5 YEAR EVENTS STRATEGY

WARRNAMBOOL CITY COUNCIL

2012

The four goals and objectives of the vision are to:

• Deliver social advantages;

• Support economic and cultural outcomes;

• Respect and celebrate the environment; and

• Encourage event best practice.

Events visionWarrnambool will continue to host a diverse calendar of events that deliver social, cultural and economic benefits to our community. Our events will be recognised for being inclusive, adopting industry best practice and promoting community strengths and opportunities for the benefit of our residents, businesses and visitors.

The 5 Year Events Strategy has been prepared for Warrnambool City Council and event stakeholders to provide a profile of event delivery and management in the region. The Strategy presents a range of strategic event development recommendations to support social, economic and cultural benefits for the industry, community and stakeholders.

Warrnambool and the wider region is host to a number of hallmark, regional and community events that provide a range of social, economic and community benefits. There is a high level of event delivery capability within Council and the community which provides a strong foundation upon which to build.

Current events delivered cover a range of themes including family, sports, agriculture, music and arts and culture held across the calendar year. These events reflect regional and community strengths and the economic and tourism profile of the region. Regional hallmark events include the Fun4Kids Festival, May Racing Carnival, Sprintcar events, South West Games, Port Fairy Music Festival, Melbourne to Warrnambool Cycling Classic and agricultural shows and field days.

The Strategy provides Council and other event organisers and stakeholders with recommendations for enhancing event planning and management best practice to support longer term sustainability of existing and potential events. In addition, through an event gap and opportunity analysis the Strategy has also identified potential new events and festivals to complement existing ones.

Introduction

Events deliver a range of social, economic and community benefits that include:

• Acting as important drawcards for visitors and contributing to the quality of the visitor experience.

• Supporting investment in community and regional assets and infrastructure.

• Increasing expenditure in our region.

• Profiling our community as a place to live and work.

• Celebrating community identity and enhancing liveability.

• Providing opportunities for residents and visitors to participate in and experience our community and lifestyle.

• Fostering skills, knowledge, connections and employment opportunities.

• Celebrating our natural and built assets and the unique qualities of our region and community.

Benefits and

impacts of events

Providing opportunities for residents and

visitors to participate in and experience

our community and lifestyle.

Council manages and delivers a range of its own events as well as providing support and assistance to external events and aims to encourage social inclusion and participation, foster community and economic benefits and promote Warrnambool as a visitor destination.

Council events include the highly successful Fun4Kids Festival, One and All Festival, Sustainable Living Festival, Flagstaff Hill community events and a range of arts and cultural activities through the Art Gallery and Lighthouse Theatre. Council’s event role and responsibilities include event management and delivery, marketing, event logistics and statutory compliance issues, community engagement, funding, event advisory services, venue hire and volunteer services. In addition to the pivotal role played by the Events and Promotions Unit, a range of other Council business units are involved in event delivery .

There is a consistent view that Council has a strategic and critical role to play in community event management and delivery. Council is also seen as a hub of knowledge and resources that can be drawn upon to build the sustainability of existing events and attract and/or develop new events.

Council’s role in events

BACKGROUND There are untapped event opportunities outside of the peak summer visitation period particularly autumn and winter and are also opportunities to enhance the event offering during peak visitation times.

Event opportunities exist because of the region’s strengths and lifestyle assets. These include:

• The natural environment;• Food and wine; • Music; • Cultural and multicultural events; and• Business related events.

OPPORTUNITIES Gardening related event(s) and activities that build on this growing interest sector for family and older people segments and which can link into food and wine and sustainable living.

Specific food and wine event(s) linked to the agricultural events held in October and February such as a ‘Ready for Harvest Festival’ and/or ‘The Spring Fare’.

Arts and cultural related events for older demographic markets held in non-peak tourism periods.

Music events in the summer months to capitalise on the weather and the number of existing family and sports events with a potential focus on youth and music types not currently catered for in the region.

Business orientated events linked to the agricultural events held in February and October or the winter months when weather is less of an issue.

A Warrnambool Event Capability Profile should be developed to promote current community and industry expertise to host and develop events and to strategically position Warrnambool within the wider events industry and market place.

Event opportunities

and attraction

Event opportunities exist because of the

region’s strengths and lifestyle assets.

BACKGROUND The events industry can foster event management best practice through the development and provision of processes and systems to build greater sustainability into existing events.

Collaboration and co-operation between event organisers and other business sectors can be improved to enhance existing events and overall event experience for attendees. This will also help to identify where financial, marketing, operational and delivery partnerships and efficiencies may exist that can provide economic and resource benefits to events and organisations.

RECOMMENDATIONSThe local events and tourism industry to continue to work together to encourage knowledge and information flows, to improve collaboration and partnerships and support the implementation of the Strategy.

Local event best practice should be fostered through the development of an Event Development Program that includes a suite of event planning and management tools to be utilised by event organisers.

The role and services of Council’s Events and Promotions unit should be more clearly defined and promoted, and established as the first point of entry for event enquiries and advisory services.

Establish a library of event related resources, documents and best practice information to support event capability development.

Sustainable events

BACKGROUND In order to assist Council and event partners make robust decisions in relation to event development and support, there needs to be a decision-making framework developed based on a number of guiding principles namely:• Does the event provide clear and measurable community, cultural and/or economic benefits that align to the

event’s vision, goals and objectives?• What is the return on investment that can be expected?• How does the event celebrate our community, economy and environment?• How do activities and planning contribute to event sustainability and development?• How do our decisions strike a balance between attracting, nurturing and creating events across the calendar

and event themes?Event organisers and proponents should be encouraged to establish event aims and objectives based upon the community’s vision for events. This will enable equitable and objective decisions relating to event support and development by Council and stakeholders. Using a weighted matrix, the extent to which an event contributes to the overall vision can be measured via an event’ scorecard’ to support decision processes. This will also help to identify which events best fit the vision, the level of social, economic and environmental benefits that can be anticipated and encourage continuous improvement in event planning and delivery. Business model options arguably need to focus on the commercial motivation for Council and level of risk that they are willing to accept.

The decision factors to be considered before applying a particular business model depends on whether the event has been secured by Council is to be managed by an external organiser and assessed against Council’s attitude towards the following:• Risk and reward: in a commercial sense;• Control: motivation to ensure desired outcomes meet requirements;• Liability: related to risk but more focussed on public liability risks;• Resources: availability of Council and other staff and resources; and• Skills and experience: who possesses the requisite skills to manage the event.

RECOMMENDATIONS

Develop weightings and score indicators for each of the key four event vision goals and objectives to determine priority support and to assist internal and external organisers with event improvement processes.Consider resources, risk attitude and management, expected return and the potential for future transference of event management and delivery activities to identify the preferred business model that will be applied to events on a case by case basis.Council to utilise both the decision-making matrix and preferred business model(s) when looking at providing financial or other support services to existing and potential internal and external events.Develop a detailed event manual that provides a clear understanding and map of Council’s role in managing its own events and what and how the organisation will provide services and support to external events.

Decision making

and business models

BACKGROUND

A number of local events receive some form of funding, sponsorship and/or in-kind support from Council for event delivery. An issue for Council and stakeholders is a lack of clear and integrated processes for providing funding and support/advisory services underpinned by funding governance and reporting arrangements. By developing event funding policies and procedures, Council will be able to make more considered allocations of funds and resources to events and identify how and where funding could be provided across events types and the event calendar.

RECOMMENDATIONS

Council to strengthen its events policy to include detail on the processes it applies to event funding and service provision to external events organisers.Council to adopt a formalised approach to processing and providing funding support to external events. This documented funding application process should include:• Establishment of funding rounds• Funding to be broken into 3 funding streams namely: - Community/local events - Regional events; and - Major events.Funding guidelines including eligibility, criteria, what will and will not be funded, and funding terms and conditions to be developed for each funding stream and provided to all applicants.Funding levels per stream to be adopted by Council based on agreed budget allocations with delegated authority to approve funding applications according to funding streams to be decided by Council.

Funding policies

and procedures

Develop clear and integrated processes for

providing funding and support/advisory

services.

BACKGROUND

Considerable investment is made in marketing and promotion within the local and regional events industry. This presents stakeholders with opportunities to adopt greater levels of co-operation or cross promotion of events, and support products and services within the Warrnambool region. The local events and hospitality sector can also more closely collaborate to develop packages to include accommodation, dining and visits to local attractions to increase economic benefits from events across local businesses. Use of the web by event organisers has become increasingly common across the industry in the region. There appears to be some good links between websites particularly from Council to other organisations. However, the functionality of websites is limited with most providing general, static event and contact information with few websites enabling potential attendees to register their interest in events, receive event updates, book tickets, accommodation and generally motivate their attendance. Council promotes events through both its corporate website (warrnambool.vic.gov.au) and its tourism website (visitwarrnambool.com.au). This can create a confusing entry point for customers. In addition, the quality and presentation of information provided on events could be improved to be more motivational and user friendly. For example, the calendar of events on the tourism website should allow for filtering by event type to enable visitors to more easily navigate around the site and access the information they are looking for.

RECOMMENDATIONS

• The industry to work together to identify opportunities to improve cross-marketing opportunities and activities. Analysis of the current calendar of events to identify potential event clusters under themes or seasons would help to inform marketing activities.

• Opportunities and mechanisms to develop inclusive packages around events should be pursued with the local events, hospitality and tourism sectors. This will assist with increasing the visitor yield from events, foster greater co-operation and partnerships and potentially identify local service or product gaps that could attract investment.

• Council to review and update its web-based event marketing and information presentation to include:• One main web host point for event information on the tourism website. Event information on Council’s corporate website should be limited and instead provide quick and easy redirection of visitors to the tourism site.• Improved functionality of the events calendar to allow for event filtering by event type,

dates and attendee interests so that end users can filter information to get to where they want to be more easily.

• Hallmark and major events should receive increased profile when visitors enter the events section of the website and content and presentation of web pages for individual events to be improved.

• Attendees to be given the opportunity to register their interest in an event and receive event updates, special offers and other event marketing and tourism information.

• The use of social media systems for marketing and customer engagement to be encouraged and enabled within the local events industry.

Marketing and

engagement

Opportunities and mechanisms to

develop inclusive packages around

events should also be pursued with the local events,

hospitality and tourism sectors.

• Identify and plan priority event development and attraction opportunities based on existing event strengths, identified opportunities and calendar gaps.

• The industry to strengthen relationships with partners, stakeholders and business.

• Improve web-based communication, promotion tools and functionality.• Promote capability of Council and especially the Events and Promotions Unit,

to provide event support and guidance.• Create a policy environment that actively encourages a more business-like

approach to events through an Event Development Program.• Develop weightings and mean scores for each of the event vision goals

and objectives to assist with decision making processes in relation to event funding, sponsorship and support.

• Develop a Warrnambool Event Capability Profile to leverage current organisational and industry strengths and to strategically position Warrnambool within the wider events industry and market place.

• Develop sound and equitable principles and procedures for funding support of internal and external events.

• Apply business model options for event delivery and management on a case by case basis.

• Develop Key Performance Indicators that relate to desired event goals, objectives and outcomes of Council and stakeholders.

Priority actions

• Retention of events that provide significant community and economic outcomes, promote the region and encourage community participation.

• Encourage best practice event planning and management within the local events industry.

• Increased sharing of event knowledge, skills and capabilities and development of efficiencies.

• Support continuous improvement within the events industry.• Identification of opportunities to grow events particularly where they

align to identified community and regional strengths and opportunities including sports, family, water-based events, cultural events and the natural and built environment and assets.

• Improve the value-proposition to event attendees, participants and partners.

• Identify investment opportunities in local infrastructure, assets and supporting services.

• Foster confidence and raise awareness of local capacity and capabilities in relation to event hosting and support services within the region and the industry.

• Increase skills, knowledge and expertise of stakeholders involved in events and support services/sectors.

• Enhanced links between regional tourism and event marketing, increase visitor yield from event activities and improve the visitor experience.

• Support robust and equitable event funding and support decisions and optimise funding and revenue opportunities through strong relationships and equitable funding management and reporting.

Benefits and outcomes