The Big (Awesome) Problem with Connect Festival Tickets
We have a major problem on our hands! We're running low on Connect Festival 2018 tickets! The 2,500 free tickets made available are over 75% claimed with orders coming in almost every hour of the day and we're only in April! The pace in which these tickets are being ordered has completely blown away our expectations. Even more humbling than the number of tickets are the words of encouragement we're receiving about the intended use of the tickets. We're hearing from people who are ordering a couple extra tickets with friends and family members in mind to invite who they've been praying for and who need Christ's love in their lives. That's the whole point of this festival and we're so excited you're taking that to heart!
As an event organizer, this a pretty awesome problem to have. It means word is getting out there and people want to come to the event. However, as someone who's goal is to share the love and hope of Jesus to as many people as possible, it's a big problem. The last thing we want to do is turn anyone away!
One of the reasons we moved the festival to the Cape Cod Fairground is the amount of space it offers. There's plenty of land which provided us the ability to grow and expand as God opened doors for this ministry. So why the cap at 2,500 tickets then? The simple answer is: that's all we budgeted for. Anything over our initial ticket threshold would dramatically increase costs and since this is our first year with the new free admission format, we wanted to set a realistic fundraising goal. So we set the number of tickets available to what the budget would allow for.
More people = higher expenses. Anything over the 2,500 tickets means we have to move around the layout of the festival grounds to make sure there's enough room for people to see and hear the music and message. This increases our production cost a lot! The higher number of attendees also means a higher usage fee for the fairgrounds, additional police & EMT costs, crowd control & safety, insurance premiums, and more.
How can more tickets be added to reach more people? Like I said, there's actually plenty of room at the fairgrounds. However, some fundraising work needs to be done before we can utilize it. So we've updated our fundraising thermometer with new thresholds where more tickets will be released. We'll be going out to actively fundraise in the coming months. When we reach one of the thresholds more available tickets will be added. Keep in mind that the $55,000 budget is our break even point. As a volunteer-run ministry no one is profiting from this event and any additional funds will go toward next year's festival. All funds go directly to the mission!
You can help by donating online, attending a fundraising event, and spreading the word about this need. We're on a mission to make Jesus famous in New England and we need your help!
If you would like to host a fundraising event at your church contact us and let us know! Whether it's a concert, meal, car wash, or other community event, we'd love to be a part of and help publicize the event! We'd also love to come and share about the ministry of Connect Festival as a "missions moment" during an upcoming church service.
Connect Festival is produced by Fuse Christian Concerts, Inc. -- a 501(c)3 non-profit ministry so your donations are tax-deductible. Click here or visit www.ConnectFestival.org for more information and tickets.
