2021 Evening in the Stacks Recap

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On February 27th, we were excited to be part of the Howard County Library System’s signature annual fundraiser event, Evening in the Stacks. If you checked out our event preview, you already know we did things a little differently this year. Instead of hosting an in-person event like in years past, we moved the festivities online, and we’re so happy with the results!

An Evening in the Stacks to Remember

Here are some words from just a few of the guests who were kind enough to attend:

This was an amazing event. Kudos to everyone involved in the planning. Virtual events are really difficult to make engaging and fun, but you hit it out of the park! – Dawn

Tonight’s Evening in the Stacks was absolutely wonderful! I loved the food, the cooking experiences, dancing and the preparing of truffles! Grazie! – Diane

Thank you, Tonya, to you and your staff for so creatively reimagining the potential of a virtual event. It was simply spectacular from start to finish. – Mickey

Post Event

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Events do not end when the guests leave. During the chef pasta demo, several guests commented asking for the recipe. We knew how important it was to send out the recipe and make good on our promise to do so. In the week following the event, our guests were sent a link to the same website to find a digital copy of that recipe and at least a dozen more, as well as a cookbook that was written by one of our guest authors.

Our team met and developed a list of questions about our guests’ experiences attending the virtual event. Our client sent out a survey to ask guests about their experience. Their answers are so important to consider as we look towards going back to a live event next year. Will some guests want us to continue with a virtual component? Did the virtual event extend outside of the live event audience? How did their experience compare to the live event?

Navigating Through a Tech Glitch

Over the last year, we’ve put a lot of energy into delivering top tier virtual events. Our own Heidi Hiller even took the time to go back to school and earn a certificate in Virtual Event Management! At this point, we’ve realized that technological glitches can happen, even at larger events – and that’s okay because they happen at live events, too. What’s important is to be prepared for them and to know how to handle them.

During the event, the platform we used locked out our attendees who had not arrived by the ‘exact’ start time of the event. The issue was brought to attention quickly through our Help Desk, which we had set up in preparation of handling any guest issues. When the issue began we did not realize how widespread it was, nor that the platform was locked. We were able to steer guests around into the event thru another link.

Meanwhile, we contacted the platform company and ultimately, they realized the issue was a simple coding error. The event was set in the wrong time-zone and coded to lock out folks in relation to that wrong time, which coincidentally was the start of the event. Thankfully, when the platform company figured this out, they were able to change the time zone and reopen the link, so any remaining guests were able to enter the celebration with their invited link. It's important to be open that mistakes like this can happen, yet people attending this event were very understanding and ended up having a spectacular time regardless.

After reporting the glitch to the platform company, they were very generous with us and now have plans to patch the issue and are crediting our clients with additional views of their event.

Keeping the Giving Going

The party is over now, but we’re still trying to raise even more funds! By the end of March, we’re hoping to meet our goal. All of these contributions will go toward purchasing learning activity kits for K-12 students, and Chromebooks and hotspots for residents without internet access.

Interested in contributing to the cause? We invite you to make a donation or make a purchase from our online bookstore from our featured authors today! Thank you!

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Innovative Party Planners is your resource for event design and planning in Maryland, Washington, D.C., Pennsylvania and Virginia. To learn more about our event planning services and how we can help make your event one of a kind, contact us by clicking here or call (410) 998-9999.