Hanging by a Lanyard

6/3/2011

Safety First with Event Badges for Convention Security

With expenses going up and revenue going down, the last thing you can afford is gatecrashers at your upcoming conference, convention, or expo. It’s unfair to your paying customers, and it compromises everyone’s safety and ability to enjoy themselves. Allowing uninvited guests to sneak in without paying is tantamount to giving your product away for free, and you need to guard against this type of theft of services in the same way that you’d guard a retail location from shoplifters. Event badges can help.

Use event badges for:

• Comic book, SF, anime, and other fun conventions
• Business expos
• Scientific conferences
• Large sporting tournaments
• Multi-day music festivals
• Auctions
• Any big event that takes place over multiple days or locations

Issuing event badges to legitimate guests is a surefire way to even the odds against unlawful entry, even for small gatherings. Unless you and your security staff are certain of your ability to identify every single person in the convention hall by sight, a discreet event badge is your best bet for maintaining the integrity of the event.

For added security, divide those involved into categories that make sense to you and print slightly different badges, distributed depending on where the holder is allowed to go. This might include one set of badges for regular convention-goers, another set for vendors, another for speakers, performers, or VIPs, one for staff and volunteers, and so on. Unique badges make perfect sense if certain areas of the conference are to be restricted. Private parties or privileges available only to those who have paid an additional fee are safer when all attending wear the correct ID badge.

In the first hour or so of your gathering, distributing the event badges makes sense for everyone. Guests should be checking in and picking up any orientation materials anyway, so issuing the badges at this time provides a moment for them to transition into your event. Organizers have an extra moment to double-check their information and an extra opportunity to begin learning people’s names. Guests themselves will appreciate event badges that double as name tags.

But it’s your security detail that will benefit the most from these security badges. At a glance, they’ll be able to determine whether or not someone belongs in a specific area. In addition, if a registered guest does cause any trouble, the information on his or her event badge will make it easier to handle.

Anonymity works in some situation, but not when you’ve invested a lot of time and money into planning this event. Keep track of everyone in the room with a stack of well-designed, custom event badges!