Author Topic: WonderCon and CCIs statements about the move  (Read 59083 times)

Offline Chris Hagish

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WonderCon and CCIs statements about the move
« on: March 12, 2012, 11:13:03 AM »
This Thread will be used talk about and post info related to WonderCon's movement.  Please keep the info source based and not rumor.

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" Comic-Con International has just sent out a press release announcing that due to renovations at the Moscone Center, the convention will be held March 16 — 18th at a yet-to-be-announced venue."
"Con’s temporary home of Anaheim, California"

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"Comic-Con International ‎@Kylee, thank the convention center in SF. They didn't have dates for us. @Alyssa no link, but a nice note to the SF Convention and Visitors Bureau that you'd like to see us return couldn't hurt."

At this time neither Anaheim nor Oakland seem to have been book for the 2013 WonderCon.

« Last Edit: March 12, 2012, 11:19:15 AM by Chris Hagish »
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Offline Transmute Jun

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Re: WonderCon and CCIs statements about the move
« Reply #1 on: March 12, 2012, 12:41:02 PM »
I'm not sure if this counts as 'rumor' or 'fact' since it is second hand. A good friend of mine is friends with a CCI executive. They were talking last weekend and the CCI executive stated that they had seriously considered holding WonderCon 2012 in San Jose, but didn't because there were issues with obtaining the necessary hotel rooms/space.

That implies to me that CCI would seriously consider coming back to Northern CA for WonderCon 2013.

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Re: WonderCon and CCIs statements about the move
« Reply #2 on: Today at 10:48:06 PM »

Offline alyssa

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Re: WonderCon and CCIs statements about the move
« Reply #2 on: March 12, 2012, 01:00:16 PM »
I agree, it seems as tho CCI does want WC in the Bay area.  Just from reading all the posts over the past year about it.

I also think they can't get the Moscone center for 2013 because it's all booked.
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Offline alyssa

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Re: WonderCon and CCIs statements about the move
« Reply #3 on: March 13, 2012, 05:08:22 AM »
Here's an interesting exchange CCI posted on the FB page,


"@David Moscone had no dates for us in 2012. So we were left to look for a new venue that could a) accomodate our exhibit floor b) have enough meeting rooms to accomodate our programming c) enough hotel rooms to accomodate our attendees and perhaps most importantly dates as close to the original WC dates as possible. Anaheim met all that criteria. It is true that Moscone, at the last moment came back to us near Comic-Con with dates but when we looked at which hall it was for West Hall, but that facility was entirely too small. We had outgrown that hall years ago.'
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Offline icedog1787

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Re: WonderCon and CCIs statements about the move
« Reply #4 on: March 13, 2012, 10:48:40 AM »
That is true regarding Moscone West, it is a smaller venue that Wondercon has outgrown.

Offline hikanteki

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Re: WonderCon and CCIs statements about the move
« Reply #5 on: March 14, 2012, 02:52:52 PM »
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I'm not sure if this counts as 'rumor' or 'fact' since it is second hand. A good friend of mine is friends with a CCI executive. They were talking last weekend and the CCI executive stated that they had seriously considered holding WonderCon 2012 in San Jose, but didn't because there were issues with obtaining the necessary hotel rooms/space.

That implies to me that CCI would seriously consider coming back to Northern CA for WonderCon 2013.

My guess is that Anaheim made them an offer they couldn't refuse.  And Anaheim will continue to roll out the red carpet for CCI as much as possible in order to get them to stay & ultimately lure in Comic-Con.
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Offline icedog1787

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Re: WonderCon and CCIs statements about the move
« Reply #6 on: March 14, 2012, 03:01:35 PM »
Wizard World was going to have their convention at the Anaheim Convention Center but CCI paid them off so they could keep Wondercon going. No one at Wizard nor CCI will confirm this though since both agreed to a gag order about it.

Offline Chris

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Re: WonderCon and CCIs statements about the move
« Reply #7 on: March 15, 2012, 08:31:02 AM »
CCI posted this last night:  "Please don't read anything into the email we sent out. We just wanted to remind people that if they wanted to attend WC they could get discounted badges online. Our plan is to be back in SF next year. They just haven't given us dates yet."

Offline icedog1787

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Re: WonderCon and CCIs statements about the move
« Reply #8 on: March 15, 2012, 10:09:58 AM »
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CCI posted this last night:  "Please don't read anything into the email we sent out. We just wanted to remind people that if they wanted to attend WC they could get discounted badges online. Our plan is to be back in SF next year. They just haven't given us dates yet."

Wondercon will be back next year in San Francisco but in the Fall and not Spring.

Offline Khaaaaaaanh!!!

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Re: WonderCon and CCIs statements about the move
« Reply #9 on: March 22, 2012, 10:04:53 AM »
Scrolling thru some previous posts and saw this response...

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Lysa Lewin Hi Janette, my name is Lysa and I represent San Francisco travel, formerly the San Francisco Convention and Visitors Bureau. We oversee the sale of the Moscone facilities in San Francisco. My team works with WonderCon and although we tried to secure the event in Moscone West this year due to the fact the Moscone North and South will be under renovations for the next two months, the dates we had available in Moscone West and the fact that West is a smaller space wasnt workable for Wondercon. The group we have in Moscone North next week was booked years ago and our renovation schedule was tailored around that previously booked event. We are hopeful WonderCon will return to San Francisco next year, and will work closely with their event team to secure favorable dates and space.
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Offline Trev

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Re: WonderCon and CCIs statements about the move
« Reply #10 on: March 22, 2012, 12:12:19 PM »
Just in case folks don't regularly check it, The Beat had an interview with David Glanzer of CCI about all of this that was published today

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Offline alyssa

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Re: WonderCon and CCIs statements about the move
« Reply #11 on: March 22, 2012, 01:31:49 PM »
Great find Trev!
I'm going to repost it here in case something happens to it on their site;
Part 1
Quote
THE BEAT: Let’s get right to it: So what is happening with WonderCon? Where will it be next year?
GLANZER: I don’t think there are dates in this facility [Anaheim] for next year. Our plan was always to find a place where we could have WonderCon-or not have WonderCon. We toyed with the idea of taking it off the calendar but in the end we thought, we should try to keep it going. After looking around, the place that had dates closest to ours, and had exhibit space and, most importantly, had enough meeting space and hotel rooms, was Anaheim. They were able to gives us some dates and so we picked Anaheim.
But, I have to tell you, we could never just move an event down to experiment. If we were to do that we would just start an event-we wouldn’t have a Friday day. You don’t just come into a market and start as a three-day show. Fans aren’t ready to take a half-day off and so on. As it turned out, Friday was not bad, we were pretty surprised.
We hope to be in Moscone for 2013, but we haven’t got dates yet. But to be fair to Moscone, they typically don’t give us dates more than six months out. The problem with that obviously this year when you have this big hole in the calendar. So we’re hoping they give us dates sooner than later.
THE BEAT: I’ve heard the reason why Moscone won’t give dates is because there aren’t enough hotel rooms booked.
GLANZER: Yes, it’s very common.
THE BEAT: And understandable.
GLANZER: If you have an organization that comes in and books a ton of hotel rooms, and then you have a convention that comes in and books a minimal amount of hotel rooms, the idea is those who are spending more on hotels are going to spend more money across the board, organizations that have expense accounts, doctors, pharmaceuticals, tech conventions.
The issue with WonderCon is we sell out our room blocks and we’ll get another hotel, but SF has an abundance of mid range and low range hotels throughout the city and there’s no way to track that. So we keep telling them yes, we had nearly 50,000, people we sold out of room blocks but there’s no way to tell who is buying outside our hotel rooms.
We had the same problems with San Diego for a long time, but the convention center actually took a gamble on us [both laugh] and said, you know, we SEE the people here, maybe they don’t stay in hotel rooms, and there weren’t a lot of hotel rooms downtown back in the day. But as it turned out, it was a boom.
THE BEAT: I’m not going to ask you to go inside the head of SF officials, but is there not an argument to be made that this is a cultural event that adds some kind of merit to the area? It’s a tradition in the Bay Area!
GLANZER: It is. You can lead that proverbial horse but you can’t make them do something. San Francisco is a great city so I don’t think they are lacking for conventions. And I can’t speak for them, but if they have something that obviously has an abundance of hotel rooms and money, and then something they are not really sure about, they will go with the thing they can quantify.
That being said, the show has been around the Bay Area for 25 years. It gets a lot of press. I think one of the things that San Diego realized is that the heads in beds is very important, and maybe San Francisco doesn’t need this, but the news coverage is very important too. I don’t know if you’ve been following it, Anaheim is getting a lot of press out of this show. And when WonderCon is in SF gets a lot of press.
We’ll see what happens. My real hope is that the show will have done well enough, that SF will say wow, we’d rather not lose that and give them dates farther out.
THE BEAT: Would you consider coming back here? Another venue mentioned to me was San Jose.
GLANZER: San Jose is a great facility. They have a hotel that’s attached to the facility. We’ve toured it. They have some meeting space. But it’s almost like Anaheim in a way, in that it’s in a market that is a subset of another market. One of the big problems with Anaheim it’s that not Los Angeles, it’s not SD, it’s in between. San Jose has the same thing.
THE BEAT: People don’t plan their year around going to San Jose, Dionne Warwick aside.
GLANZER: Can we get the audience there? I loved San Jose when we had APE there but they don’t have an over abundance of hotels. I understand they have expanded their hotel facilities. We’ll have to see dates, but I think everything is open, especially if Moscone doesn’t give us dates.
THE BEAT: So it really is a complete question mark.
GLANZER: It really is. Now, to be fair to SF, they don’t give us dates until six months out, but we’re trying to argue that is just not enough time. It’s almost a Catch 22. Do we start looking for someplace else knowing that they are going to give us dates? Or….I don’t know.
THE BEAT: Gosh, won’t this ever be settled. You’ve had so many years with the big Comic-Con with endless questions. Now WonderCon is a hot potato!
GLANZER: Yeah, we could certainly do with less of that. We would love to be back in San Francisco. That’s our plan, and it’s always been our plan. We’re just trying to get those dates.
<snip>
« Last Edit: April 02, 2012, 06:12:40 AM by alyssa »
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Offline Transmute Jun

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Re: WonderCon and CCIs statements about the move
« Reply #12 on: March 22, 2012, 05:45:26 PM »
Thanks for posting that information! It's very interesting. I am glad they're cracking down on Pro and Press badges... as they say, they've always been very liberal with those, and many of those badges end up being scalped, because they do not require 'someone else' to pick up the badge for the buyer.

Offline Bert Su

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Re: WonderCon and CCIs statements about the move
« Reply #13 on: April 02, 2012, 08:17:31 PM »
I would you space out the dialogue in the interview. Running all those sentences together makes it difficult to read.
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Offline Zero

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Re: WonderCon and CCIs statements about the move
« Reply #14 on: April 02, 2012, 08:21:39 PM »
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I would you space out the dialogue in the interview. Running all those sentences together makes it difficult to read.
Here's a slightly more formatted version of the interview: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login
(No replies can be made in that thread, mainly because it's for record-keeping purposes for later reference.)  Feel free to comment about the interview here though.

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