Hopefully in the right order these are the steps we took in Suffolk. Although there are differing ways to go about organising these events, this is the process we followed and it worked well for us. It’s a long list but essentially all just common sense so don’t be put off!
- Select a location – in Suffolk we are lucky in that we have the beautiful market town of Bury St Edmunds and also Woodbridge on the Deben estuary. Both are blessed with multiple eating establishments and attract lots of visitors. Picking an attractive location that is well served by both road and rail is a great start. We even managed to persuade a couple of excellent buskers to show up on the day to make the experience of walking through the town more even more enjoyable.
- Find a date when there is a reasonable gap between County events and select a day of the week where the venues are likely to be not too busy. In Bury St Edmunds we chose a Thursday since this was historically half day closing and remains a relatively quiet day.
- Book Victor Lesk (Mr Café Bridge) with his BriAnBridge App for both directing and scoring. Victor provides a service which is priced very reasonably at a relatively small percentage of total income for the event. Victor delivers not only the directing and scoring, but also the overall movement including personal movement cards for each player and much more.
- Select the Cafés/Restaurants you would like to play at. There are several points to consider when evaluating venues
- Work out how many venues you might need and how many tables there would be in each venue. At our first event we had 8 venues with 2 tables in each, with one having an extra table. This year we increased it to 12 venues since we anticipated a large increase in the number of players that would participate.
- Keep venues within a reasonable distance of each other to reduce the amount of walking time between them
- Ensure they have suitable tables on which to play bridge (round, square, oblong – it doesn’t matter)
- Ensure venue opening times work for your event and if not, you can always ask them to open early. I have found that they have all been accommodating even the national restaurant chains
- If possible, avoid venues with stairs to climb which tends not to suit the demographic of bridge players
- Check they have a suitable menu – in the case of Suffolk we elected to offer a light lunch rather than fine dining opportunities, so a menu that offers a lunch within your budget – for us it was just £15/head and there were no complaints!
- One venue needs to be large enough to hold the prize giving at the end of the event as well as host a charity stall
- Check mobile phone signal (required for the BriAn Bridge App) is available and if not, then whether or not they have free Wi-Fi available
- Now getting the venues on board to participate.
- Top tip! Initially don’t mention this event is anything to do with a charity, otherwise they may zone out.
- Instead, your opening line is that you want to make a block booking for lunch! That will get their attention and then you can explain the event and finally that it’s also supporting a local charity.
- Sell the venue the benefits of participation. Tell them the numbers of people that will be coming in and out during the day. With just 4 tables there will be 128 opportunities to sell teas, coffees etc. Furthermore, local people become aware of venues that they have never tried before and in some cases didn’t even know existed.
- Mention the other venues that have already signed up or participated last year. No one likes being left out! Once they have participated, they will be willing to sign up next time, making the job or organising these events so much easier.
- Explain how many tables you will need and understand how flexible they are willing to be
- Ask the venue if you can place a pop-up banner about the event outside each venue
- Point out that you want to agree a menu with them to meet the light lunch budget/head and that you will arrange pre-orders before the day. Smaller venues really appreciate this
- Agree arrangements for paying the venues and when payment is required. This tends to be a mix of payments by BACS either side of the event and others that need a card payment on the day for which I simply claimed reimbursement after the event from our county treasurer
- It’s time to start advertising your event well before registration opens.
- We created an online flyer using imagery and jokes from Café René in the ‘Allo-‘Allo TV series, ensuring people would realise this event was about having fun!
- We managed to get this on nearly all club websites in the county including the unaffiliated clubs where many of the may of the players came from who participated on the day
- We arranged for someone at most clubs to make an announcement about the event on a club night. Additionally, we went along to several unaffiliated clubs to play in one of their sessions so that there was an opportunity to promote the event
- Ensure there is also an explanation of how Café Bridge works on the county website. Resources are available for this from both BriAn Bridge and the EBU
- Open registration at least 2 months before the event.
- We made it clear that choice of lunch venue would be based upon how early players registered for the event. That had the added benefit of people signing up quickly so that you can better estimate how many tables each venue will host
- Our registration page included a requirement for email addresses, and whether or not they were willing to use the BriAn Bridge App. This is relatively important since those that are willing to use the App, will then be seated N/S
- Pricing was kept at a reasonable level at just £25/head comprising a light lunch for £15 and a £10 donation to the charity. The consequence of this is that our County Association covered the event overheads which amounted to approx. £500, which included fees and expenses for Victor Lesk, prizes for the event and a raffle run by the charity, plus a few sundry expenses. The Suffolk County Association regarded this as our de facto charitable donation. Of course, as an alternative the event pricing can be set to cover event overheads.
- Once the number of pairs registering stabilised, then we started offering them (12 pairs at a time) a choice of lunch venue and menu selection based upon a document which included the light lunch menus from all venues. Be prepared for people selecting a lunch venue and then ordering from the wrong menu! 😊. Once all selections were received these were collated and then passed to the venues as pre-orders for the event
- Prior to closing registration do whatever you can to ensure you have an even number of pairs to avoid a sit out; and just as importantly arrange a reserve pair in the event of last-minute cancellations or even no shows on the day. This has happened at both of Suffolk’s events.
- Now you are the home straight and once you have closed registration, contact Victor Lesk to provide him with all the information he needs to work out the movement and develop personalised movement cards for each player. In providing this information to Victor, you can include special requests for players who may have mobility issues and Victor will then work out the shortest route for them. He will also accommodate requests where pairs want to join each other for lunch.
- Typically, then send out an information email to all players a week before with details of how to download and install the BriAn Bridge App; a map showing the venue locations and information on suitable car parks, as well as what time to be seated. Remind them that all drinks on the day must be paid by the players themselves before leaving the venues and also let them know that there will be a prize giving event at the end of the day and where it will take place. Most importantly tell them to check their emails 24 hours before the event, since Victor will be emailing them to let them know their starting venue.
- On the day before the event, it’s a good idea to pop into each venue to remind them that you will be there early tomorrow to set up the tables. Don’t miss out this step!
- On the day of the event, the boards which Victor will have already advised upon in terms of numbers of sets required (each set a different colour to make it easier for players to find their tables), the bidding boxes and table cards should all be taken to each venue for setting up
- Try to avoid flyers for future County events on the tables, since the tables will already be somewhat crowded and you can always include the flyers in the follow up email thanking the players for their participation
- During the first round Victor and helpers will deliver the movement cards and a hard copy of your map, which is required particularly for visitors from out of county who may not be familiar with the location
- During the lunch break the charity will typically sell raffle tickets and this can be left to them to manage. You will already have enough to do!
- Lunch break is also an ideal opportunity to take photos whilst all players are stationary. That may need help from someone since getting round to all the venues by yourself is not always possible
- Invite (beforehand) local print or broadcast media to drop by one of the venues during the day for a short interview or to take photos
- Hold the prize giving at the end of the event and post results on the county website. Victor will also post them on his BriAn Bridge website
- Start preparing for the next Café Bridge event!