2022 has seen a return to in-person events after nearly two years off during to the COVID-19 pandemic. The good news is that it seems like in-person events are back for good. Unfortunately, many venues are struggling to handle the spike in business due to staffing issues.
According to a Bureau of Labor Statistics report, the hospitality industry had 1.2 million fewer workers in July 2022 compared with February 2020, just before the start of the pandemic. While these job openings are spread throughout the hospitality industry, this shortage is having a significant impact on the events sector.
If you’re running an events venue, it’s critical to understand the ways in which these staffing shortages will impact your business so that you can make the necessary adjustments and set appropriate expectations for your clients. Below are some of the ways in which this issue may create headaches for your business.
Staffing shortages impact your bottom line in a variety of ways. In addition to reducing your capacity, you’ll also face rising labor costs. Many events venues have been forced to offer significantly higher wages and extra benefits in order to attract workers in this competitive employment landscape. Staffing shortages have also caused insurance costs to rise since understaffing has the potential to create additional security and liability issues.
Increased costs will reduce profit margins. When quoting prices to clients, it’s important to factor this into your bids to ensure you’re able to maintain a sustainable level of profitability.
As a result, it’s critical to clearly communicate your timelines to clients to ensure they have realistic expectations. In addition, you may need to ask them to finalize items such as guest lists, budgets and special requests earlier in order to have enough time to ensure you’re properly staffed for the event.
Having long tenured, experienced employees allows you to provide better service and deliver a better guest experience. These employees understand your system, have bought into your culture and give you peace of mind that events will run smoothly. They also make it easier to get new hires up to speed with your processes and culture.
With workers leaving the hospitality and events industry in unprecedented levels, it’s creating challenges with employee retention. In order to combat this issue, you may need to provide greater incentives to existing staff members. This may come in the form of more flexible hours, rising wages and other perks. While this may result in a short term hit to your budget, it represents a long-term investment in the success of your business. Any actions that can help you retain your best team members will pay huge dividends over time.
After missing out on in-person events for nearly two years, guests are excited for a return to normalcy, and they still have their pre-pandemic event experiences as their frame of reference. Unfortunately, it can be very challenging to maintain the high guest experience standards you previously offered when you’re extremely short staffed.
This can lead to disappointment for guests if they find that the experience doesn’t match their expectations. As with many of these other issues, clear and direct communication with clients well in advance of the day of the event can go a long way towards smoothing out frustrations and creating a sense of good will. However, the ability to provide a great experience is critical to the success of an events venue, and this is a challenge that must be worked through to ensure guests are happy.
The impact of staffing shortages can be very significant, and it’s critical to do everything possible to minimize these staffing issues. If you’re unable to hire enough workers to staff your events, Xclusive Services can help.
At Xclusive, we offer staffing solutions for just about any position your events venue may need to fill – from entry level workers to experienced managerial staff. We can provide the staff you need on short notice to ensure your upcoming events run smoothly.
Our Xclusive Excellence™ promise will give you peace of mind. As part of this promise, we:
Don’t let staffing shortages ruin events and tarnish your reputation. Xclusive Services can provide the quality staff you need when you need it.
Please request a quote or call a local office for immediate staffing needs.
