It's not complicated at all - it's merely a matter of money. Guidebook is not cheap, though the people running it are nice and want our business so they give us a better-than-list-price deal by a lot. This year the con budget got hit from three directions all at once.
The majority of Con income is from registrations, but prices are set in advance and cannot be changed within a given year, so our options for raising more money to offset the hit were minimal. As a result, each division was asked to contribute to bringing the budget back in line. Guidebook was the second-biggest line item in my budget that I could sacrifice, so I did. (*)
Historically, our uptake of Guidebook among attendees has been low (18-32% in various years) so while I recognized that this wouldn't be a popular decision it felt like one I could make that would affect fewer attendees than other cutbacks that we might otherwise need to do.
(*) the biggest has to do with how we print the Pocket Program and is a little more complicated to explain but I can if people care.
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timeasmymeasure
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Date: 2018-01-10 05:14 pm (UTC)The majority of Con income is from registrations, but prices are set in advance and cannot be changed within a given year, so our options for raising more money to offset the hit were minimal. As a result, each division was asked to contribute to bringing the budget back in line. Guidebook was the second-biggest line item in my budget that I could sacrifice, so I did. (*)
Historically, our uptake of Guidebook among attendees has been low (18-32% in various years) so while I recognized that this wouldn't be a popular decision it felt like one I could make that would affect fewer attendees than other cutbacks that we might otherwise need to do.
(*) the biggest has to do with how we print the Pocket Program and is a little more complicated to explain but I can if people care.