I try to avoid fc mostly due to the hotel

Both the main and overflow hotels price gouge, blfc offers far better rooms for far less. Also the elevators at fc can be horrid. And with the fur con only taking a small % of the con floor, if your in the overflow hotel it's a long nasty walk to the con.

I also always feel bad for the dealers there, the dealers den often goes into the 90's


I think word of mouth is a major cause for the increase of attendees at any con

It's really complicated, and not well understood. There are the logistics and economics for the convention members, but this is a major factor when the member is deciding to go to a con for the first time, and when a member is deciding which cons he or she will continue to attend when they have a major life change, such as job loss, maawwige, kids, etc.

It may surprise you, but even a con that is stagnant and shrinking gets a significant number of new faces each year. The real secret is convincing these folks to come back again and again. This boils down to a pair of very personal questions for each person. Did I have fun? and Did I have more fun at this con than I did at the other con?

But everyone has different things that they enjoy. Some folks love the costumes. Some love showing off and performing their costumes. Some folks love the art. Some folks love the friends they find at the con. Some folks love getting laid. Some folks love the work of volunteering at the con. Some love the program items. Some love to freak the mundanes. Some love the city where the con is held. The list goes on and on and is a varied at the people going there.

The folks running the con have to expend their limited supply of goodwill, money, and people points to put on a convention that is enjoyable enough for enough people that it will survive. There are many wrong answers, but there are also many right answers, and depending on the convention personality, what is right for one is wrong for another.

I'll stop here, since I don't want to spend the entire day in front of the computer. I want to go out and have fun. *grins*

BLFC's growth is easy to explain. The environment is unique (casino with in-house entertainment amenities), the rooms are huge and excellent for parties, the con offers a experience that's in tune with what most furries actually look for at cons these days (heavy emphasis on parties/fun rather than programming), and it appears to be very well-run by a group of people that are just really into it. It was cheap, with the hotel 1/3 the cost of a comparable downtown hotel in its first year and still not bad now. All of these things lead to a huge word-of-mouth factor that makes furs eager to check it out (and of course to return). And it can draw on both the Bay Area and LA communities.

MFF is growing at a pretty standard rate, I would say, for most cons. AC is on a similar track (despite many negatives to the AC experience that are similar to the FC experience, below). MFF does benefit by being easy to get to and having a nice hotel.

FC's contraction last year was probably a one-off blip, but the high hotel costs, split layout over two hotels, rooms that sell out, and crowded elevators are probably deterring some people. I would expect close-to-flat attendance over the next few years.

For Califur, I could give some hypotheses, but personally when I've been there I simply haven't had very much fun. BLFC being in a similar region at a similar timeslot on the calendar is probably not helping either (I doubt anyone would travel out of state to visit both cons this year.)


Basically, there's no all-in-one answer, but cons grow fastest when they're some combination of inexpensive, easy to get to, have a good venue, offer a different/unique experience, or can draw on an underserved community. They shrink due either to management problems, alienating their attendees, or being limited by the size/cost/structure of the facilities in the area that can reasonably support them.

Could also be who goes as well; if big name artists go then that would attract a lot of people.

I think a few factors go into it. First and foremost would be the housing- BLFC, MFF have amazing hotels for their conventions. FC's hotel now warrants a resounding 'meh'. Califur's hotel is just awful, I'm woe to say. We live a few minutes from it but won't be attending this year, just because how it's set up and the price of locals visiting (parking). The hotel's not situated near anything, either. Unlike that redondo beach con for 2 years, where there is lots to do around it, Califur is isolated from anything good, even food.

I'd say publicity is another thing- Sal and I were the guests of honor the first BLFC, and pumped the con as much as we could. Sal has a pretty large fan base, so that helped- Shiuk being a part of BLFC is another thing that helps with publicity. And everyone has such a great time there, they spread the word and recruit. Most people I know going to FC say 'it's fun to socialize' and Califur is given a pretty negative rating from a lot of people. There's not many out there that pump the con up or go on about how awesome the convention has been.

I think efforts of the staff and response to attendees is another big thing. BLFC has listened to feedback and done their best to make everyone happy- eg, the dealer's room is amazing. Califur and FC's dealer rooms leave a lot to be desired, from the dealer's side of things. I've also heard a lot of people saying they wish Califur moved to a different hotel, but I've not heard any plans/response to that (though, to be fair, I don't keep up on the convention and could be missing it due to my own fault).


So... think that all is a bit of what's contributing to it.

Dreamous and Procyon are right. I've heard that word of mouth from the California cons (and Midwest Furfest) has spread about BLFC and helped entice people. There's also the cheapness of the flights/hotels, and yeah, if what I've heard about is true, the theme was very well done. Midwest Furfest likewise gets a ton of word of mouth from myself and as many of the people I can poke about it, since the hotel is really fun and the group running it knows exactly what people want (free food and soda. :P)

I think that I'd like to say that the explosive growth from BLFC stems from a few things.

First off its in a unique area, as some have pointed out. Its in a casino hotel resort that features things that you really just don't find in that close a proximity to each other rarely if at all anywhere else. Having so many food and entertainment areas within the very walls or just a short walking distance of the hotel is a benefit to everyone because it means everyone can be lazy and not have to go anywhere to gain foods and miss something from the con.

Second, because of the cheap hotel rooms available it is insanely easy for furs to stay in the hotel the con is hosted in.

Third, I think that the themes in which the con has featured in the past have just deeply spoken to a lot of furries out there, hailing from eras that they feel a strong pull to. Looking on Wikifur, BLFC's first theme was "Roaring 20's", an era of classy fashion and opulence. Next, they went with "80's Pop Culture", of which I can say I hail from directly being born in the nineteen eighties so all that nostalgia is something that a massive amount of furs find a calling to. And then that leads up to the theme that everyone ran wild with, "Utopia" where it was a dystopian society.

Compare all of this to Califur, a more local convention to SoCal, where the best that they've been able to do is get a hotel that's in the middle of an industrial park complex. Granted, yes it is close to the airport, but that's about all I can even say about it. The Starbucks down in the lobby becomes raided every single day of the con because elsewise the only food places are a Pizza Hut and Subway within walking distance, otherwise be prepared to go for a drive through an area where every building looks the same and/or is closed because its a weekend and industrial parks shutter their doors on weekends.

Califur's focus has always sort of been for the furs of SoCal even though it anyone can attend and sometimes does.

Really, I think there may be some subliminal muscling in going on here. BLFC may not have realized it or intended it but moving their event to within three weeks of Califur is leaving plenty of furs with the lingering memories of a con that they've deemed far better, and will probably make purpose plans to attend again next year. And this is a challenge that Califur can't do anything about. The success of BLFC is probably going to slowly kill Califur or drain its overall attendance now, which really is sad after all the longevity its had around here.

--Mozdoc

Constaff.

The people in charge of FC are pretty much killing it, they're not changing with the times or evolving.
They don't give out memberships to staff members (this is a holdover from when the con was barely making money).
They don't give out memberships for the same year con to volunteers.
They won't do anything to improve registration (2 hour wait standard, 1 hour minimum).
They won't provide either membership OR at least have someone pick up your con badge for panelists / presenters (That's right, you have to stand in line for 1 to 2 hours, just for the right to then present to people for a couple of hours, after paying to be there).
They won't spend more than $100 on the Con's theme.
They WON'T EVER move out of the Bay and the most expensive hotels (outside of LA) to someplace cheaper.
They won't expand the dealers den into a larger room.
They need to STOP changing con chairman every year. This was worthwhile back in the beginning. Now it's just dumb.

I've been staff on FC in the past, I often do panels for the con, and I have several friends, who until recently, were on staff. The problem with FC, is again, they won't change with the times, and they won't act like a major convention. And the rotating con head means that there is no real continuity from year to year, because that cons from the the chair.
FC needs to grow up.

I don't know about most of these issues. But, last FC's registration was the best registry I ever had at any con. Wasn't one hour. In fact, I don't think it even took ten minutes. Ultra quick and painless.

And, they've expanded into the Convention Center. Outside of taking over even more of that facility, I just don't know what other facilities could support a con of this size without majorly relocating to another city, hundreds of miles away. It's like the same problem that the San Diego Comic Con has. There's just nowhere to go without totally relocating to a different section of the Earth.

Well, you were lucky. I was in line an hour. On Saturday. And I was a panelist.
And everyone I know who wasn't able to pre-reg was also in line at least an hour, many for much longer. FC has the slowest registration of any con that I know.

Guess so. I had a friend that had to go into the longer line and he was through before I was.

Still, wouldn't it be nice if there was some way to make things really flow like they should.

(Remember's Comic Con's notion that everyone register in advance via the net. They turn on the server's at a pre-announced time for a limited number of tickets and the flood of nerds at second one crashes these main frames to an inoperable state...multiple times.)

So, I'm out of ideas on how to run registry. After all, if most everyone used smart phones to speed things through, I'm sure no computer in the world could handle it all.

And, you mention two to three thousand people max and I'll probably have to bite the bullet on that one. 'Any computer in FC's 'happy place' budget range...' (right?)

FC hasn't 'taken over the convention center', they use a few sections in it, and they won't move the dealers den there, where it should be. Because they 'can't afford it'. If they can't afford it, then they shouldn't be there!

As for moving it away, there are facilities within a hundred miles that would be cheaper, but the people who run the con don't want to have to drive that far.

And no, it's not like San Diego comic con. That has over twenty thousand attendees, FC has only two or three thousand.

Sorry. I didn't say they took over the center. I meant that, some day, they might be able to. As in having one way of expanding where they are. Probably be a challenge, getting it away from the vollyball leagues, though. (Words can be such tricky things.)

As for the point of the people running it on their convenience, I can back. Not everyone can be as crazy as World Con.

I wasn't meaning on that bulk a scale. I was saying that at three thousand, it would be hard for FC to return to a singular hotel. Thus, being relocated to another section of Earth where the expansion space could be found.

Well, I don't really have any particular inside information to do more than speculate, but I feel that FC is doing the best it can in a somewhat challenging situation. It's hard to find space for a convention that draws ~4000 people at a cost that's acceptable to the attendees - there are just not a lot of options for events of this size since you are entering a market that is dominated by cash-flush business and trade conferences. I go to academic events every year of similar size and routinely pay $200/night for a hotel and $500 for registration, and true business events pay even more for the same facilities, so I can't really complain about $160/night and $60 registration. (Also, just in general, you can only expect so much out of unpaid volunteers who have to manage an event this large!)

Still, it may ultimately just turn out to be the case that growth beyond several thousands attendees is unacceptable for the community (due to the higher cost and need for distribution across many hotels), and over the next few years all the major cons will basically cap out at this level or begin to shrink and be surpassed by "small" upstart cons (until they themselves also become unwieldly large and the cycle repeats). Honestly, I'd be OK with that. If FC grows unpopular people will stop traveling to it from out of state, and it will turn into "small" regional con of 2000, could move back into the Doubletree, and be like it was in 2005 all over again!

There are A LOT of cons that are much bigger than FC that do not have these problems or these costs. FC drew 3500 people last year, and I'm sure that at least 1000 of those did not stay at the hotel (most of the local furs do not, they drive there, so I wouldn't be surprised to find out that it was closer to 2000 not staying at the hotel).

FC could do better, and they should try to. Will they? I don't know, but the way they are currently set up is not conducive to better negotiations. This is why they need to stop switching the con chair every year. FC has been lucky, in that it took over as the west coast con as soon as it started, and was blessed with high numbers from the beginning (I've been going since the start). But it hasn't adapted to the situation, and it needs to. Otherwise BLFC may end up supplanting it in a few years.

Hm, do you have an example of a con that's managed to pass the ~3000 attendee threshold and keep hotel rates significantly below those of FC? AC's rates are also very high. MFF's are (slightly) lower, which I imagine has a lot to do with their off-season timeslot. And my understanding is that FWA has had major hotel conflicts (although I don't know their rates). All other furry cons are much smaller. Perhaps we can learn from other types of fan conventions?

As for FC, mainly I remember that there was a LOT of discussion about their move to the Fairmont and then to the convention center about various alternatives, including the possibility of date changes, venue changes, and so on. I'm inclined to believe that the organizers have done the best they could, and that the Bay Area's high costs and year-round season simply make it hard to find the kind of bargain rates that most furries expect for an event of this size. But, maybe I'm wrong.

I'm pretty sure Fanime, which is like 10K or 20K attending has lower hotel rates. And they're in the bay.

Hm, it would indeed seem that way (despite being in the exact same venue as FC the "lowest rates" posted for the same hotels are about $20-40 cheaper.)

One thing that gets overlooked is a bit of luck/Catch-22. A large con draws people, simply because it's a large con. A small con discourages people from coming again next year. It's probably not the biggest factor involved, but it is a factor. Big cons get bigger because they're big. This mostly applies to new attendees, I think, though.

The personal experience stuff other people mentioned above is probably a bigger factor, though, especially when it comes to returning attendees.

I don't think Antheria was stillborn, at all. After all, the first one packed out that last second hotel to it's bloated point. And, the sequel was bringing out the mayor. If anything, "Two-Con" self destructed from the inside over trying to continue on-wards.

As for CaliFur, I always felt that it had reached it's occupancy limits at it's current location. Just try to find a parking space during the height of the con, screams that point.

FC...is pricey. One of the things I loved about FurCons is it being a cheap vacation. I don't consider dropping a grand-plus for a weekend to be 'cheap'.

I wasn't around in the days of ConFurence. What impression I got was simply it was there on the early days when our numbers were spotty and organization was poor. I believe it was paving the way in the days when recovering it's costs was a hard task to achieve.

The last second hotel was what killed it. When they got booted out of the original hotel a week before the con and ended up in a motel 6, I think most people wrote it off. The next year was slightly better but it only takes one or two bad years, for a new con anyway, to sink it.

On my POV, I think scrounging up any hotel that was capable of hosting at the last second was pulling miracles. I really can't fault that con for fighting to make it happen when the worst possibility of events, takes place.

Yes. The place was tight. Yes. There was so little room that little else but the big attraction could have been hosted. Yes. There was practically nothing else but the big show and a microscopic dealer's den to show for it. Yes. The main room had to be shared and the show took every chair in the place. But, I overheard something that I'm sure most furs never did. A quick conversation between a manager and her staff, ordering them to do anything...absolutely anything to make their guests feel welcomed. That hotel not only wanted us, they craved us. Sure beats Sure beats hotel crews at past FC's that thought we were beneath them or conducted credit card theft.

Besides, Antheria was the Southern California's local con...like CaliFur started up as being.

Did you ever get ear fulls of Two's bitching about 'how hard it was to run a con'? Sure. He used it as a joke. But, I've always had my questions as to where he funded that con at and if his interests weren't so much in hosting a con, but creating an atmosphere for his comedy show. My suspicions were that Antheria was run by funding from the Anaheim Fur House. Prove it, I can not. But, I very strongly suspect the two were linked. After all, RainHopper idolized Two so much...

I wish that Antheria had succeeded. It's even closer for me than Califur and I'd go every year if it were still running. The odd thing is that it had so much trouble booking up the original hotel. It's right in L.A., there are lots of furs there. Yet somehow they couldn't fill the rooms and we ended up in Motel 6. Very odd.

Doesn't seem odd to me, at all. You just pointed out why rooms weren't being booked. When the event is so local and xx minutes away from home, why go to the extra cost of renting rooms? Besides, I've already been witness to a great experiment of how cheap some furs are. The whole point of booking rooms is because the event is far away and one doesn't want to be sleeping out on the street. With Antheria, it was more like PS party Plus.

Why, I had this long running theory that a whole different type of Antheria-like con could work there in the greater LA area. Not so much running it out of a hotel, as locals wouldn't want to book rooms. But, something on a different level. Like, if it were somehow possible, renting out an old supermarket for the weekend. Really depends on the owner to pull this off. But, I've heard of those lots renting out on short notice for things like garage sales. Charge admission and somehow get a budget to make the place better then just a concrete floor and 10,000 square feet of nothing. If planned right and informed, it could really work.

I guess as you say it down to a combination of things. However I don't think it is set in a block of stone; for example, I'm from the UK so if I want to go to any of the US 'cons then they are all expensive (the price of the plane flight can be around £600-£1000+ (roughly $800-$1500) depending on when you book).

That said and the only 'con I've ever been to is anthrocon. Though I do wonder if it can continue to grow in its current location - not because its venue is too small, but because of the hotel situation. Once anthrocon opens for hotel room bookings they quite literally get taken up like hot cakes. That then just leaves the outlying hotels that are further away from the 'con, and while during AC a hotel is just largely a place to sleep it can be frustrating for people if they have to travel (say) 10-20 miles to an outlying hotel just because they've (for example) forgotten something.

I wonder if pittsburgh has the hotel capacity and prehaps that it is limiting AC's growth. Last year they had 5861 attending; the year previous, 5577 and before that 5179. Though for 2013 and 2014 that's just a 7.68% and 5.09% increase - a lot smaller than in the late 00's when it was much higher. With all these percentages and numbers I feel like I'm doing an election special I'll be talking about a percentage swing to FC and doing an exit poll next!

SP

Anthrocon is becoming a problem to attend. A lot of furs I know go there and I love to visit with them, but the old "nice" hotel, the Courtyard, is now available only to supersponsors and sells out in minutes. The main hotel sells out almost as fast and none of the other options are very good. The event space is nice, but the rooming situation is dismal.

Simple: fame isn't distributed equally.

It's all about the ball pit.

First and foremost is price. FC is expensive to go to. Room prices are high as is everything else. Second, ease of getting there. Reno is easy to get to, there are flights there every day and because Reno is a gambling town, the air fare is relatively cheap as are the hotel rooms. FC is a lot harder to get to. The biggest airport to San Jose is San Francisco, but even if you fly into San Fran, you can't just hop a bart train down to San Jose, you have to take the bart, then you have to take a train. That's a big pain in the butt so you're less likely to see many out of town furries attend that con unless they know people who are going and can get them to help cover some of the cost of room and also get them to and from their places.
Third and most importantly is who is running the con. I just got back from Momocon in Atlanta today. That is a massive gaming/anime/comic con. Lots of people and it was well organized. i'm on staff with Anime Weekend Atlanta and the con president not only is well organized, but he has great staff. Add to that that he doesn't just run AWA, he also runs other cons all over the world and you really start to see and ins and out of running a successful convention. If the people in charge aren't doing their job properly, aren't taking care of their staff, aren't giving the con goers things to make it exciting, then the con is going to fizzle out and sputter. Word of mouth is everything for a great con. If you go to a con and have a lousy experience, then everyone you tell about it is going to be put off on going, and you're likely to not want to go the following year either.
I went to FC once and was not impressed at all. It doesn't take much to run a great con and make sure everyone is having fun but the staff has to be excited about wanting to make sure that the guest are having fun.
So to summarize it's price, ease of access to the con, and whether the con is fun and makes you excited to want to go the next year.

Yup. One night at the FC room cost me as much as an entire week of lodging in Las Vegas. Worse yet, I could have fit four FC rooms into that Las Vegas room.

There's this odd thing that people say to me... "Oh I don't want to go to [fill in the furry con] because it's too small."

I stare at them for a moment, trying to see if they've caught their own Catch 22 there...

There's definitely another factor to think about...the shear number of cons.

So many years ago, we had some big con names. (So to speak.) Then, there were a few smaller ones. A year+ ago, I had found this listing of active fur cons at some web site. (Bookmark's long gone.) It stated (at that time) that there were over 70 active fur cons across the globe. Not every American state had one listed. But, the better percentage did. So few people in the world could possibly afford to con hop for a year or two. So, that's got to be a factor into why some cons aren't forever growing. Because, the choices are out there, now. Choices that weren't as abundantly available, just five years ago.

Well I can only say from UK cons experiance - confuzzled for example has good management, a team of them. Has always had a good hotel and has had to grow and move each year to accommodate and they get better and better. Plenty of events, plenty of facilities a mix of options food and drink a free breakfast and dinner. Etc
If the facility is right, the communication with the fandom is right then it will do well. First immpressions are everything in the industry so if the first con is beyond bad then it will begin to plummet.

I think a lot also might have to do with word of mouth. I've heard mix reviews for califur and my own experience at FC wasn't bad, but I would say less interesting than blfc. Blfc was very well ran to a point that I was even shocked how organized they were. Management is very tough and I'm sure it's a lot more to difficult than its made out to be. So it's probably a mix of many things

For me the biggest factor is the hotel(pricing/amenities/location).
FC was great at the double tree, good at the fairmont, and lousy at the convention center.
BLFC is growing like mad because it's cheap, fun, and the amenities are all centrally located within the hotel.
On a similar note I think RF could be great if only they could find a larger hotel farther from the airport.

if you want to know how a con is run and the trials and tribulations involved give uncle kage a call, im sure hed be more then willing to regale you with horror stories from all his years runing Anthrocon...unless running it finaly killed him or he retired when i wasnt looking...i havnt kept up with con news since 2 sense stoped airing im sad to say.

I think one factor is the directors and staff planning out all the details and fun events, if you are going to a gathering but a con should develop some organization, It can survive a few years without it but all else being equal, how hard the staff works and listens plays a lot into the game.