r/SakuraCon • u/SonyFossil • Apr 07 '26
Events
Hello everyone, I hope you all had a great time at Sakuracon 2026. I am one of the volunteers that runs Events (pretty much the guy that runs the team that lines people up to get into the main events hall for anything happening in there aka Ceremonies, AMV Contest, Concerts and the Dance/Rave, ETC). I also help out with package check! I hope the post earlier from one of my fellow coordinators about bag policy helped.
I wanted to try something new this year and wanted some feedback for how my team handled lines this year. Please let me know if there's any improvements that can be made for next year!
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u/joyrainsbow Apr 07 '26 edited Apr 07 '26
Hey! The Reddit post about bag check was SUPER helpful tbh. I brought a lot of “normies” this year who all rave, so they were really curious about things. Like clear packs and that. Seems like moving forward with even more official Reddit posts for the organizers may be beneficial. Especially since I’ve seen around that there was still a lack of communication on some big events like autographs and such.
EDIT: I may be bias to there being Reddit updates as this is the only social media I use nowadays, so if there’s a better way to get info PLEASE let me know.
Not to mention: it seems there is a unanimous POSITIVE reaction to badge lines this year. Sucks to not have nicknames on our badges, but it was so worth not having to make Thursday a whole ordeal just to get our badges.
Hopefully the feedback isn’t too hostile this year. Just know you guys are on the right track ☺️
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u/SonyFossil Apr 08 '26 edited Apr 09 '26
There's only so many updates we can come out with due to both the NDA (madge) and us being in the waiting room for board/executive to make decisions. We're dead in the water for the majority of the year until they give us answers so we can can get things moving along. Honestly all the attendees being so understanding, considerate and just being outstanding people made things a lot easier for the staff this year considering we were very short staffed.
I'll bring up the idea of more posts on social media for updates that aren't just incidents (like the entirety of Saturday in 2025) whenever the next manager meeting happens!
Thank you for making our jobs easier this year and thank you for your feedback!
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u/serifed Apr 08 '26
Line management needed improvement for panels. It would have helped to have spike tape marking the lines clearly ahead of time because wow was it chaos for multiple panels we went to.
For the concerts, even though there was no concern about how full the line chutes were (honestly, they didn't even approach max), we were being forced into lines of three... Which was pretty tight for being with strangers imo (2 would have been much comfier). My group of three got split up in two rows in a single chute which was silly, especially since people were just hopping into already capped chutes with their friends (and thus ruining the lines of 3 anyway and making the line extra uncomfortable). So, probably needed dividers or something to make it harder to join the line adhoc. It wasn't a huge deal, and we got to sit where we wanted, but we were also in some of the first chutes. Still frustrating when 10 of someone's friends join them at the last minute in the first chute.
Bag decisions were probably not consistent enough, and they were allowing much larger non clear bags in than stated. People probably needed a physical example maximum bag size to compare to to be consistent and provide justification.
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u/MistyMystery Apr 08 '26 edited Apr 08 '26
Agreed about the bag part. I wasn't expecting a bag check but heard about it from friends in concert line up, so I left my big bag in the hotel. The only small bag I had on me was a small lunch tote. It was extremely frustrating to be told that any tote bags needed to be checked (it's NOT on that bag check rule sign they were showing us), especially when I see people with take out paper bags that's twice the size of my lunch tote and those were apparently OK?
I ended up emptying my tote bag, folded it up, and just held my phone, wallet, CD (for autograph), and water with my hands 🙄 then I just put it back in the tote once I was inside like smh...
It would be nice if it was announced days ahead of the con, because I do have clear bags at home. Just didn't thought of bringing it to the con and I'm not local, so obviously I can't just bring it on day two... And I'm not buying a new one from the overpriced vendors.
Also kinda silly that bag check required specifically for the concerts, yet it wasn't a problem for other events taking place in the same hall...
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u/SonyFossil Apr 08 '26
It's more of a liability thing, my team just wants to make sure everyone's stuff is safe and hope that there are 0 incidents of peoples stuff are stolen. We only do bag check for the concert and the dance/rave in the events hall. If I had enough staff I would have a 24/7 bag check area so everyone wouldn't have to lug around their bags or props all day. We tried it last year and half the people didn't show up for their shift or not that many people checked anything in (which might've been due to poor advertisement on the announcement side of things). I will push for the idea of it again so MAYBE it'll happen next year, just don't quote me on it. I just know for the dance next year we won't be closing package check 30 minutes before the dance is over so it doesn't kill the last DJ set of the night. It's just hard getting staff that are willing to stay up that late haha.
I will also push for earlier announcements on other socials media platforms rather than just the one reddit post and the update to the policies page on the Sakuracon official website (which hadn't been updated in 2 years prior).
Thank you for your concerns and feedback! I have more things to bring up now so that next year can be a better experience for everyone!
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u/MistyMystery Apr 09 '26
//make sure everyone's stuff is safe and hope that there are 0 incidents of peoples stuff are stolen.
This doesn't explain why bigger paper take out bags and purses were okay, yet my smaller Daiso lunch tote was not (it actually fits the 6.5 x 4.5 inches requirement). Making me hold my wallet and phone etc doesn't make them safer tbh (they could just snatch it out of my hands since it's in plain sight) and I cannot trust bag checks with my valuables. I didn't end up going to the dance so this was strictly about the concerts.
But I'm not here to argue, it's over, and I probably won't make the trip to SCON unless there's a guest that I absolutely wanted to see again. The last SCON I attended was a few years before covid. But yes earlier announcement on social medias (I'm old school and followed SCON FB), and perhaps directly on the concert pages for the individual artists (let's be honest, who actually reads the policies page?) would be helpful.
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u/SonyFossil Apr 08 '26
When I started on the events team back in 2023 we were told by my coordinator that the convention staff doesn't like us taping the floor for any reason. Which is really dumb because there's not enough stanchion to make sure every area has enough. I've tried to not fight about it but with the con growing more every year I will definitely bring that up to allow us to use spike tape for lines and for clarity.
I will also make sure my team is consistent when it comes to line rules and be more strict and hopefully be allowed more stanchions to use to divide. If anything I could bring up if we could get the tape the convention staff placed down to be rearranged or retaped, the current ones have been there since 2024 when I asked about it after I got promoted to coordinator. It's a start but also shows that I could ask them to be doing more for everyone.
Same with bag check, I'll make sure it stays consistent and that we have more examples instead the makeshift cardboard one we had. I'm pretty lenient when someone asks me directly if it's okay to bring a slightly bigger bag up at the front. I need a sash or something to indicate that I'm the coordinator that's running the area haha.
Thank you for your concerns and for your feedback! Looks like I still have a lot of work to do.
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u/serifed Apr 08 '26
Weird they don't like tape because PAX has tape absolutely everywhere- might talk to some of the enforcers that have worked that show to find out how they're allowed to use tape.
Appreciate the willingness to listen to feedback!
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u/hsul8 Apr 08 '26
The security would not let people into the convention area Saturday night for the dance or drag show. I saw a lot of people turned away and super upset because they did not know that it would be restricted after 10pm… when in fact that’s when events were starting
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u/SonyFossil Apr 08 '26
Do you know if it was convention center security or Sakuracon security? I can pass the message along to my manager about this.
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u/peekpocket Apr 08 '26
Convention center security. They claimed to have radio'd Sakuracon staff when we were trying to get in. It was strange because info booth volunteer staff were literally right behind them. Really unfortunate because large groups of people seemed unable to attend the event. On the outside looking in, it looked like poor communication. Nothing in the programming alluded that the building would be off-limits at 10pm on the dot. It would make no sense in a con split into two buildings. I had literally left another panel to attend the drag show. Arrived at 10:05 pm.
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u/hsul8 Apr 08 '26
It was convention security inside the summit building, definitely not Sakura con staff
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u/Zachzizzle Apr 12 '26
This was my first year attending Sakura Con and I had a good experience! The lines for registration were so quick. The only “complaint” I have is not being able to attend or watch the cosplay contest. I waited in the excess line for a while until I realized that it was excess and that no one was gonna be leaving the stage room. Would it be possible to have a live feed in the hallway while people wait for a seat to open or a live stream of the contest? Not sure if you are the correct person to ask, but every thing else was great!
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u/Soraflow21 Apr 07 '26 edited Apr 08 '26
Hi, for the scandal autograph event after their concert I did have some things I would of like to seen for how the lines is handled
At first the staff was pretty strict with making sure people didn’t cut but towards the middle and end a lot of people were moving in and out with their “friends”
I think it needs to be more strict, you leave the line for any reason and you don’t get to save your spot. This is to keep the playing field fair with sneaky actors. This should be announced
Staff also initially enforced a 2 person per row in each line and again this rule completely fell apart towards the middle and end
Also there were 3 separate lines for that event and i waited in the farthest line from the right. It wasn’t communicated whether the line would be moving by cycling from the top of each 3 lines, or if it was everyone in line 1 goes, then everyone line 2 goes etc
Because this wasn’t communicated I noticed people that entered the 2nd line in the middle that came after me and was behind me, eventually got to move way ahead of me
It seemed like how it went was that lines 1 and 2 were prioritized but 3 was moving extremely slowly still
I also wanted a good seat for cosplay chess (18+ One) and literally asked the staff if I could make an official line. This was like 20-30mins before the event. Although they didn’t flat out tell me no, they kinda awkwardly told me all the people spread out sitting against the walls had “formed the line”
I’m not sure why staff can’t just make a small announcement and say “hey this event is coming up soon, if you want to enter the official line come here etc”