These are the basics of the first email exchanges I had with Renae concerning "Admissions" taking over campground entrances…
Hi Renae,
We (Sue, Beth and I) had a meeting yesterday with Jeff K., and it sounds like we're going to try to implement that idea on as broad a basis as possible this year. I said you and I had experimented with it last year and that I'd work with you on it. Amie had come over for that part of the meeting gave us your email address, and here we are…
Jeff wants me to get a basic "overall" budget put together by the 20th (of May), but I should be able to do that based on the general idea we were trying out last year...
Essentially, I'll just shift part of the "camping staff" over to some new
category (like "Camping Cashier Runners" or something) that will be in your
department, put a rough estimate together, and we can work on the details
(specific numbers of people you'll need, etc.) after the 13th...
One relatively big thing you might want to think about is the idea of the new position that'll be created: The new "Camping Cashiers Manager" position... That's probably not
the right term for it (since that already means something specific to you and the rest of the ticket office), but the basic idea will be to replace one of the campground managers with someone on your staff…
That person would be responsible for
- Handling all admissions-related questions;
- "Overseeing"/managing the cashiers and runners; and
- We'd have to get them tuned-in as to how to manage traffic (when cars are backed up from here to kingdom come, it's dark and windy out, and everybody's going crazy), and a couple of other (fairly simple "campground manager things").
No need to worry about the details of that now, but one of the most basic questions would be whether or not you think you know or would be able to find 7 or 8 people (depending on how big a stink VIP makes) who could do that job and would be willing to do it for somewhere around $8.00 or 8.50 per hour (for 12 hours). No need to answer that one now, but something to mull over (between tests)...
Like we talked about last year, the most basic idea is to turn over everything associated with the front campground gates to "admissions," and make the camping staff responsible for taking care of everything that happens once people have been "admitted."
From: Renae
I think it's good that we are doing that for We Fest. I will be up in the office on May 13 so you can catch me up there anytime after that and I can help you with whatever you need…
I will start to think about this. I am moving tomorrow and then I start finals so it will be pretty crazy around here for the next week! After all of that is over (middle of next week) I will be able to look at this stuff a little more. I'm not sure if this is what you guys were thinking or not but my first idea is that I don't think we need to create a whole new position. I think that we could just train one of the cashiers more about camping stuff and then pay them a little more than the other cashiers. Then they could be a "head cashier" or something. That's all I really have for now. I will get back to you next week sometime when I can really think about this. Have a good week!
~Renae
From: Bill
"Head cashier" idea sounds real good. Really won't be tooooo much camping training involved (cashiers pretty much run the front as it is - at least in the situations I'm familiar with), but we'll make some kind of "checklist" and make sure they know who to call if they need help... The big concern (or main job) will be keeping the runners, cashiers and campers humming along...
Bill
-- Anonymous, May 03, 2002