This week marked the end of my work with Leeds Young Film Festival as both the Volunteer Coordinator and Venue Supervisor. Unfortunately the festival didn't attract the numbers we had estimated or had experienced in previous years. Now begins a week of evaluation to discuss what we could have improved and also gathering information for our funding sources.
Some of the key reasons I believe the festival underperformed are the following:
Planning - not enough time to market the festival
Marketing - the marketing not fully explaining the concept of the events
Saturation of the market - the timing of the festival, during Easter holidays when there are so many other events for children
Outside influences - as there has been no festival for three years we have lost a large portion of our loyal audience - three years is a significant portion of time for children, many of whom will have outgrown the festival in this time
Aspects I could personally improve are:
developing ways for the volunteers to feel more involved
organising activities for the volunteers, as it is a children's festival many didn't want to watch the films
better perks - watching free films cannot be one when they are not the target audience
providing clearer training on how to interact appropriately with children
providing more written instructions and resources for volunteers whose first language is not English
Comments