As I mentioned yesterday things went pretty well, but always room for improvement. Here are some notes, if nothing else to serve as reminders to me for next year:

• I didn't reserve the UHaul truck we use for temporary storage far enough in advance, and ended up having to return it by 1pm on Sat. That added one more thing to have to get done on a busy day, and it made the final clean up harder because we had to spread out the stuff going back across a couple different vehicles. For the $100 it cost to rent it though, was absolutely worth it - we loaded up leisurely on Fri and just got up Saturday morning and drove to the event.

• Printing could have been managed better. The printer I used last year went out of business, so this year we used Kinko's. Little to a lot more expensive depending on the item, but in return a lot more flexible about turning things around quickly. Adding to the confusion was we also had to print items for SQLSat#5 in Olympia. As much as I love my color printer at the office, it doesn't handle high volumes of printing on card stock, so what should have been low(er) cost was more because we had to send it out. Not sure of the answer, either give up on card stock (which is sooo useful for things like evals) or find another printer that is less expensive. We did invest time to convert almost all of the printed items to Reporting Service reports that accept event name and date range as parameters. Output to PDF and it's easy to print internally or at the printer, or just skip if not needed. Should make it easy for next event.

• We pre-ordered ice from a local grocery store this time, and that was perfect, much smoother than last year. Definite repeat for next time. We ordered 300 lbs initially, and that lasted us the whole day by keeping the extra in a huge 130 qt ice chest.

• We bought 2 thermal coffee containers last year to use at events, and that saved us money and effort. Dunkin Donuts made 7 gals of coffee for around $40, and we ordered donuts from there too. One stop, and a lot cheaper than the $150 or so we spent on coffee last year. The containers were about $125/each, so it will take a few events to see real savings, but there's some additional value from just the simplicity. We also had 2 coffee makers, plus water and the filter packs to make more, made about another 3 gallons during the day (not all of it used by end of day).

• We didn't list the session level in the event guide. Should have, just didn't. Fix next year. And make it easier to generate one, at least a good basic template.

• We didn't list a map of the room locations anywhere. Mistake! Fix next year, and make a couple big copies for mounting on walls.

• We used smaller Rubbermaid containers for drinks this year. Not sure of the size, but the average household size, maybe 18"x24"x24" or so, and those were a lot easier to move around when fully loaded with ice and drinks.

• We had a volunteer meeting the Thurs prior to the event to stuff the event bags and that worked well. Gives the sponsors the max time to provide items (they always wait to the last minute) and with 6 volunteers, we did 250 bags in about 2 hours, including stopping to eat pizza.

• We brought miscellanous office supplies, but no scissors - would have been handy. More tape next time, and put safety tape in office supplies too. Also a box cutter.

• We tried recycling and that sorta worked. Maybe not enough recycling locations, and no messaging about it an advance. Maybe also having someone near the drinks for the first hour reinforcing that message would have helped.

• Prize tickets worked well, and the prize desk worked well too. Just need a better process for getting the tickets to the speakers, and making sure they know how to use award them. This is a combination of slightly better messaging and more coordination at check in.

• The t-shirts worked out very well. My friend Steve Jones had argued that an embroidered t-shirt might feel rough against the skin, but they did a nice job and the shirts looked good. I had someone comment that it was nice enough to wear to work. (Note that I'm just mentioning Steve here so that I can count this as me being right once...out of a lot of times)

• Our revised speaker evaluation forms worked well, and it felt like the scoring was more realistic. What we didn't do is tell the speakers what to do with them after the end of session raffle, so they kept giving them to me. Worked, better messaging/process.

• We didn't run power cords for the sponsors at setup, had to return to this later in the day. Better to just run the cords early and get them taped down.

• We had checkin set up outside the doors to the facility, under a covered walk. About 8 am, just as check in started, the lights went out - daylight sensor kicked in. For about 15 minutes the volunteers struggled to read until the sun came up a little more. What lesson to learn there?

• The check in process was our weak point. We originally split into A-M, N-Z, and speakers/walkins, but after watching, that's too complicated. Better to have A-M and N-Z (or more if you have space), and just expedite speakers through the line, and handle walkins easily. One change we made was having our #1 greeter (of three) give the arriving attendees their event bag when they joined the line, gave them something to do during the sometimes 5-15 minute wait to get checked in. Next year I think we need to do a practice walk through with all the real stuff so that 1-2 volunteers know exactly how it works, and then let them drive the process. We only went part way this year with a site walk through/talk through, we should have set it all up.

• The single most important thing is to keep an accurate count for lunch, and as part of check in we struggled with that. We had students going throught that weren't there for the event, we had three separate entrances, speakers setting up and forgetting to check in, etc, etc. What we didn't want was to run short of lunch, so we had to cross check our count by counting all the attendees in the first session, plus sponsors, etc. We ended up good on lunch, with only about 18 meals left over, but really that was a little closer than I'd like it to be.

• We didn't capture vegetarian preference at registration, but we did ask at check in and we got that latter part right, didn't run out of any veggie meals.

• The end of day raffle went well, we moved through the prizes quickly and had some fun too, announcing them from 2nd floor to all the attendees in the courtyard below.

• We didn't appoint an event photographer, just missed it. Joe Healy took some, we'll see how they turn out.

• It was a good example of how to take a less than perfect venue and make it work. We use the same facility that the Orlando Code Camp used 2 years ago, but by picking the room locations based on the results we needed, it had a lot more of a true 'event' feel.

• We had plenty of signs up, but they were too small. Budget was running low, so it was 8.5x11 signs on foamboard, just not quite big enough. We'll probably just order a batch of the larger 18x24 signs with the generic SQLSat logo and loan them out as needed.

• We didn't staff for enough volunteers at end of day. Even though we were continuously cleaning up through out the day, there's work at the end and we needed a few more people.
  

Probably more, but that's all my written notes plus what I could remember.