I love conventions, I always have. The sheer number of people I get to meet and interact with, the networking that I do, the friends I see and new friends I make drive me to be a better person. Then, there is the gaming. I love playing games. I love thinking. I love strategy and I love the emotional up and down as a well laid plan goes to hell in a hand cart and then comes together like a masterpiece for an epic come-from-behind win. Hands down, the last four days have been the most fun I have had in a long time, and my happiness and joy is tempered only by the realization that I can no longer support this convention.
This is not a rant about RFRA. That ship has sailed and I applaud GENCON for taking a stance against discrimination in any shape, form or fashion. Instead this is how I realized that this convention, like everything else in America, has fallen to the chase for the almighty dollar.
In 2011, GM Chris and I took a chance on a little thing called Gamer Nation Studios, a brand name for the hours we spend thinking about games and a chance for us to make the games we love to play. We shared a booth with a friend and made enough money to book for the next year, and so on. Fast forward to 2015. The exhibit hall is packed with new vendors, all living their version of the dream that Chris and I were fortunate enough to get a piece of in 2012.
Their dream ends today, at least as far as GENCON is concerned.
Beginning this year, a vendor has to accumulate 30 priority points to be able to rebook their spot in the exhibit hall. A single priority point is earned by paying $1200-$1800 for a single 10 foot by 10 foot booth. So, my company has 3. Others I know have less, a few have more. This represents a thinly veiled attempt to allow the largest vendors of the convention to book all the space they need or want, and leaves the indie publishers and small shops out until the cattle call that happens on-line, when hundreds of would be vendors will be seated at their computers furiously refreshing their computer screens to take the scraps that are left at the end or back of the exhibit hall in a mad rush that resembles the housing and event registration mayhem that also happens on-line and leaves hundreds of people screaming bloody murder each year. They get the last spaces if they are lucky enough to get in before the spots are sold out, of course.
A friend and game designer who will remain nameless told me that this convention is starting to feel like it did back in the days when it was in Milwaukee, when the only way to get a room near the convention center was to know someone with one of the big publishing houses or game vendors. The little guys are gradually getting squeezed out as they make way for the superbooths that can take all the prime endcap space and aisle space in the front of the hall with the most foot traffic.
Then there is “Family Fun Day” and the lines, and lines….and lines.
There is no valid reason why a person, in this day and age, has to wait in a line for hours to buy generic event tickets, pick up their badge packets (their attendee badge and event tickets they purchased) and perform other menial tasks with a human. I am a professional, I attend professional conferences where I have a scanner in my booth and I can scan the attendee badges to know whether they registered for my seminar or event. There are automated solutions everywhere that allow for automated kiosks to simply scan a QR code, your badge bar code or other personally identifiable information, pay for generic tickets or pick up the tickets I previously purchased. Think AMC Movies, American Airlines or any of a host of retailers that have taken the human out of the equation and allow for self-service directed by the end user.
The Family Fun Day is a good value at $35 for a 4 pack of one day tickets, but the line to pick up the badges on Sunday was long! I mean there were still 50-100 people with kids and strollers in line at 12:30! The convention is over for all intents and purposes at 4pm! I know, blame the users for being late, right? WRONG! This should be a place where people can have fun, and get value for their hard earned dollars; find a way to get the families through the door faster and re-purpose some of the event sign up booths that stand empty on Sunday.
Then we have the exhibit hall, or, as I call it – Candy Land. In years past, it was crowded, but passable. Thursday mornings had the initial onslaught and the rush to get great games first, in fact this year the nice lady in the Magic:The Gathering area opened the door right at 10, instead of 10:15 and I was number three in line at Plaid Hat, but I digress. This year, we could not navigate in any reasonable length of time in the front end of the hall, especially in the 2200-3200 aisles. It is clear the convention organizers are adopting the American Airlines strategy of passenger relations. In other words, cram more booths in the same space and hope we don’t notice. Well, we noticed. The conditions in the exhibit hall are more cramped than I ever remember them being, with no time to conduct a transaction before the next guys are muscling up trying to get into the space, or you are taken off balance by a giant backpack wielding human or other attendees that have their Cool Mini or Not bags that are 3 feet long and made to hit people’s knees and Achilles’ tendons as they walk too close to you, all in a fight to get the newest stuff that will be on Amazon within 30 days at a little less than what you just paid for it, along with the free shipping that Prime offers.
That said, I loved the experience of the convention. I love the people that I game with. I love the friendships and the relationships I make here. I love the cooler temperatures and all the games and all the role playing I get to do. I love to spend my money on new hotness.
I hate that I will never do it again.
David Villegas - GM Dave
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I’ve come to this column after hearing about it on the O66 podcast, and having read it twice and given it a good, hard think, I’m going to disagree.
Like all convention organizers, GENCON invests a crap-ton of money to reserve the convention space, and tries to earn a return on that investment by, inter alia, reselling the space to exhibitors. Square footage is a commodity. It’s valuable. As such the biggest vendors in the GENCON exhibit hall are also its most largest, and therefore most important, paying customers. Why wouldn’t the convention prioritize those customers, who are paying five- and sometimes six-figure sums for their booths, over the comparative chump change from smaller players? They’d be stupid not to. Why? Because, as you concede when you complain about the on-line “cattle call” for exhibitors without reservations, the demand for booth space is presently greater than the supply.
I mean, honestly: you may as well complain that the high-rollers at Vegas casinos can reserve seats in special rooms and get comped drinks, while all the people playing nickel slots have to just muddle along.
What makes the column particularly incoherent is that you then turn around and complain about how overcrowded the exhibit hall is. Legitimate gripes about attendees hauling around mini-fridge-sized bookbags aside — those people annoy the crap out of me, too — GENCON apparently is trying to fit as many exhibitors as possible into the space available, not just cater to the big players, while also accommodating about a 10% year-over-year increase in the number of attendees.
You make some good points about the organizers failing to leverage technology to reduce the time attendees spend waiting in lines. Beyond that, though, were you under the impression that GENCON is a charity? Because without the organizers’ “chase for the almighty dollar” — trying to recoup the costs involved in running the con — it’s far from clear that a convention that’s been under Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection as recently as 2008 would even exist at all anymore.
I remembered the first time I attended Gen Con it was when the will call line was long and I missed my morning events because of it. Next time I went there wasn’t too much of a problem. But the last time I tried to attend was the big housing fiasco. Because I could not get room I could not attend because the cost of a rental car and flight cost too much.
I love your points and unfortunately this is what is happening with many conventions. It really is sad when conventions do this. One of my favorite things to do is attend the smaller lesser known cons where I know I can get a room and just play games. With the internet and easy access to a lot of cool things I feel the draw of the exhibit hall for me is the indie booths and the webcomic artists I love to say hi to.
Dave, I think we met a few years ago when Order66 was nominated for an ENnie. ENnies Submission Coordinator and Author Hans Cummings is my better half.
First, let me say, both Hans and I agree with your analysis.
Since 2011 we have attended the con as author/publisher vendors in Author’s Avenue. Last year when we were told that Artists Alley vendors would be determined by jury system and Authors Avenue was up in the air to be determined later, we began to give serious consideration to investigating whether other smaller cons might be better for us.
We are residents of Indianapolis, but we stay downtown because I am fulltime at a con this size in my electric wheelchair. The past two years, I have left our table only for restroom breaks, to which I have jokingly referred as “running the gauntlet.” Even though the manager of Authors Avenue is handicapped aware and very accommodating, the con has become almost unfriendly to those who are ADA.
The process for Artists Alley/Authors Avenue is different than for regular vendors. We get discounted table space, and the price for that is that we are not allowed to collect money from those who want to purchase our books. We fill out an NCR slip, they take it to a cashier, pay, and return with the bottom slip stamped “PAID”, and we give them their purchase. GenCon takes ten percent of our sales. For us, that’s not been too much of an issue, but we lose sales every year when the queue wait exceeds ten to fifteen minutes, and this happens on Saturday and Sunday EVERY year we have attended. We heard many people say they didn’t want to stand in a line that went all the way past Summer Glau’s table in the autograph area
We also noticed on Saturday, which is usually our biggest day, traffic was unusually light in the rear of the hall where our tables were. We heard reports that people saw the congestion at the front of the hall near Paizo, FFLG and Green Ronin scared people away from even entering the hall. We think it gave a false sense that the hall was packed. Other small vendors (not part of Artists Alley and Authors Avenue) reported their Saturday sales were also down significantly.
We have not ruled out attending next year, however, we are seriously considering whether or not we should.
Correction: we have been author vendors since 2013. FFLG should be FFG.
Sorry for the typos.
Very well spoken, Dave. We’re having similar problems with our local con, and many wonderful gamemasters have called it quits starting their own game days at local game stores. As long as I continue to get that amazing experience of playing with diverse gamers with different levels of experience, I might not return to the local con myself. Besides, you run one of the best cons in the country right now.
Garrett
Have you sent your concerns to Gen Con? They might listen. You never know if your concerned customer correspondence is one of hundreds and it was the one needed to tip them over edge to change things.
The way your article reads is that you had a great time except for these fee things. Do those items really cause such a vehement refusal to attend future Gen Cons? Are you championing for a cause in which you no longer participate because…? Do you feel like your principles would be compromised by attending again?
Selfishly, I hate to see you not go back as I’m actively working on assembling a group to go next year and want you there, but it’s your money and time. You have to feel okay with the way you’re spending it.
This took big brass ones to write, bro. Made me tear up a little bit. Gave me the sads.