will be selected. One will be indoor venue and other will be outdoor venue. The indoor venue chosen for this study is ‘Radisson Blu Edwardian Manchester’, which has splendid arrangement for the audience. On the other hand, outdoor venue chosen for the study is ‘The Regent’s Park’, which has most glorious arrange for the audience. The objective of this report is to compare these two event venues in regards to health and safety, licensing and legal, waste management, supply chain management, corporate social responsibility and risk management. Moreover, the report will recommend the best option between these two event venues for organizing the 21st birthday party.
Outdoor Venue
Background of Outdoor Venue
For the outdoor venue a 21st Birthday party has been thought and being a family event it will be comprised of individual from age 5 to 70. This indicates that the event will be occupied by children and parents, who will be the primary stakeholders. Based on this “The Regent’s Park” has been selected as it is the most attracted location for parties and festivals. It has the open air theatre and the largest free access to various types of waterfall collection (The Royal Parks 2017). Various wild bird species and animals are the part of entertainment, which will surely engage all attendees.
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Figure 1: The Regent’s Park
(Source: The Royal Parks 2017)
Health and Security
Hazards in Venue
According to Brown (2014), outdoor events are more prone to accidents due to electrical hazards, unsealed wires, inappropriate wirings and unavailability of fire extinguishers. These factors are common for Regent’s Park. On the other hand, Getz (2012) pointed out that polluted environment from technological fills such as chemicals from batteries are hazardous to nature, which impacts of audience.
Staffing and Security
The event will have some attractive performances from hired professionals and even from audiences. However, the volunteers and staffs are not having enough knowledge about how to deal with accidents arising from sub-events and reduce panic. Also, Chan (2015) pointed out that at any outdoor venue attendees are found to visit protected areas, which when breached will lead to accidents.
License and legal Issues
Child Protection and Music License
Cvat.org.uk (2017) pointed out that for any family event, the volunteers of the venue must have well training for child protection policy and even they must not ever have any criminal record. Apart from that, in the 21st birthday party, there must have some music session for the entertainment. However, playing music in the public place needs to have music license. Therefore, there may be legal and license issue in regards to music playing in outdoor venue.
Premises License
According to the words of Hall (2012), most of the event managers fail to coordinate the type of events that are to be allowed in the venue, which finally raises issues from various stakeholders. Discrete functions by event manager raises obligations. On the other hand, Petrick, Bennett and Tsuji (2013) stated that management of outdoor event often fails to complete the event within stipulated time period. Often, events are found to occur after 11pm as well, which creates premise license issue.
Waste Management
According to Ziakas and Boukas (2014), the outdoor event organizer should be highly capable of ensuring adequate waste management. Otherwise, it can have harmful impact on the community. Being an outdoor venue, The Regent’s Park is not fully optimized towards managing the waste generated from the events. Hence, there is high chance of workplace hazards, dangerous substances and chemicals to be presented in the nearby location. These factors may not be suitable for the attendees in the birthday party. However, 100 attendees in birthday party are quite less and they can be accommodated small space, which can be beyond the harmful material.
Supply Chain Management
The supplies for the Birthday Party for outdoor venue will be mainly technological equipment for sub-events; food items for dinner; and pickup service. However, the cost of material handling will be quite more and even the climatic turbulences might impact the open air space. According to Fairley et al. (2013), while technological equipments are not served at time, it can take long hours for rectification. On the other hand, while there is a faulty circuit then also it takes long hours for the rectification. On the other hand, Drury, Novelli and Stott (2015) pointed out that medical emergency, food supplies and pickup facility for outdoor venues are more resource consumable than an indoor event.
CSR and Sustainability
There is enough risk in outdoor venue while organizing any event. In case of outdoor venue, there is high chance of environmental damage due to open waste in the public area (Pernecky 2015). However, The Regent’s Park have long green pathway for encouraging corporate social responsibility in the event. Apart from that, the outdoor venue can also organize eco-themes for promoting CSR activities in the event. Moreover, outdoor event can be quite adjustable with the CSR and sustainability issues.
Risk Management
Sufficiency of Resources
Fleming, Marchini and Maughan (2014) opined that for any outdoor event, the source of electricity, water and technology is extremely important. Therefore while considering the Regent’s Park, it is quite prominent that concentrating the whole event in one particular limited area there might be issue with water distribution, which may incur extra costs. Also, Boo, Carruthers and Busser (2014) pointed out that fire breakage is quite rapid in outdoor events, which may not be controlled by traditional equipment.
Roles and Responsibilities
Bury (2016) pointed out that differences between volunteers within the event and venue often creates a situation of conflict that hampers that service quality. On the other hand, Brown et al. (2015) stated that family events are somewhat personal and since Regent’s Park mostly deals with huge festival or cultural events, the volunteers may fail to serve satisfactorily.
Indoor Value
Background of the Venue
Erncia Events London Co. is going to organize a 21st birthday party. The party will be extremely enjoyable. There will be singing, dancing, and fun drinking games, dinners and lots more. The indoor venue chosen for this birthday party is ‘Radisson Blu Edwardian Manchester’ in the Great Manchester. The venue has perfect accommodation and well operational arrangement for conducting this event. Total numbers of attendances for this event will be 100 audiences, who will be from various age group, income and regions. The colonnaded seating area in bar set of this venue ha extremely decent tone (Radissonblu-edwardian.com 2017). On the other end of the spectrum, there is handsome line-up of boardrooms.
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Figure 2: Radisson Blu Edwardian Manchester
(Source: Radissonblu-edwardian.com 2017)
Health and Safety
Fire
According to Edwards et al. (2014), indoor events are highly affected by the splintering of fire. It is mostly occurred for inappropriate wiring and infrastructure of the venue. On the other hand, Ferro and Floria (2013) opined that during fire breaks, the exit gate of the indoor venue become crowded. It can cause severe injuries and physical harms to the attendees. Hence, the indoor venue can have significant health and safety Staffing and Security issues during birthday party.
Staffing and Security
The staffs of Radisson Blu Edwardian Manchester will be dealing with the interior security of the party. On the other hand, the staffs of Erncia Events London Co will be dealing with the security of attendees. The venue volunteers are not well advanced towards dealing with security system (Lockstone-Binney, Holmes and Robertson 2015). Hence, they have not adequate experience for managing accidental scenario. On the other hand, the staffs of event team may not have adequate knowledge of audience management. They may be aware of the fire extinguishers location, but they may not be aware of the emergency alarm.
Licensing and Legal
Alcohol Consumption
According to Bbc.co.uk (2017) majority of indoor venues in United Kingdom are highly coupled with consumption of alcohol irrespective of the types of events. The volunteers from both the venue and event organizing company are responsible for controlling the alcohol consumption. Hence, it is required to arrange correct licence for alcohol consumption towards ensuring someone’s presence as Personal License Holder. Over alcohol consumption in the birthday party within the indoor venue can cause ethical and legal issue.
Public Liability Insurance
According to Lee, Han and Ko (2013), audiences are more likely to face accidents from falling objects or fire, heating and slippery. It can mostly be occurred from effective infrastructure of the indoor venue. For this reason, this indoor venue is having public liability insurance policy for covering up the injuries caused to the audience. However, many times, the venue refuses to maintain this polity and leads to legal issues.
Waste Management
‘Radisson Blu Edwardian Manchester’ is quite advanced in their waste management process. After every event, this indoor venue dumps their wastes in the city corners through their vans. Hence, it can be said the waste management process of this indoor venue is quite affordable in this indoor venue (Patti et al. 2016). Moreover, it is positive for any event towards ensuring sanitized service within the community. Furthermore, the team of event management need not have to deal with waste management process directly. The entire process of waste management is handled by the team of the venue. Hence, the risk in regards to waste management is quite less in indoor venue.
Supply Chain Management
In case of indoor venue, all the equipments and facilities may not be provided from the venue itself. Hence, the event management team sometimes needs to arrange the needed equipments from outside suppliers. In most cases, indoor events need to be fully dependent on the venue. Hence, the qualities of the indoor events are highly dependent on the indoor venues. However, most of the time, the indoor venue fails to provide best quality organization of the event. In this way, the quality of the service in the indoor event may be limited to the indoor venue (Qub.ac.uk 2017). However, event organizers can reduce their expenditure, as they do not have to directly deal with the suppliers.
Corporate Social Responsibility
‘Radisson Blu Edwardian Manchester’ will the associated with 21st birthday party. Hence, there is high chance of environmental degradation from the waste. In such situation, this indoor venue can perfectly deal with corporate social responsibility by promoting natural theme in the birthday party. Moreover, the corporate social responsibility of the indoor venue can ultimately enhance the reputation of the event management organization.
Risk Management
Resource from Venue
According to Park et al. (2017), indoor venues mostly face risk associated with the staffs and the failure of technological equipments. Moreover, the risks related to technical damage are quite common due to backdated features. In most cases, it can be found that technical equipments seem to be backdated on the day of event. It can have negative impact on the quality of the event. However, the risk can be managed through proper updated technical equipments. The staffs should be highly careful in regards to handling accidental scenario. In this way, the indoor venue can minimize the risk to be occurred at the birthday party.
Food Hygiene and Supply Chain
The risk can also be occurred in regards to quality of the foods. Hence, the indoor venue can minimize this risk through preparing and storing the foods as per the food hygiene regulations. A quality team has to be there for checking the food qualities. In this way, it can minimize the risk the event party (Ferro and Floria 2013). On the other hand, the staffs of the indoor venue should keep constant contact with the suppliers for arranging all the necessary things within time. It can also minimize the risk at the event party.
Conclusion
While concluding the study, it can be said that outdoor venue is quite inflexible in providing all the equipments to the event. The event management team would have to organize various equipments like technology and food from outside of the venue. Hence, organizing event outdoor venue can be quite expensive. On the other hand, the quality of the food can be unhygienic, as foods are mostly arranged from outside of the venue. Furthermore, the outdoor venue can also have high rate of CSR issues from the wastes of the event in the public place. On the other hand, indoor venue has legal and licensing issues in regards to alcohol consumption. Furthermore, the indoor venue also has some health and safety issues. Oftentimes, the technical equipments remain backdated and cause severe health and safety issues to the attendees of the event. However, if the proper measures are taken, then the issues of the indoor venue can be overcome.
Recommendation: Best Option for Erncia Events London Co.
While comparing the two venues, it can be said that both the venue has risk associated with it. However, outdoor venue has higher risk related to the waste and CSR issues than the outdoor event. In case of outdoor venue, the risk of environment pollution is quite high, as the wastes are directly disposed of in the public place. On other hand, there are also other issues in outdoor venue in relation to health and safety, roles and responsibilities and legal and licensing issues. In case of outdoor venue, the staffs of the venue may not take all the responsibilities of the event. The outdoor venue, The Regent’s Park is quite wide and open. Hence, managing the attendees in such an open and wide place may be quite tough for the volunteers. Moreover, booking such a wide area would be quite expensive for the event organization. On the other hand, the event organizing company has to hire the food and technology from outside of the outdoor venue. Hence, the outdoor venue would be quite costly for organizing the event. Furthermore, there may have some accidental and licensing issue in the outdoor event.
In case of indoor venue, most of the resources and equipments are provided from the venue itself. Moreover, the event organizing team may get all the supplies from within the venue itself. It can reduce the capital requirement of the even organizing company. Furthermore, the quality of the service may not be of super quality. However, the service is quite satisfactory for the attendees of the event. There are some legal and licensing issues along with health and safety issues. However, if proper measures and licenses are gathered, then these issues can be overcome easily. The food quality team of the indoor venue always provides standard food to the event attendees.
From the above analysis, it can be said that the 21st birthday event would be best suitable for indoor venue. The indoor venue has limited risk related to health and safety and financial risk. Moreover, the indoor venue is quite cost effective and flexible than that of outdoor venue.
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