Comic Book and pop culture conventions are a multi-million dollar business built on the backs of volunteers.Have you ever wondered how they worked? Or what it takes to keep them operating?
Personally, I love conventions. I have been attending them since I was 12 years old and my mom dropped me and my friend off at a comic convention which was an hour away. It was a great experience. As I grew older I told myself I wanted to be a part of my local fan community so I decided to start staffing conventions. I have now been staffing conventions for over a decade and have been such a valuable asset to these events, I was made the head of many departments for several of them.
After a recent convention experience by this website’s co-creator, Matthew Sardo questions of how conventions are run and how they can run better was brought up. This led me to start working on a few articles regarding convention attendance and operation. This is the first of these articles, where I will outline the truth, not many know about running a convention.
1. You Don’t Get Paid
Unless you are working a convention where tens of thousands of people attend (and even then it’s a maybe), you are not going to get paid for your service. At least when it comes to most comic book and pop culture related shows. You may only get paid in the satisfaction of helping out with the event. Depending on the convention and their policy, you may get little more than a badge for use after you have done volunteer service at the convention. Sure, some conventions do offer their workers a room to sleep in for the weekend, food so you don’t go hungry, and even a collectible shirt which says STAFF on it, but this is not a universal policy. You may even find yourself spending your own money for the event with little chance of reimbursement.
