Norwescon Clubs

I have left a couple messages and talked to john Collins. Its Richard that I need to actually chat with. John said he would make sure Richard contacted me.
I understand it a busy week there too.
Patience I guess.


Still working on contact as of 12/1

Contact accomplished as of 12/3

Slow progress, and I am working a lot too!

... and what's going on? anyone heard from Richard? Or .. anyone who will do furnature removal for cheaper than 1500?

Just so this doesn't get lost as background noise:

Also what about the corking fee if we bring in the booze?

Also will they let us bring in our own kegs? If so, even if they are home brew?

This is also a Very Big Deal (tm) to the Merchants of Deva. One of the foundations of our events are our specialty drink concoctions, pre-mixed in vast quantities with sooper sekrit recipes man was not meant to know.

Richard from the hotel was supposed to provide what he termed a "flat corkage and serving fee" that would allow us to buy our own alcohol and mixers, prepare the vast quantities and hand over the finished barrels of fun to the Maxi's bartending staff to serve. The bartending staff were to serve these drinks to our party guests at no charge to the guests as the staff's services would be covered by the corkage fee.

There was also some question of how tips would be handled. If the Maxi's bar staff kept all tips, and guests tipped only the bar staff, our group would be left with zero recompense for the outlay in booze, supplies and fees paid.

As far as I was understanding at this point.
tips are tips. They would go to the bartenders.
Donations to nonprofit are exactly that, and must go to that cause as stated by the nonprofit fund raiseing laws.

The corkage fee may be different from the bar tending fee. And their bartender may cut off anyone from service as required by law with a bar tending license.

This all needs to be clarified.

i am having one hell of time contacting Richard for anything. I would love to talk to you guys about ides you had for that space upstairs and how to secure it and so forth.
thanx

You may be able to hire (or take volunteers) your own bartenders, so long as they have their class 12 liscenses. You can get a group rate on a class and get everyone liscensed for cheap if they need them.

They, the hotel, stated that service in their licensed bar was to be done by their bartenders. They are hotel union staff and the hotel can't cut them out.

I don't know if this will be the case in the end, but this was the requirement.

You may be able to hire (or take volunteers) your own bartenders

What was stated by Richard (hotel staff) at the con/parties/hotel meeting is that they must use the hotel bar staff for any alcohol-serving functions in the Maxi's space due to union agreements. The same is true for food service.

IOW, no parties in the Maxi's space may directly serve any food or alcohol, period. All parties in that space must have food and alcohol served by hotel staff.

Gibbitt wrote:... and what's going on? anyone heard from Richard? Or .. anyone who will do furnature removal for cheaper than 1500?

Yes I finally have.
Check out the new topic and please respond ASAP.

There was also some question of how tips would be handled. If the Maxi's bar staff kept all tips, and guests tipped only the bar staff, our group would be left with zero recompense for the outlay in booze, supplies and fees paid.

There is a way I can see doing this would help keep your party in line with regulations on banquet permits as well as compensate you for the money you are putting into drinks/food/etc., since banquet permits aren't supposed to be used for events that are open to the general public.

My suggestion is that parties using the Maxis space pool together for a combined club table during Norwescon and sell annual memberships to their "club(s)"- you could sell one membership to one organization's party or multiple memberships and split proceeds (say, one membership for $10 or 3 memberships for $20).

Then close the party off to "members only". Everyone who's attending has to show they are a member, no exceptions.

Please note that you DO NOT want to sell these at the door of the party (then it's an admission fee, and subject to various taxes), and that there's probably more bookkeeping to be done this way, but it would keep you in line with needing a banquet permit and could help fund your party. There's also the problem of needing volunteers to staff the table... but if you do it in conjunction with other groups, this might work. The NW Con League used to sell memberships for multiple conventions this way- each con would chip in some volunteer hours at a table and sell memberships for ALL the conventions who were members (back in the days before Ted Stevens made all the internet tubes and you could buy things online easily).

Sweet now I need a con badge and a secret society badge and know the hand shake and pay for a drink.

Lets make it all cost. Can we charge for parking. They make a killing outside the hotel doing that.

My law guy is reviewing the membership thing. I believe any kind of membership is an admission. I know a private club that had that particular problem. But they are a company, and not for profit.

Has anyone other than us ever taken a door count?
And is everyone badge only now?

I feel a lot is being said here that doesn't need to be said or is only partially right. Lets try to verify all of our ideas before some one takes hold of a false one and tries to implement it.

Sweet now I need a con badge and a secret society badge and know the hand shake and pay for a drink.

Riff was asking for a way to be able to a) use Maxi's and b) get recompensed for all the tasty drinks and snacks Merchants of Deva would be paying for.

I gave him my suggestion as to how to make this work- make the event members-only, and sell memberships. It's just that, a suggestion, not a way to gouge people.

I believe any kind of membership is an admission.

I believe you'd be wrong. Norwescon sells...wait for it... memberships, and restricts access to a number of convention spaces and events to members only, and locks out the general public. I am not familiar with ANY local con selling admissions (possibly some of the HUGE cons like DragonCon, SanDiego ComicCon or the Creation Cons that Paramount does are).

My assertion of familiarity with how things like this work is because, although I Am Not A Lawyer and feel free to fact-check me and tell me I'm full of shit, back in the day, I helped run a convention as the chairman of a board of directors (of the non-profit corporation that was the umbrella organization), and also got this organization's IRS tax-exempt status approved- because our income as a social club was being derived from...wait for it... selling memberships. (The IRS won't let you do get tax-exempt status as a social club if you are getting the vast majority of your income selling admission to events, by the by).

Oh, and before someone jumps my shit about non-profit status... no, I don't even think you need to incorporate and go through tons of hoops, either. There are clubs that exist as voluntary associations.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voluntary_association

The catch is that corporate status means that if someone decides to sue, the corporation is the one that gets sued... not the association members. (I could go into things like corporate shields and whatnot, but really, let's not.)

Yes Norewescon sells Memberships and has the status to sell.
As McBastard has stated they are a company. None of the groups are. And if any of the groups are, they should be doing business by buying a dealers spot from Norwescon.

To charge for drinks get non profit status or sponsorship to get the proper permit to do so.

Mine was a suggestion too. And a membership would just raise the cost of a good time at a con.

I really don't want to see Norwescon get in any trouble for stuff we do because of all these changes. And honest mistake on our part could potentially cost us, the con, or the hotel a lot.

To charge for drinks get non profit status or sponsorship to get the proper permit to do so.

I actually don't think you need to do this, as I've pointed out. Let me lay out my reasoning.

The hotel is requiring banquet permits for parties, which is our starting point.

http://www.liq.wa.gov/licensing/banquet-permit-info.asp

Here's the key parts:

"Attendance must be by invitation only. The event cannot be open or
advertised to the general public. Examples of acceptable events include
company banquets, retirement parties, and club, organization, and church
events."

and:

"The sale of liquor by the drink is prohibited."

So, here's the thing: a party where all members of your organization are invited (but nobody else) is NOT open to the public, so it falls under the banquet permit rules. It's also perfectly legitimate to a) sell memberships to your club and b) have your club be a voluntary association that's not incorporated (see above). In addition, Norwescon has ALWAYS allowed clubs to sell memberships at club tables- Camarilla, other cons, whatever. God knows I spent several years selling memberships to cons I was working on at a club table.

So I'm not seeing why this is a perfectly acceptable way to finance your party while staying within the rules (of course, you could give FREE memberships if you wanted- but Riff was asking for a way to finance his MoD party). It's different that what's gone before, but isn't that the point? Yes, this is all very stupid that the hotel is making people go through hoops like this. Oh well.

Donation jars are also prohibited under the banquet licence rules. Only Tip jars, which, if they are going toward the hotel staff, do NOTHING to recompence the group.