Feb 17 2009
Feedback: Katsucon 2009 (A “Waste of Time and Money?” Yikes!)
Katsucon 2009 happened this past Valentine’s Day weekend, which means feedback is finally making it’s way onto the various message boards and communities..any boy is there an abundance of feedback. Overall, it seems the convention really had some serious issues with registration and crowds. I am amazed that this complaint about registration at cons (across all genres) comes up so frequently. Every single convention has registration of some sort. You’d think that since cons have existed for so many years, that someone would come up with an organized and efficient way to handle it. Apparently not.
Anyway, I’ve gone ahead and gathered up some of what attendees have been saying, and it is posted below. Just a warning, some of this feedback is pretty damn harsh (you know it’s bad when the most commonly used adjective to describe the con is “clusterf**k”). Based on what I’ve read, I certainly wouldn’t be attending this convention myself any time soon. I think Katsucon needs to take a long, hard look at the feedback from this year, and plan to make some drastic changes.
The Hotel, Staff, & Crowds Feedback:
- “I met the Katsu con chair briefly last year and complained that security were d*cks, especially to photographers. Someone must have listened, because they decided to up their game and act like d*cks to all con attendees instead!”
- “Next year, if I am not a staff member myself, rest assured I am taking names of those who abuse their powers as staff members. I am a human being, and I therefore am one to be reasoned with. If you think you can treat me like an animal, know that the only reason I did not verbally or physically lash back at you was to prevent myself from being removed from the convention. And trust me, I really wish I started taking names this year. You have several staff members that don’t deserve be staff let alone be at a convention.”
- “A big big thanks to the hotel. I’ve never had better service. Everyone I met or saw was excellent.”
- “The hotel staff were nice too, to just about anyone.”
- “Every staff member I ran into seemed considerate and helpful in each of my cases, generally including asking what a line was for, or asking if they had seen a certain one of my friends pass by, whom I DID eventually find by their help.”
- “The Hyatt was a nice hotel, but 6000, is at least a thousand too many for that site. The conference rooms just cannot handle that number of people and still be able to run efficiently, this pretty much set the stage for a ripple effect in most peoples gripes.”
- “It was so crowded, I couldn’t get into any events without waiting in a line hours prior.”
- “Smaller cap or bigger space. That’s all I’m saying.”
- “Seriously, it’s not our fault the hotel was not large enough to accommodate everyone, don’t yell at us when there is no room to go anywhere. We’re paying for the hotel, badge and possibly parking. I do not appreciate being treated like cattle and like I’m some stupid kid standing in the middle of a busy street. I’m a grown adult and I do expect a certain level of respect as I give respect to con staff since I am staff at other cons.”
Registration Feedback:
- “Pre-reg on Thursday night went smooth as silk.”
- “I can’t really complain about registration myself. No one was lined up when I came in Saturday, but that didn’t stop me from taking a half-hour to find the badge pickup area, which I could see right in front of my face.”
- “Registration was a disaster! Why preregister at all if we gotta wait in line for over an hour with staffers having no idea what was going on or where to stand?”
- “Registration! That makes no sense for pre-registration to take longer than regular registration!. That really sours the con experience at the very beginning and really makes you wonder why you bothered.”
- “What was the deal with registration? In the past few years that I have been to Katsu I have never seen the ball dropped that badly on something so crucial.”
- “Pre-reg line and Reg line being combined into one line was a terrible idea. Really guys. I shouldn’t have had to wait for hours when I pre-registered with people who hadn’t even registered yet. In past years Katsucon’s registration was always incredibly smooth and well run. It was a disaster this year.”
Valentine’s Ball and Rave Feedback:
- “[The rave] was great, as usual. Both DJ’s did a good job keeping the party moving both nights, Sat. night had a lot of DnB which isn’t my style, but hey that’s why I’m no DJ… it was still a great time. No complaints.”
- “The Rave was awesome on both Friday and Saturday. The DJs were very good, and there was always enough room. I was thankful for the instant transitions from concert to rave on Friday.”
- “I waited over an hour in line for a formal ball. That hurts after a while when you’re wearing heels and a nice dress. And it’s because the lessons ran late? That made me just the slightest bit irate. The ball itself should be much more important than the lessons. If you don’t have it by that point, an other 20 minutes isn’t going to be life-changing.”
- “The V-Day dance was a disaster! Not necessarily the con’s fault, but talk about not being able to get in even though we arrived extremely early!”
- “I really think [raves/dances] are a bad thing for cons in general. They are crowded, hot, smelly, and IMHO the DJ’s are pretty bad. More importantly, they attract a pretty sketchy and annoying element who seem to be there for the express purpose of partaking of recreational pharmaceuticals and raving, which spills over into the convention proper where other people are trying to hang out and mingle in peace. It is my understanding that four people were carted out of the rave on stretchers this year. That is something I don’t want to see at a con, everyone should be happy and healthy.”
- “The [Valentine’s Ball] was piss poor planning and the biggest clusterf*ck I’ve ever seen.”
- “Seemed like the Ball was a clusterf**k - oh wait, no, that was the whole convention.”
The Maid Cafe Feedback:
- “Maid Cafe was amazing and [I] hope they do this next year.”
- “[The Maid Cafe] was the best POTENTIAL idea that was carried out extremely poorly. First, our maid didn’t speak much at all, not very social and we saw her twice… maybe 3 times during our meal. I saw a couple maids that weren’t taking care of us being much more social with their tables and seemed to have some experience. I was pretty [frustrated] with the service I got.”
- “The Maid Cafe was a great idea, but a few things were not good. One, too few maids were there. You definitely need more people next time. They were all stretched too thin.”
Other Events/Panels/Programming Feedback:
- “The masquerade line, it was really handled quite well. Very impressive.”
- “The classic arcade machines are what make Katsu my favorite game room. Both YMCK and Aural Vampire were AWESOME.”
- “The gameroom was run outstanding this year.”
- “Low quality as well, very slim pickings on the events and panels.”
- “I was very very disappointed with programming. I actually cleared up my schedule to attend some programming, only to stare at the schedule.”
- “Not a fan of how my group was treated regarding the masquerade. The total lack of communication between those staff members and the lack of respect towards the cosplayers made me rage so farking hard and honestly I wanted to break a few faces.”
Overall:
- “All in all I really did have fun meeting people and making friends.”
- “It sucked, blah blah blah. I had a good time seeing my friends, but man, did it suck.”
- “A clusterf**k. I really can’t describe this con any other way.”
- “Ugh, as much as I love Katsucon this had to be the worst con I’ve ever been too. Everything, and that includes nearly everything was back asswards retarded.”
- “Probably the worst con I’ve ever been to, and I’ve been going to various genre cons since 01.”
- “Waste of time and money. Will not be coming back.”
- “I’m sorry, but I am furious over the way I was treated this weekend. Like I mentioned in my earlier post…the ONLY time I had fun was with friends. Thank goodness for the bar…even if drinks were 10 bucks a shot…still money I would rather spend there than giving it to this con again for a piece of thin plastic.”
- “All in all, Katsucon = EPIC FAIL”
@ Cambios
Yeah. I’m curious to see what steps they take to correct it. As I understand it, the convention is moving to a different hotel next year, the third one in as many years.
But there’s no excuse for those kind of registration line problems, especially for a con that’s been around this long. Someone seriously dropped the ball. This was a 6,000 attendance capped con, not a convention of 30-40,000 people.
Looks like most of the attendees had their stuff together–great costumes. I’m sorry they had such negative experiences. There’s no reason for security detail to be harsh to people…customer service is part of their job unless someone’s safety is really in danger. They aren’t supposed to make people feel UNcomfortable.
Tara
The Costumer: http://thecostumer.today.com
OK, so a few caveats:
I wasn’t at KatsuCon. I do know a number of the people who run it, security included, and have worked security with them at other conventions in the past. I have worked various con security for a number of years as well.
And damned if we didn’t get called names and pitched about every time. Why? Because we had to enforce the rules of the hotel, the convention, and to make sure that things were safe for the con-goers. And yes, that means that people will get asked to move and to stop doing things. And unfortunately, if people don’t listen and/or comply, yes, the staff will get harsh.
As I said, I wasn’t there, and I don’t know any specific incidents, but I take any such comments as “Security was being a bunch of d*cks” with some very large grains of salt.
It will be interesting to see how this all falls out.
I’m not surprised at all. I went to Katsu 14 and vowed never again. The con is horribly organized and the staff and volunteers are rude. My question for the attendees is why return next year after complaining about lack of organization and rude volunteers and staff?
The change to a new location will not make anything better. The staff will be the same, and they will be less organized due to the larger space. The Gaylord center will be a nightmare for those who rely on public transportation. When I heard of the change in venue my inner staffer flinched, I can see the very expensive rooms and resort being trashed my immature anime fans. I would not be surprised to see a repeat of Katsu 8 (2002) where a brand new and very fancy hotel in Baltimore got trashed by some horrible people.
I do agree it will be interesting to see how the Katsu con com responds, but as usual I only expect them to really pay attention to the “z0mg best con evar !!!11!!” responses.
Registration does go smoothly at some conventions. Ohayocon’s registration this year, for example, tore through its line in no time, a huge improvement over the previous year. Every con just does registration differently, even if it’s just slightly so. But having pre-reg and reg in the same line does seem like a bad idea.
It does sound crowded though, and if they are able to move to a larger location, hopefully that should fix most of the issues.
Hey there, my name is Jenifer and to those of you who visited the Maid Cafe, you’ll remember me as the bleach-blonde lead maid that was running around frantically between seating people, taking reservations, and handling other miscellaneous tasks.
Just to give Katsucon staffer perspective on this, the grand majority of all the problems that the convention had this year were space related. We knew from the start that the Hyatt really couldn’t handle us well, but our home for next year, the Gaylord National Harbor Convention Center, couldn’t take us this year. We put a cap on attendance to try to limit the sardine effect, but it clearly didn’t work out as well as we hoped.
The lines for everything (registration, Masquerade, V-Day Ball, and even my Maid Cafe) will all be much, much easier to handle in the Gaylord, and the extra space means the lines will be able to get through much quicker with less uncomfortable elbow-rubbing or security/staff yelling. A lot of the “staffers were a**holes to me” problem will also be solved by this; for as upset as you were with the space problems, we were just as upset, and in some instances it unfortunately came out on you, so we apologize for that. The only problems that won’t be solved by space, at least in the Cafe (since its the only branch I really know full details on), is the food, which we’re currently ironing out with our Gaylord representative.
That’s all I wanted to get out really; the staff does care about what everyone thinks, and we admit that this convention had some big flaws, but we don’t want to lose people due to a problem that will be fixed in 2010 with our larger convention space.
Just so you know, i attended Katsucon, and i went to all the dances and never once was anyone carried out on stretchers, and never did i see or hear of any drugs. Just wanted to let you know. It pisses me off when people say and talk about things they don’t know.