Con with us…Again! A Comparison of Organisers

Hi lovelies,

We didn’t post last weekend and this is the reason why….we went to London Film and Comic Con. Now I wasn’t originally going to write a post about it but as LFCC has different organisers to the last one, I thought it would be cool to compare them. If you haven’t read the original blog post feel free to find that here.

So, we took our own advice after the last con and actually planned this several months in advance rather than the week before. I can say it definitely helped but it did have some drawbacks, I’ll discuss that below. This time, we got tickets for the entire weekend that cost about £90 per person, basically £30 a day. London Film and Comic Con was hosted by Showmasters Events at the Olympia in Kensington. Liverpool was Monopoly Events and as you would expect there were quite a few differences in the two events despite both doing the same thing. As you would expect, there’s guest meetings, panels and talks, cosplayers and of course, artists alley.

One of the things I actually loved about LFCC was the layout. Unlike Liverpool, everything was in one building and was pretty easy to navigate around. Most of the artists booths were in the center of the main floor with the panel stages and a green screen booth around the edges. All the guests tables and other photo areas were upstairs on the balcony. It made sense and really made artists alley the focal point of the arena. However, there was absolutely zero seating for those attending aside from stage seating. At least Liverpool utilised benches outside so people had a place to eat but in London nothing. Most people ended up sitting on the floor. We ate lunch elsewhere as again food prices were kind of ridiculous.

As much as I loved the layout and was pretty happy to search out all the areas, there was a severe lack of signage and decoration around the arena. Although Liverpool was confusing AF, they did have ample signage and also plenty of screens showing all the different schedules. LFCC basically had a piece of paper stuck to the side of the different booths and stages that was easy to miss. At least they did post the overall floor plan on the event website. Liverpool also had plenty of banners for guests and organisers etc which just added to the overall vibe. LFCC had nothing really. I mean they didn’t even have event merch to purchase….I think you may have got a landyard with a diamond pass.

My biggest issue though, was the lack of communication over cancellations. I get it, shit happens, guests cancel and sometimes cancel late BUT there’s literally no reason to keep that quiet. So shortly after announcing David Bradley they removed his info off the guest list bearing in mind tickets had already been on sale and I know because I was going to purchase. Now this cancellation happened over a month before con but no information was put online. Then Tom Savini cancelled 2 days before the event. I had photoshoot tickets with him so was gutted but there was no email from them informing me. This was put on social media but it was tacked right on the end of a post announcing him as a guest in November. Potentially tickets roll over to them but still have received no communication. At least Liverpool had the decency to announce guest cancellations.

Unlike Liverpool, there was no pre-buying of guest autographs. Basically you purchased those on the day with cash or by purchasing event vouchers. To be honest I couldn’t really find much information about getting autographs, even at the event I couldn’t see any timetables other than for the photos and talks. One thing LFCC did do though was release the stage and photobooth schedules before the event so you could at least plan around those. At least the queues moved fairly quickly for photoshoots though you did get more time to chat at the autograph tables.

I think I’m going to leave it there as it kind of feels like I’m moaning about everything when in fact, it was a brilliant weekend. These were just some of the main differences between the two cons and their organisers and not all of them were bad. Just different. I got to meet some amazing artists, small business owners and cosplayers as well as David Boreanaz and Ray Winston. So yeah no complaints, just observations.

Thanks for reading. Let us know in the comments if you attended and how you found it. Don’t forget to hit those like and follow buttons maybe even join our email list if you loved it.

Rach xx