Slight Problem...

[Kris]

I am doing a show in Hawaii in September at a large hotel chain's conference centre in Waikiki. I'm production managing and Lighting Design/Operator for the event. I have just been informed by the venue that they have a new contract in place for a 3rd party company to take care of all of their rigging requirements.

So here's the rub.... this "contract" between AV company and Hotel is going to add $30k USD to my budget. I kid you not. I have 18 rigging points for this show and they charge $1750 per week... PER POINT. Plus they have to "approve" any and all gear flown on said rigging... whatever that means. I'm hanging over 60 moving lighting fixtures and a JBL Vertec line array as well as projectors, cycs etc, etc.... I can only guess how much this is going to slow me down and add labour cost to the bill.

Now, in Australia I would go straight to the ACCC and raise a fuss because it is illegal, but this is in the USA.... anyone know of any American laws pertaining to this fiasco that I might be able to quote at the Hotel management?

Other than that I am going over our contract with a fine tooth comb to see if there's any way around it.

[OzDrum]

anyone say "Staging Connections"??...

[chris p]

Kris, I know of some people (in fact, my old law firm) who can get you the answer to your question, BUT it would cost bigtime. The advice might run to $5K or so. Let me know if you think its worth pursuing for that sort of budget.

[Chris H]

I used to provide a nice PA and do FOH for a few bands doing the corporate gigs, musos like Paul K's B.B etc, places like the Hilton etc......another Co had their installs in these venues but my band contact didn't like the non musical way of much of their their work, so he paid me instead , to lug in my PA etc........ we could only ever manage to get one gig in each venue.........I arrives at one venue while their mixer was still in the room and they had to pack up to make way for me..... very cool reception i got.
This sort of thing, one way or another has been simmering along behind the Melbourne live music scene for decades.
It has always been strategic for business to get on well with Premier Artists

[Chinagraf]

Can't you just tell your client you'll need to oncharge the extra costs to them and explain to them why and what is happening? If using this particular hotel is going to cost them another 30 K (plus a loading if you are going to pay the bill) then they might think about reconsidering their choice of venue.
My parner is a finance whizbang chick for a very large corporate travel company who organizes these sort of international conferences every day. If you want pm me the name of the hotel and I can ask her if they have any reputation for this sort of thing..

[Kris]

Thanks guys.

Apparently it's a new policy so we may get away with it as our contract was signed early last year. It's way too late to back out now.... 1,500 punters already registered and the Hotel is "giving" us the ballroom due to the huge number of guests arriving. I'll keep you posted.

[TimS]

Good luck then Kris..

[Kris]

All sorted. We signed before the policy was implemented so we're exempt.

Thanks for all your input.

[chris p]

Pleased to hear it - so much better than meeting them in the duelling field with lawyers at dawn.

[Chinagraf]

Kris = 1, money grubbing hotel administration = 0

:)

[Thirteen]

I have done lots of shows on the U.S. East coast over the past couple of years, and the regulations are unbelievable. We had video gear and a video operator/tech, but the big manhattan venues force us to have a house video guy, at a cost of $5000.00 per day, and they usually sat in the green room all day and never even walk onto the stage.

[Stephen C]

Now, in Australia I would go straight to the ACCC

Seen it happen in Sydney. Actually I think I may have read about it in AT.

I thought this was a really dull post and it appears I can't delete it.