Every year, 130,000 sci-fi and fantasy fans donning Captain America and Princess Leia costumes crowd into the San Diego Convention Center for the event known as Comic-Con, where they mingle with stars and other fans. Some 15,000 advertising executives descend on the French Riviera for a festival in Cannes, where parties on cozy yachts are the norm. At New York's Fancy Food Show, attendees sample each other's caviar and paté.
What now?
The coronavirus pandemic has upended the events industry, forcing organizers of everything from fashion, food and auto shows to gatherings of global elites to make tough choices.
Some are using technology to try to replicate interactions like "bumping into" an industry colleague in the hallway. Others are pressing ahead with in-person events, but with precautions like limiting attendance and using contact-tracing apps. Many events are just canceling or postponing.
The events industry has historically been slow to rebound from economic recession. It took a decade to fully recover from the 2008 financial crisis. This time, on top of an economic downturn, it is facing the prospect of prolonged lockdowns, travel bans, social-distancing regulations and public unease about being in large groups even when society opens up.
Some conference-reliant businesses likely won't survive the downturn. Many virtual events are free and sponsors aren't as keen to spend money on them. Financial fallout from the pandemic "has made it impossible to sustain" Women In the World Media LLC, wrote Tina Brown, founder of the live journalism events business, in a letter sent to supporters Thursday.
Party-heavy confabs with close contact between attendees are key to networking in some industries. Christiana Cacciapuoti, an executive at advertising-technology firm MadHive Inc., said run-ins with the "tippy top" people at companies is the major draw of the Cannes Lions festival, a global gathering of marketing and advertising professionals. "It's basically all close personal contact," said Ms. Cacciapuoti. "You and the person you're meeting with are definitely not six feet apart." The organizer of the Cannes Lions festival has canceled this year's event and said it's too early to discuss changes for 2021.
Among business-to-business exhibitions that have announced cancellations or postponements, 58% have been canceled and 42% have been postponed, according to industry research group the Center for Exhibition Industry Research. Some 69% of canceled exhibitions added a virtual offering, with the shift online causing, on average, a steep 87% drop in revenue.
For its five-day, 23,000-person summit that was set to begin March 29 in Las Vegas, software giant Adobe Inc. first shifted to a Plan B: a livestream from its San Jose, Calif., headquarters, where over 70 presenters would take the stage giving speeches cut down to 10-minute "bite-sized chapters," said Alex Amado, Adobe's vice president of experience marketing.
With two weeks to go, local authorities banned gatherings of more than 10 people. Adobe had to ditch the onstage event and have everyone present from their homes. To avoid taking a chance on every presenter's home wifi, Adobe had presenters record their talks. In the end, every presenter filmed solo at home, except Tampa Bay Buccaneers quarterback Tom Brady, whose video was shot professionally just before the full lockdown.
Serendipitous encounters, a major attraction for many conference attendees, are difficult to replicate online. Software company Docker Inc. created a "Hallway Track" feature, designed to help attendees strike up casual conversations with one another, for its May convention, usually held in San Francisco for 5,000 people and now scheduled to happen online. Volunteer "captains" will control online channels dedicated to topics of interest. Users can signal their interest, then chat through the app one-on-one or in a group, said John Kreisa, Docker's senior vice president of marketing.
Some in-person contact just can't be replaced. Amit Shah, who has organized a "matrimonial convention" for single Gujarati Indian-Americans in Atlanta for 14 years, canceled this year's event, rather than replace it with online matchmaking. He may raise the maximum age--typically 38--for next year's event, to accommodate singles who would have had their last chance in 2020.
Even trade shows, where handling the products has traditionally been crucial to the experience, are trying virtual events. At New York's TexWorld USA, fashion professionals typically feel new fabrics and make bulk purchases on the spot; this summer they will view them through a virtual showroom. "Nothing's ever going to replace being able to touch and feel fabrics," said the show's organizer, Jennifer Bacon, show director for fashion and apparel for Messe Frankfurt USA.
The Summer Fancy Food Show, where professionals sample each other's food, is also going virtual. Exhibitors will instead show and describe their product on video, offering to ship samples.
Media outlets are taking their events online, too. Digital-media site Skift Inc., which provides travel news, revamped its 2020 conference as a virtual event. Rather than charging its usual full-day fee of around $1,000, the conference is offering shorter events free or on a pay-what-you-can basis. A free Skift event on Thursday drew 10,000 registrants. An all-day virtual Skift event in June will cost most people around $300 to attend. Many of Skift's sponsorship deals will generate about one-third of the amount originally anticipated, said founder and chief executive Rafat Ali.
TED, the five-day event where attendees pay up to $10,000 to hear from thought leaders, will post its lectures online over eight weeks. Those who purchased tickets for the Vancouver conference, originally scheduled for April, then for July will have access to virtual chat rooms and other networking features.
The Wall Street Journal has moved events targeting professionals in health care, cybersecurity and tech online. Its Future of Everything Festival, scheduled for May, was reconfigured as a free virtual series.
Even events that are still going forward in late 2020 are adding virtual components to reach those unwilling to travel. That may remain even once Covid-19 has passed. "I'm very excited to see what a hybrid physical and virtual event will look like," said Mr. Ali.
For those envisioning what a return to in-person conferences will look like, there are examples in China, where Covid-19's spread is receding. At a 25,000-person consumer auto show that opened Thursday in Changsha, in Hunan Province, workers in full protective gear screened visitors, scanning a government-mandated contact-tracing app and turning away those with recent virus exposure.
Attendees then passed a temperature check and had their hands disinfected by an automatic machine, said Michael Kruppe, general manager of Shanghai New International Expo Centre, who attended the show. Attendees, clad in masks and gloves, were instructed to stay 1.5 meters away from each other.
Comic-Con, scheduled for July, was canceled last month. Its home, the San Diego Convention Center, is currently serving as a homeless shelter during the pandemic.Four-time attendee Paul Grewal in Palo Alto, Calif., said he'd be happy to social-distance, pass temperature checks and even use a contact-tracing app to attend next year's Comic-Con.
"If that's the cost of keeping Comic-Con going and growing, that's a cost I'd be willing to pay," said Mr. Grewal, a Facebook Inc. executive and former judge who lectures at Comic-Con on legal issues in the Star Wars and Star Trek universes.
Some other Comic-Con events around the world are going forward. Andrew Scott, the British actor best known as the "Hot Priest" in the Amazon comedy "Fleabag," is headlining a Comic-Con June 27 in the U.K. city of Birmingham, where he is scheduled to take photos with fans and sign autographs.
Organizer ReedPOP said it is considering changes for its events, from banning hugs to having stars send fans personalized messages in lieu of celebrity meet-and-greets. "The thing about our fans is they want to have fun and they want to follow rules," said Lance Festerman, president of ReedPOP. "If you lay out the ground rules for how to do that, they're quite happy to comply."
A Comic-Con scheduled for September in Long Beach, Calif., plans to only place 25 chairs in a room that would have held 100 in previous years and build exhibitor booths with three walls, among other changes, said its organizer, Martha Donato, founder and president of MAD Event Management.
Ms. Donato predicts that even after lockdowns are lifted, people may not attend out of fear. "I think there's a trauma that we've been exposed to," said Ms. Donato, whose event typically draws about 10,000. "I don't think we can expect a normal level of attendance in any scenario."
September's New York Fashion Week is still on, said a person familiar with the matter. The Sundance Institute postponed its May film festival in London and September Hong Kong festival, but its Park City, Utah festival in January 2021 remains scheduled. Mobile World Congress, which canceled its 2020 event, said it was too early to discuss changes for February 2021.
Investment firm Allen & Company will not hold its annual mogul meeting in Sun Valley, Idaho, said a spokeswoman for the resort where the event is typically held. The World Economic Forum, held every January in Davos, Switzerland, will hold its next event in "the most optimal configuration possible for participation," said a spokeswoman.
Cancellation typically means sizable sunk costs. "A general rule of thumb is that if you cancel within one month of an event, you can expect to pay for about 90% of the venue fees," said Sharon Crichton, executive vice president and global head of production at Jack Morton, the event unit of ad giant Interpublic Group.
Only 25% of exhibitors surveyed by CEIR had insurance covering cancellation due to communicable diseases. Policies typically only cover events that are absolutely barred from happening, not those the organizers cancel willingly.
Public guidance against large events--with no explicit ban--can be "the worst possible scenario," said David Audrain, executive director of the Society of Independent Show Organizers.
"None of your customers actually want to come because they've been frightened to death about going anywhere public. But there's no physical ban in place stopping you, enabling you to at least claim your insurance on it," Mr. Audrain said.
Suzanne Vranica and Benjamin Mullin contributed to this article.
