Comprehensive Report: Attraction and Event Management Strategies

This report provides an overview of event and attraction management, focusing on the Olympic Games as a case study. It defines event management and attraction, highlighting their interrelation. The report explores the formation and growth stages of mega-events, such as the Olympics, addressing planning challenges like attracting crowds, unfavorable weather, and rising costs. It offers recommendations for successful event management, including meticulous planning, cost management, and time management. The report emphasizes the importance of creating an inviting environment and avoiding cost estimation errors. It also examines the role of committees and the delegation of responsibilities in event organization, drawing upon academic references to support its arguments. Overall, the report provides a comprehensive analysis of event management principles and strategies.

Attraction and Event Management 1
ATTRACTION AND EVENT MANAGEMENT
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Attraction and Event Management 2
Introduction
Event management is a term that has puzzled many people who have never imagined its meaning
and its purpose in the current setting. It is a broad activity that focuses on communicating and
linking the people together. Event management can be established and be initiated on both
regional and international stage (Wood, 2013, p. 87). Event management has several meanings.
According to the Cambridge dictionary, event management is described as the task of planning
and organization large events such as conferences, parties, and trade shows. Similarly, it can also
be described as management of events to make and organize festivals, conferences, meetings,
and high profile events. The section of events is much wider, and it includes dates, meetings,
parties, concerts, sports events, conferences, charity events and much more.
On the other hand, the attraction is not part of event management. Attraction is set of activities
that are intended for learning, experiences, food, culture, and of course traveling as well as
sporting activities. Even though event management and attraction are different notions, it should
be noted that they are nearly allied with each other. Event management will go along with it
within the entire period of any sporting activity (Jayawardhana, 2016, p. 6).
Formation stage
For a long period, events have played a key function in the community and as well as in the
growth of tourism and other attraction activities. Olympic is considered a mega-event or special
events which provide an opportunity for leisure and cultural experience. Based on the facts
available, mega-events are held after certain duration and have become a tool of tourism that
must be taken with lots of consideration. In this case, special consideration is given to 2018

Attraction and Event Management 3
Summer Olympics. As much as these events are important, what is their life cycle and perhaps
saturation issues involved in their planning? The growth of these events may be as a result of the
increase in global growth population, increased movement and leisure time.
Based on the evaluation of the formation stage of the Pyeongchang’s Winter Olympics, some
improvements have been made on the venues and road and rail network, besides; there are
updates plans to further connect with Olympic fans. The details indicate that the organizing team
is keen on delivering a successful event despite numerous challenges experienced. The assurance
of the committee on the preparation is an indication that everything is set; however, other factors
should be considered as well when organizing such an event. Some of these things include safety
among other things. Participants and the fans must be protected when it comes to staging an
event (Stevens, 2014, p. 103).
The second factor is the stage layout. This is the main concern, and it is the core of all activities
in the coming event. Despite the assurance from the committee, well, it seems things are not on
the right track. The speed at which the construction work is being undertaken is way too low that
while time is also running out. This is an issue that might create some challenges that might
interfere with some of the pre-activities of the main Summer Olympic. On the development of
facilities that support hospitality; it seems the plan is okay, the locations of the hotels are
favorable and easily accessible from the playing grounds.
All the permanent venues seem to be complete while others too are almost done. Besides,
focusing on operational preparedness, PyeongChang 2018 is now inclined up and doing the
promotional events in readiness for the main event comes August (Kyoung-yim & Heejoon,
2018, p. 25). Similarly, there are areas that the organizers have done well especially on the sales

Attraction and Event Management 4
of the ticket. Advance sale of tickets is important since it gives the organizers time to plan the
number of security officers needed and many other important things. On the other hand, the
Olympic torch relay is also set to be started with an aim to heighten media and public for the
activities, while rights-holders and partners advertise showcasing the activities will also to kick
off.
Growth stage
Planning a mega event such as Olympic can be very challenging; however, with the help of the
experts, the whole planning can be much easier. There are always daunting issues that the
planners will always encounter even though they are common (Beesley & Chalip, 2011, p. 347).
Such problems include attracting a crowd, losing attention from the fans, unfavorable weather
conditions, over-attendance, limited space with a hard and difficult layout and rising cost during
the planning. These are some of the challenges that this event will like to encounter. Event
planning as discussed earlier comes with numerous challenges that always worry the
management as the planning continues to progress.
Recommendations
For the event to be successful, the work must be put before the event and ensure that the event
planning is meticulous and well thought out. Any event planning in most occasions always have
a committee of experts that gives the direction of what is supposed to be done; therefore,
Olympic games or event planning has always been steered by a committee of experts drawn from
various countries to realize its success. The formation stage, in this case, based on the coming
Pyeongchang's Winter Olympics have a committee that has composed a tick list and ensure that

Attraction and Event Management 5
all bases are covered to make it the best one in history as it has been done in the previous events
(Minikin, 2014, p. 317). However, in comparison to other events of the same type those have
been held in a different location, it seems there is lack of proper organization even though the
International Olympic Committee assured everybody of a successful event. Under normal
circumstances, the organization of the Olympic events is delegated by the International Olympic
Committee to the National Olympic Committee of the host country or city (Skey et al., 2016).
Based on the knowledge of the event management, what is supposed to be done is crystal clear,
and it will be very easy to handle situations of such kind. If every problem and challenge is an
individual, the event planning manager would be in a position to plan and pull off the perfect
party in their sleep and keep the working going without challenges (Ludes, 2012, p. 155). But
being an event planner is not just about being capable of operating without obstruction or
redirect upsetting meddlers. The issues mentioned in this case are a threat to this event
sustainability and therefore, requires a solution that will ensure the smooth continuation of the
Olympic events for the years to come (Kaplanidou et al., 2013, p. 143).
a) Creating an inviting environment
Making people excited concerning an event during unfavorable conditions can be a serious
hurdle. Bad weather tends to draw people indoors; however, with correct event plan and other
décor, fans will line up in the cold to get a glimpse of the activities (Collins, 2011, p. 13). Since
the event is happening during summer, it is important for the planners to paint it with warm
summer or winter theme to make the attendees forget about the season’s doldrums outside.

Attraction and Event Management 6
b) Avoid estimating costs
When planning an event, it is always important to avoid estimating costs for the whole event.
Expenditure costs may increase at the end of the year calendar. The price of products or services
may change due to economical changes in a given region. Therefore, to get on the right track, the
organizers should get quotes from the experts, have contingency or back up plan wherever
possible (Sant & Hinch, 2013, p. 291). This will help in avoiding probable failures due to
insufficient funds allocated for the event. Even though the organizers of the Olympic have
always perfected this act, it is still important to stress on it for the sake of its sustainability.
c) Good time management
Investing the right resources at the right time is important. It has always been a norm in every
occasion that when the Olympic event is about to happen, there will always be a rush in doing
things such as infrastructure expansion. The organizers need to do everything in time to avoid
such scenarios that have threatened the existence of this mega event. (Barrett et al., 2017, p. 38).
Therefore, setting a target is important.

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List of References
Barrett, AG, Mowen, AJ, & Graefe, AR. (2017). 'Predicting Intentions to Return to a Nature
Center after an Interpretive Special Event', Journal of Interpretation Research, vol. 22, no. 1, pp.
33-51.
Beesley, LG, & Chalip, L. (2011). 'Seeking (and not seeking) to leverage mega-sport events in
non-host destinations: The case of Shanghai and the Beijing Olympics', Journal of Sport &
Tourism, vol. 16, no. 4, pp. 323-344. Available from: 10.1080/14775085.2011.635016. [16 May
2018].
Collins, M. (2011). 'The Olympic Games: a social science perspective. (Review)', European
Journal For Sport Management, vol. 8, no. Special issue, pp. 125-127.
Jayawardhana, A. (2016). 'Ensuring Security Against the Threats of Terrorist Acts in Mega Sport
Events', International Journal of Sport Management, Recreation & Tourism, vol. 25, pp. 1-8.
Kaplanidou, K, Kerwin, S, & Karadakis, K. (2013). 'Understanding sport event success:
exploring perceptions of sport event consumers and event providers', Journal of Sport &
Tourism, vol. 18, no. 3, pp. 137-159.
Kyoung-yim, K, & Heejoon, C. (2018). 'Eco-Modernist Environmental Politics and Counter-
Activism Around the 2018 PyeongChang Winter Games', Sociology of Sport Journal, vol. 35,
no. 1, pp. 17-28.
Ludes, P. (2012). 'Trans-Generational Dialogues: Social Sciences as Multimedia Games', At the
Interface / Probing the Boundaries, vol. 85, pp. 151-171.

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Minikin, B. (2014)., 'Event management in sport, recreation and tourism. Second edition',
European Sport Management Quarterly, vol. 14, no. 3, pp. 315-319.
Sant, S, Mason, DS, & Hinch, TD. (2013). 'Conceptualising Olympic tourism legacy: destination
marketing organisations and Vancouver 2010', Journal of Sport & Tourism, vol. 18, no. 4, pp.
287-312. Available from: 10.1080/14775085.2014.947312. [16 May 2018].
Skey, M, Kyriakidou, M, Mccurdy, P, & Uldam, J. (2016). 'Staging and Engaging With Media
Events: A Study of the 2014 Eurovision Song Contest', International Journal of Communication
(19328036), vol. 10, pp. 3381-3399.
Stevens, J. (2014). 'Staging the Olympics : The Event and Its Impact', Sociology of Sport
Journal, vol. 19, no. 1, pp. 93-94.
Wood, L .(2013).'Events management: an introduction , by Charles Bladen, James Kennell,
Emma Abson and Nick Wilde', Leisure/Loisir: Journal of the Canadian Association for Leisure
Studies, vol. 37, no. 1, pp. 85-87.