On Saturday the Agents faced a new challenge. How to budget! Being a team of supremely awesome facilitators (Flora Newbigin, Deanna Rodger, Rap Man Josh & Roisin Feeny) who all tend to find budgets pretttty boring (having just competed our tax returns this was fresh in our minds) we decided to flip-mode squad the task and get them to run a festival for £2000. Way more fun!
When the Agents arrived they were presented with an itemised list of things they could purchase with their money for the running of the festival. The shop was open in the corner of the room, run by Mr Providence Providence, and they had 30 minutes to decide as a group what they wanted and fill three ‘spaces’ (tables labelled space 1, space 2 & space 3) with their purchases to satisfy their punters (us with wigs).
This was the shopping list:
Budgeting Activity
Venues
Field £50
Devas Free
Battersea Arts Centre £250
Hyde Park£750
Boat on the Thames £500
Technology
Kareoke machine £15
Function 1 sound system £500
Portable phone speakers Free
Basic sound system £150
Silent disco £50
Radio Free
Strobe light £20
Head torches£1.50
Your laptop Free
Food and Drink
Burgers and chips £80 per 100 people
Champagne and Oyster bar £200 per 100 people
Krispy Kreme Donuts £100 (1 for each guest)
Vending machine £10 each
Candy floss £12 per 100 people
Banquet £30 per head
Sushi bar £7 per head
Popcorn £2 per 50 people
Creature comforts
Portaloos£5 each
Tent £100 each
Bunting £1 per meter
Tables and chairs £150 per half day/ £250 full day
Disco Balls £20 each
Ice sculptures £75 each (+ £25 cooling unit)
Fiireworks £175 per 15 minute display
Limosines £50 per hour
Bubble machine £40
Marketing
TV advertising £750
Facebook site Free
Flyering£1 per flyer
Word of Mouth Free
Logo £65
Ticket sales
Free event Free
500 @ £7 each
5000 @ £15 each
The festival was a lot of fun. There was a function 1 sound system and a firework display at the end of the day – (a post-it note that said fireworks that Mohammed hung from the ceiling). The budget was on point, it even had a contingency fee in it. The only problem was when we went we decided that the burgers they served us gave us food poisoning that meant there toilets were oversubscribed that led to some other problems. We took this opportunity to talk about risk assessment. Also for some reason the Agents put the sound system outside the tents which none of us really understood.
After a small break Tref then blew our brains with what actually really book keeping looked like and how efficient you could be if you knew how to work Excel like a magician. Deanna was actually on the edge of her seat and looked like she might at any point tattoo Tref’s name on her hand as permanent show of her gratitude for this world of budgeting possibility.
After this all Agents got printouts of a basic budget template and had to started breaking down their projects into categories they needed to budget for. This is a sneak of some of the things on Christian’s. I paid him £10 to let him show you. He likes to keep things close to his chest.
Next week more tips on how to make admin fun.
ps. yeah yeah I know. budget photo.
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