SC - Feast accounting

Mon Apr 12 13:54:12 PDT 1999

>From sca-cooks-owner at bastion.globeset.com  Mon Apr 12 15:49:41 1999
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Date: Mon, 12 Apr 1999 16:48:19 -0400
From: Jeff Gedney <JGedney at dictaphone.com>
To: sca-cooks at Ansteorra.ORG
Subject: Re: SC - Blosing money was - Cleaning up.
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Oh Yes, that was bad, but that was a long time ago, when things were not so 
organized.
Also we were starting up a new Canton, and Were a bunch of newbies operating 
with little or no Support.
Needlerss to say that there has been a lot of changes since then.

Most Baronies or other groups will have lots of people who have done it all, and 
know the pitfalls.
In my barony we have a mentor program - No one can autocrat until they have 
"co-autocratted" an event with an experienced autocrat first, so they know how 
the process woirks, and what to expect.
Our barony also maintains a good event fund, that allows the barony to front as 
much money as we might need ahead of time, instead of depending, as we did then, 
on reimbursing, from the gate, personal funds spent ahead of the event to buy 
food, and rent the hall.
I was not "taken advantage of", BTW. 

True I lost the money (enough to buy a good used car, back then), but there was 
a complicated array of reasons for this.
1)   I was personally responsible to the site as I rented it in my name. That 
made me guarantor. I got a good price, though.
2)   I had very poor publicity. 
3)   The Crown Province bordering the canton to the west had a BIG, MAJOR, 
FIGHTING Event the very same day, and only two towns away. And they had better 
publicity.
4)   I bought all the food retail from a local Supermarket in the town 
(Greenwich Connecticut, a VERY upscale town, and accordingly paid much more than 
I should have)
5)   The canton was incipient, and had no money to cover losses. 
6)   The barony had very little money at that point, too.
7)    We were not then in the habit of even taking unpaid reservations. We held 
the event, cooked for how many we thought might come, and held our breath.
8)   The Barony offered to take up a collection to cover the loss, but I felt 
responsible for flubbing it, and was determined to "take my lumps", so I refused 
to accept the offer.
9)   I did not consult any experienced autocrat, and had never helped with any 
of the pre-event work (such as organizatrion) of any other events, so I had no 
Idea hwo to proceed. I kind of fumbled my way along, and took the consequences.

Please note number 8 above.
If you don't do any of the items 1-9 then you should be able to survive, I 
think.
These wetre very iomportant lessons for me.
The next five events I ran made a combined profit of over 1000 dollars, and were 
well recieved ba all.

brandu

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Jeff Gedney
Software Quality Assurance Engineer
Voice Recognition Technologies
Dictaphone, USA
Mailto:JGedney at Dictaphone.com

>>> "Michael F. Gunter" <michael.gunter at fnc.fujitsu.com> 04/12 3:39 PM >>>
> (Someday I'll tell you of my FIRST event, back when feasts were autocratted 
and cooked by the same person.
> Stew and bread and cheese, plus Pears in syrup for dessert was the menu. And 
only 14 showed up! I personally lost 350 (1979) dollars on that event).
>
> Indeed I have come a long way, but what a long strange trip it has been!!
>
> Brandu
> (Not among the "SCADinosaurs", but certainly among the "SCADeinotheria")
>

Oh my GAWD!  That is so bad, do they have stuff in place to see that others 
(newbies) are not taken advantage of in that way?  Also another newbie 
feastocrate advice?

Helen

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