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[skyhoof]

My first Eurofurence was EF7, I'm a member of security since EF14.
Now I'm security team leader for the fursuit lounge.


This are my feelings about EF20:

I arrived in Berlin on monday the 18th and left on monday the 25th.
During that time i had that many impressions that i really feel the need to share my feelings about EF20 with you.


What made me most happy was:
For myself it felt like we had the most peaceful convention within the last 7 years.
There were some incidents which could be handled fast. As always in such a big group of attendees there were some few who did ... lets call it "dumb things" ... and needed to be handled by security.
But there was not a single major incident.


Another great thing:
Some formerly problematic attendees showed us their best side this year.
This made me very happy this year :-)
We're always happy when people are able to enjoy the convention!


About work in the security team:
As a security member i had a lot of work to do during the convention.
But even when there was no work to do (in theory), i could not stop working. Every year during Eurofurence i become a work'o'holic.
I always want to do my best to make EF an awesome experience to everyone. Working on that is so much fun to me, that i forget to have breaks or to visit panels ans shows.
This year i had 4 hours of sleep every night in average, had close to zero free time (only watched the PawpetShow, but with a radio in my ear) and feel overworked like hell.
But it was totally worth it! Reading the attendees positive feedback about the con and about security compensates all this.

Of course we could not make everybody happy and needed to annoy some very few people, but this was to grant about 2000 attendees an awesome convention.

Working for the security team is awesome! We at security treat each other like we were a big family. Working at this team is always a pleasure.
I really need to thank all my colleges here in this thread, where everybody is able to read it!
Guys, you rock, all of you! From our newbies, who joined the team this year to the head of security, all of you!



What i disliked
was hearing from some attendees that they believed in that "staff members get everything for free and may skip all cues"
To prevent a wrong impression to attendees:
All staff members pay not only the full prices, we also pay a lot more for preparations, meetings and the like. We don't get any money.

I had nearly nothing of the amusements that Eurofurence provides, just to make sure that you are able to enjoy them! And i payed a lot of money to do so, as well as i spend my work holidays to be able to work for you!

If i skipped any queue, it was to do my work.
So please, please, please don't spread any rumors about those "unfair staff members, getting everything for free"!
Hearing them really hurts us a lot!


Thinks i would like to suggest doing different next year:

To the Hotel:

The lobby of the hotel felt a bit overcrowded, compared to the years before, where we used to be at smaller hotels.
But the hotels "Orangerie" was closed all the time, except for breakfast.
I would suggest to the hotel to open that area to the public next year. There is so much space where people could sit down and have a conversation. That space felt like wasted to me, this year.
I know that you prepared that area for breakfast, but i would suggest to do so way later.


A great number of Eurofurence attendees like to stay up very long in the night.
I'm sure your employees working at the bar realized this fact.
Would it be possible to transfer that knowledge to other services like the opening hours of the breakfast and room cleaning?
I would suggest to close breakfast one hour later and also start room cleaning one hour later.
I know, that such changes are not easy for a team which so far used to have other service hours and went very well with them so far.
But please keep in mind that Eurofurence books out your hotel totally for one week.
The convention was booked out after a very short time. We would had even more attendees, if the Estrel would have been able to offer more rooms.


The Prices in the hotel restaurants are a bit to high.
Our attendees complained for example that the price for a pizza has been "almost criminal".
I'm pretty sure that those prices are calculated well and work pretty good during "other" events.
But our attendees are a bit different. Most of them safe money all the year to be able to visit this one event. For most of them there is not much budget left for visiting the restaurant.
I'm sure that you would sell way more, if you would lower the prices to a level which is comparable to a usual restaurant outside of a hotel.
This year most of our attendees bought their food at the nearby Mc.Donalds and "Reichelt" supermarket.
With previous hotels we made the experience that changing the price politics during the convention seemed to be a win-win situation for our attendees and the hotel.




To the Fursuit longe:

Thank you for the table providing "Sagrotan" and "Febreeze".
Some Suiters told me that it would be awesome to provide some low-prize deodorant as well, because it happens often that other suiters forget about bringing those down to the lounge.
A discounters no-name deodorant with a neutral odor for about 0.79 EUR per can would do a great job.


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[Fineas]

was hearing from some attendees that they believed in that "staff members get everything for free and may skip all cues"
To prevent a wrong impression to attendees:
All staff members pay not only the full prices, we also pay a lot more for preparations, meetings and the like. We don't get any money.

Pfff this again. Allow me to attest to this.

- Most of us are super sponsors.
- Almost everyone takes early arrival and late departure at the same price as any other attendee. Some even came days earlier then Tuesday.
- Directors and many others attend the physical meetings with the hotel. Meaning you might get a reduced rate as a courtesy by the hotel, but you have to pay your own transport (to Berlin in this case).
- I had 400 euro worth of stuff, just to lend out and run my little part of the con. You DO NOT want to know how much (for example) stage crew brings with them from their own private lives with no guarantees or compensation for them. If stuff breaks during the con its the same as it would have broke at home.
- We have a strict rule that all purchases are returned by paying out for store tickets. No ticket, no pay. And only from stores, not a single thing we make gets sold to EF.
- Eurofurence E.v. is a non profit organization. For our tax cuts we are required by law to: have no paid members, be able to explain all expenses and end up with a zero balance at the end of the year.

[Jumpy]

Two tiny corrections, which do not invalidate any of your argument, but are nevertheless important:

Eurofurence E.v. is a non profit organization. For our tax cuts* we are required by law to: have no paid members, be able to explain all expenses and end up with a zero balance** at the end of the year.

Ad (*):

Eurofurence e.V. receives no special tax cuts, because we are "just" an incorporated social organization ("eingetragener Verein"), not a charity organization ("gemeinnütziger Verein"). We are more or less taxed like any GmbH (similar to a Ltd) would be.

Ad (**):

Eurofurence e.V. can and sometimes does make a profit. The requirement is that any such profit be kept in the organization as a reserve to be used in the future - there can be no entity that takes the profit away.

[meo]

A quick wish from me: I chatted a lot with Silver Horse due the con and it seems that people got confused by the fact that he didn't is one of Conops or even Security, please give the Fursuit-reg-desk a Securitycontact next year so people didn't have to seek for one and get disappointed when the Regteam say the they couldn't help them.

Also I would recommend to hand out these small electric Fans that you can get for around 1 € (for example these: http://www.werbeartikel-discount.com/product_info.php/products_id/52093?osCsid=44jjnu78nffqamoe2vk97bjv86 ). I would even buy one at the Con to help an overheating Suiter, but please give at least every Suiter one of these.

[Token]

[...] please give the Fursuit-reg-desk a Securitycontact next year so people didn't have to seek for one and get disappointed when the Regteam say the they couldn't help them.

AFAIK there should be at least one person with a radio at the desk - which is a super effective way to contact us. :-) It might have been with someone not around at that time, which I am sorry for. Thank you for the feedback, we will try to improve on this next year.

(A workaround if things somehow still fail: Around the corner was conops, which definitely has a direct way of contacting security.)

Best wishes and hugs,
Token

[RedFoxy]

*hugs security men* As I told you around the fire, I'm with you, you do a really good job!

[Blue Raptor]

Security did a great job, and I liked the arm bands, clear designated security logo and little language flags.

[RedFoxy]

but, there was differences from security patches with yellow background and with the rainbow background?

[Codewolf]

but, there was differences from security patches with yellow background and with the rainbow background?

Nope. The armbands usually were yellow, tshirts and large patches were rainbow

[RedFoxy]

but, there was differences from security patches with yellow background and with the rainbow background?

Nope. The armbands usually were yellow, tshirts and large patches were rainbow

ok :3

[Rush_Lion]

What i disliked
was hearing from some attendees that they believed in that "staff members get everything for free and may skip all cues"
To prevent a wrong impression to attendees:
All staff members pay not only the full prices, we also pay a lot more for preparations, meetings and the like. We don't get any money.

After all the work you guys put in, out of your own time and money, I wouldn't even dare complain IF you took some liberties or got some perks (and i know you don't!). I would call it well deserved. I come to EF to have a holiday, to shamelessly relax and be without stress. And it's because of the many volunteers who DO work that that's possible.  My compliments and thanks to all of you!!

[Rattie]

After all the work you guys put in, out of your own time and money, I wouldn't even dare complain IF you took some liberties or got some perks (and i know you don't!). I would call it well deserved. I come to EF to have a holiday, to shamelessly relax and be without stress. And it's because of the many volunteers who DO work that that's possible.  My compliments and thanks to all of you!!

Thank you a ton for the recognition. That kind of feedback is what makes my work worth while. It sounds like you had an awesome con, and that makes me so happy to hear. I hope you'll return next year for a new round of adventure. And I will be back, playing my small part in making the con great

To Skyhoof. Props to you and the whole seccie team, you rock! Not only because of the amount of work you do, but for being such a friendly bunch of people.
Funny to think, that furcons helped me to see past the uniformed person enforcing strict rules. Working with you via ConOps of coursed helped in that respect. And nowadays when I see a seccie guy on duty, I smile and think of you

[Lutra]

You did a great job. I absolutely enjoyed the convention and felt safe the whole time