Information on Hosting Needed

[Arefin Bari]

I wish I had written a whitepaper on organizing an off-season event so it would be helpful to you. I organize the Mayhem (last year it was Mayhem @ the Museum, and this year it was Mission Mayhem) in South Florida. I do have few suggestions for you.

- Organize a planning committee, who meet often, we had 7 people in the committee. (Also divide up the work between the committee members).

- Make sure you got a sponsor/sponsors (try to hit up a college, because it is helpful to them from a marketing point of view) who is willing to provide you with shipping cost of the field. (Have a group of people work with the money and figure out how to spend it and keep all the teams happy.)

- Venue is something you also you want to look at before you contact FIRST. My suggestion would be not to choose a venue that’s outside and under a tent (Trust me, I have experience with this, Mayhem will be inside from now on).

- Get in touch with FIRST and ask them if there is a field available for the dates you are looking at for your event.

- One very important aspect of an off-season is getting volunteers for the event. You will need around 50 volunteers (this past year at Mission Mayhem we had 40 dedicated volunteers who were very dedicated).

- FIRST doesn’t provide a carpet with the playing field, you will need a carpet.

- Food at the venue is also very important on the list.

- Plan out a floor plan beforehand.

- Start contacting teams at least 3 months before the event.

- Also think about how can this event inspire the public, if you are letting public walk in and just watch.

- Lastly, you want to make sure you got a Mike Walker and Billfred at your event so the field runs very smoothly throughout the day.

I am very new to this and this was only my second year organizing a FIRST event. I have got my gurus like John Burke (who organizes the Mayhem with me), also Chris Fultz, Andy Baker, and Libby Ritchie (they organize IRI every year which is known as the best off-season event); you might want to get in touch with them so they can give you more advice. If you need any more information, feel free to contact me. I will help you out anyways possible. Good luck.