Welcome to Startup Monday.  Our new weekly post will feature the hottest ideas from the tech and events industry.  If you have a startup that we should look into, let us know on Twitter!

What do long lines and slow check-ins have in common? Angry clients! Never fear; help is here. No more standing at the door, flipping through ten pages of names. New iPad and iPhone apps offer efficiency and professionalism for guest check-in. We’ve taken a good look at the latest options and reviewed them for you. From basic spreadsheet uploads to full-on social media integration, these apps are at the front of the line. Each of these applications caters to slightly different needs and they vary in cost, but they all look like they’re worth a try!

  1. My Guest List is the world’s first app allowing event managers to sync guestlists and function enquires from your website, Facebook, or spreadsheets to an ipad ready for hosts or door staff to use at the beginning of your event. This clever app is great for guest management- tap guests off as they arrive and track arrival times, VIPs, and walk-ins. All of the night’s data is translated to reporting and statistics- logging the total number of people who attended your event and the performance of your promoter. Finally, the most important feature, social media integration- allowing your database to have both Facebook and the iPad working in sync. This enables complete guest profiling, including how often they frequent a venue, what they like to drink and how much social influence they have.  The service starts at $25 dollars a month.

2. CheckInEasy is a great iPad/iPhone app which was recently used for the Google holiday party to check in over 2500 guests! This app is great because guests can either be looked up by name or using boarding pass style barcodes.  Also, if you want to be notified when a special guest arrives, you can choose to receive a text message or email. CheckInEasy has really emphasized their attention to data security so that customers can feel confident about protecting their guests’ information. The app is only $1.99 and the starter package, up to 500 check-ins, is $99.00.

3. Eventbrite is a leading ticketing service that has created an app called Entry Manager. This app allows you to log into your Eventbrite account and pull up guestlists from all of the events that you are planning. Attendees can be checked in by name, or by scanning invitation barcodes that guests can print out or pull up right on their iPhones.  The list automatically syncs with other devices being used to check people in.   All of your attendance data will be stored on the server and accessible in your Eventbrite account for further analysis. An Eventbrite account is necessary, and the app is free!

 4. Event Farm has a mobile guest check-in app for the iPad and iPhone. It is sleek, stylish and full of features. It allows you to customize the background of the app to promote your brand and to keep up with the real time analytics for the event.  Also, guests can leave tickets behind for the rest of their party if they happen to arrive separately.  Use it in conjunction with the fully-featured web-based Event Farm Ticketing System, or create your own list by downloading their Excel guest list template.  The cost starts at $0.50 per guest that you upload, with no extra fee for the app.

5. Venue Driver Mobile Check-In is a web based venue management system. This software is ideal for nightclubs and bars that hold events regularly which require guest check-in, VIP table reservations, or ticket distribution. The software can be used on an iPad/iPhone, and the data can be viewed online. It is a great solution for both the venue and the guests, since guests can sign up for events on their mobile devices, and managers can easily keep track of the consumer database, making it easier to plan for future events. The management system requires a subscription, but the app comes at no extra cost.

6. MyBanquet is a great iPad app for events that require seating assignments.  It was created for weddings, awards banquets, and gala dinners.  Guests can be uploaded from facebook, a text document, or manually.  Then, you can design the layout of your event, organize table assignments, and easily email reports to important people every step of the way. You can add notes to people’s table assignments if special arrangements need to be made for their dinner or accessibility.  RSVP’s can be handled manually or by connecting to facebook.   It is only $3.99 in the App Store and doesn’t require a subscription.

 7. Guest List Manager is an app developed by Hilton Worldwide, ensuring event managers have the ability to coordinate guest lists with room bookings. This app is great for managing the small details of your event through key features like viewing the current guest list and reservation status regardless of how the guest’s reservation was booked, viewing the group’s room count, and searching for attendee cancellations. This application is extremely effective and makes booking the Hilton as your next event venue so worthwhile! Guest List Manager is convienently available on iPad, iPhone and iPod touch.     

We’re super excited to finally attend the Event Solutions Idea Factory Expo this coming February 26th-29th, 2012 at Cesears Palace in Las Vegas, NV. This has always been on ABCey’s “Must Attend” lists, but our hectic schedule hasn’t permitted us to do so until now. This is regarded as “the” Event Industry event of the year, where creativity, success and connections are founded. Planners, producers, and marketers from across the country and around the world will come together to explore ideas and strategies that can help take you and your company to the next level. It’s a perfect mix of fun and informative events, educational sessions, a massive resource Expo, networking opportunities and more.

Here’s a recap from last year!

We are always up for learning and staying on top of current industry trends, so this is a great opportunity for those interested in the same. And, it’s in Vegas…how can you go wrong? Okay, just make sure not to stay out all night so that you don’t miss the morning sessions!

EDUCATION: Take part in more than 100 sessions, presentations and demos and keep your
business ahead of the curve and ahead of the competition.
EVENTS: Many included and optional events will bring the latest event and catering trends and concepts to life. Bring your camera
and take home ideas you can use.
TRADESHOW: The Tradeshow floor will bring you hundreds of essential resources for successful events and meetings.
NETWORKING: Connect with other event planning professionals to share ideas, discuss the issues and create solutions.

To register, click here! Make sure you get your pass by January 31st to save. The complete ES Idea Factory Brochure can also be downloaded on the website. We hope to see you all there!

Christmas and Hannukkah are just around the corner, so it is time to start preparing! Here are some creative and fun photography tips that we hope you’ll enjoy.

1. Prepare: Making a List, Checking it Twice

• Make sure you are prepared to capture the moments of this holiday.

• Check that you have everything and find some good places to take some shots

• Pack the camera

• Make sure the batteries are charged and you have extra memory cards

• Put someone on ‘photos’.  Make sure someone is taking charge and photographing the whole event!

• Consider the light in the room that you’ll be photographing in. Is there enough light? Will you need a flash?
• Are the backgrounds too cluttered and distracting?

2. Get Your White Balance In Check: Pay attention to what type of light you’re shooting in and set your white balance accordingly.  If you have a camera that shoots in RAW, however, you can change it later.

3. Set Up a DIY ‘Photo Booth’: Time to be creative and set up a photo booth station where the party is.  An idea would be to photograph everyone as they come in and then leave a tripod set up with a self-timer on the camera for people to take pictures of themselves during the party.  As the party goes on, the photos get crazier!

4. Capture the Preparation Stages:

• The meal or party is the best part of the day, but there are other photographic opportunities; mainly the preparation stages of the day.

• Food preparation

• Putting up decorations

• Wrapping gifts

• Kids throwing a tantrum while getting dressed in their Christmas outfits

• Setting the table

5. Before and After Shots: Take pictures of the place before the party starts and after it has finished. It will show you what a success it truly was!

6. Time-lapse Christmas Series: A creative idea would be to set up a web cam on the table looking down the Christmas tree. Set the camera to go off every 5 minutes over the day and you will end up with one of the most wonderful series of shots. Of course can be applied to a Hannukkah bush as well;)

7. Christmas Lights: This can be tricky so read up on it!

8. Find a Point of Interest- but just per shot: Work hard to de-clutter your images

9. Fresh Group Photos: Take the group photo before the day gets started and when everyone looks their best.

10. Opening Gifts- Shoot in Continuous Mode: Opening gifts bring a wide array of emotions, facial expressions and excitement, so be ready to capture all of them! You will find a lot of really exciting, memorable photos.

11. Fill Your Frame: Fill your frame with your subject either by using your zoom or getting up closer to the subjec

We recently saw the launch of a new lifestyle brand, HelloBrit.com which aims to find helpful, yet creative new ways for busy people to live more simply, beautifully and imaginatively. Brit Morin (wife to Dave Morin, the founder of Path) has been working in the tech world for several years now and was a former Apple and Google employee. She is already being touted as the Martha Stewart of Silicon Valley and has recently been featured in The LA Times, Huffington Post, and TechCrunch. Brit gives new ideas and tips to live a more simple and creative life whether it be through technology, food, style, health that she either created or curated from scouring the web, something that is becoming very popular! Brit says “The ideas should come to you, and they should come through a channel whose expertise and taste you trust.”

Her site is looking like a cross between Real Simple and Wired Magazines with videos showing you how to make Christmas tree cheese appetizers, how to use electrical tape to make candy cane cups, DIY Holiday welcome mats, wearable dinner party napkins, and more. She recently featured a great gift guide for the holidays and showcases 20 of her favorite products and apps. Thanks Brit!

The brand’s first offering is a wedding app called Weduary, which was inspired by the process that Morin and her husband used in planning their own ”Pixel Cowboy”- themed wedding this summer. This will be a new service for brides and grooms, and will hopefully make for a more interesting experience for guests online and off. Make sure to sign up on the website to be notified when the new site arrives! There will be some other apps launched in the future which will likely be centered around ways to be creative around the home and novel ways to perform everyday activities like cooking, decorating and shopping.

We hope you enjoy and use Hello Brit for a little inspiration into your own creativity! We know that at ABCey, we will be keeping up Brit’s innovative ideas and using them for inspiration of our own, especially this holiday season.

We were really excited to hear that the AC World Series, Louis Vuitton Cup America’s Cup Challenger Series and the 34th America’s Cup Finals will be sailed in our hometown, San Francisco, Calif. in 2012 and 2013! This is the oldest trophy in modern sport and continues to build upon its rich heritage of leading-edge innovation with an event that is designed to showcase the best sailors in the world on the fastest boats. This will be the first time in 18 years that this worldwide event will be held in the United States. There will be approximately 45 race days, so that means that SF will be experiencing more days of competition than any other international sporting events ever held in this city. Arriving for the first time in the summer of 2012, the sailing will start with two back to back events, the first from the 11th to 19th of August and the second beginning a week later, running from the 27th August through the 2nd September.

The upcoming America’s Cup events in Newport, Rhode Island, San Francisco and San Diego, California are predicted to create thousands of jobs and over $1 billion in economic impact over the next two years. For the first time in history, the America’s Cup will be able to be seen from shore, creating tremendous public access for spectators as well as drawing large spectator crowds to benefit the port cities hosting America’s Cup events. The City of SF estimates over 300,000 visitors on peak viewing days and no tickets are necessary.   Additionally, the America’s Cup is predicted to deliver an estimated over $1 billion economic impact to the San Francisco Bay area, with more than 8,500 jobs that will be created due to the America’s Cup.

ABCey Events is looking forward to working on some of the many events that will be surrounding the actual races. If your company is involved and is interested in some outside event planning or production help, you know who to call!

Rough America’s Cup race day numbers & dates:
AC World Series 2012-2013 Race 1 (Aug. 2012):  7 race days
AC World Series 2012-2013 Race 2 (Sept. 2012:  7 race days
AC Opening events (7/4-7/7 2013):  3 race days
Louis Vuitton Cup challenger series 2013 (7/13-9/1):  32 race days over 51 days
America’s Cup Finals (9/7-9/22 2013):  9 race days over 16 days

On Wednesday night, we attended the SF Weekly Holiday Event at the Academy of Sciences benefiting One Warm Coat. There were hosted bars, hors d’oeuvres, live music, games, crafts, raffle prizes, and most importantly – Fish! We had a great time, but have to say that it lacked some fundamental event planning and production elements. There was a rather large line to get in, and nothing differentiating the ticket holders from guest list or VIP invites. It was pretty chilly out, so we were super excited to get inside after a bit of a wait. There were only two people at the registration desk, so we’re guessing this was one of the reasons for the lengthy line. We know we’re hard to please, but these things are really important!

It’s hard to bash an event that offers a full hosted open bar and food from over 6 Bay Area restaurants. Again, we were super thankful to be invited in the first place. Upon entering, we headed towards the food which for some reason was all crammed in this back area that was almost like a narrow aisle. Everyone was jammed up next to each other and again, and more lines! Why wouldn’t you space out the food throughout the venue a little better? I’m not even sure I know who the caterers were as I wasn’t able to grab any business cards with the masses. We decided to skip dessert and grab a cocktail, but the lines again were so long upstairs that we headed down to the Aquariam and found Artesa, where we were able to get a few tastings. By the time we headed back upstairs for dessert, they were cleared and everything was gone! One vendor was left with some yummy scones, but the rest must have ran out. I was bummed!

There were plenty of Ugly Sweaters, and casino games were provided by Homefry’s. We wanted to play a round of blackjack but weren’t patient enough to wait. I think they needed at least another 5-6 tables or so. There was a mock photobooth set up, in which they used Victoria’s Secret paper as the backdrop. They also used this to cover the registration tables. While this looked nice and creative at first, it quickly began to rip and it just ended up looking like trash all over the floor.

We left as the Raffle was going on, and looks as if they were giving out $1,000 in prizes for donating a coat. Last year’s event donated over 1,200 coats. So, even if the event didn’t have flawless production, this is a pretty good feat! DJ Eric Sharp was great and have nothing bad to say there. We were able to dance for a bit and had a great time overall! SF Weekly- let us help you with your planning next year. We’d be happy to make your event run a bit smoother, and ensure that everyone leaves with raving reviews!

Do you ever spend hours in a store or shopping online, trying to find the perfect gift for someone, but just can’t quite figure out what to get them? Well, now your days have become much easier, and just in time for the holidays!  Givvy is an “open community that let’s you participate in shaping the next gift-giving trend”. Whether it’s for a birthday, holiday present, housewarming party or a little something for yourself, our community of curators makes it easy to discover trendy new gifts that will inspire you and delight your friends and family.  You can also keep track of your most important occasions and social events with a personalized calendar and gift reminder service.

Givvy is uniquely designed for use inside Facebook—so you can discover gifts and share occasions while staying connected to the friends you love most. Givvy is an open community that let’s you participate in shaping the next gift-giving trend. Simply share your favorite gift ideas with friends and earn points as your influence gains in popularity. The members with the most influence earn exclusive rewards and join our community of Curators.

Your Holiday season of gift giving has now become much easier.  Make sure to check out Givvy’s Facebook page for great ideas for the perfect gift.

ABCey Events would like to thank Larry Rubin, one of Givvy’s founder’s for making our gift-giving days much easier!

WIth Thanksgiving just around the corner, we thought we would give you a few fun facts about this special holiday.  M.J. Stephey, from the Times, tells us 10 bizarre facts. Enjoy!

1. T-Day or a Tray: In 1953, Gerry Thomas, from Swanson, had 260 tons of frozen turkeys to serve, so he ordered 5,000 tons of aluminum trays and got an assembly line of women to dispense small amounts of turkey, corn bread dressing, peas and sweet potatoes, which became the first ever TV dinner.
2. Football & Feastin’: The tradition of watching football on Thanksgiving started in 1876, when the newly formed American Intercollegiate Football Association held its first championship game. Less than a decade later, more than 5,000 club, college, and high school football teams held games on Thanksgiving Day.
3. Franksgiving:  In 1939, FDR said that Americans should celebrate Thanksgiving one week early, hoping the decision would spur retail sales during the Great Depression.  Americans did not like this new deal, so the mayor of Atlantic City declared that the residents would have two meals, Thanksgiving and “Franksgiving”.  It wasn’t until two years later, in 1941, that Congress adopted a resolution and declared Thanksgiving to be held on the fourth Thursday of November.
4. Mary Had a Little Thanksgiving Obsession: The woman who wrote the nursery rhyme “Mary Had a Little Lamb” also played an important role in making Thanksgiving a national holiday. After a 17-year letter-writing campaign, Abraham Lincoln was finally convinced to issue an 1863 decree recognizing the historic tradition. 
5. Americans at the Abbey: In 1942, London’s Westminster Abbey held Thanksgiving services for U.S. troops stationed in England. The Church’s pew sang America, the Beautiful and The Star-Spangled Banner, with more than 3,500 soldiers in the church.  This was the first time a foreign army was invited to take over the grounds of a 900-year-old church.
6. Pardon Me, Mr. President:  When President Harry sympathized with a Turkey in 1947, the annual tradition of pardoning a turkey before thanksgiving began in the White House.  
7. Slow Roasting Tradition: It took more than 150 years before all 13 colonies celebrated Thanksgiving at once, in October 1777, although the first Thanksgiving was held in 1621.  George Washington loved the holiday, while President Thomas Jefferson disliked it, calling Thanksgiving “the most ridiculous idea” ever conceived.
8. Turkey and Chicken and Duck– Oh My!: A store in Louisiana claims to ship more than 5,000 turduckens a week before Thanksgiving day.  I bet you wonder what a turducken is? It is a turkey stuffed with a duck stuffed with a chicken.  Now that is a lot of meat.
9. Fast vs. Feast: Thanksgiving is all about eating an abundant amount of great food.  Ironically, it was initially supposed to be a fast, not a feast.  The settlers at Plymouth Rock celebrated the day by prayer and abstaining from food.  But when Wampanoag Indians joined them, celebrated the 3-day celebration with dancing, games, and feasting.  
10. What’s in a Name?:  Three towns have been named after this special holiday — Turkey, Texas, Turkey Creek, La. and Turkey, N.C. — each with less than 500 residents.  It is said that t the pheasant’s name came from Christopher Columbus, who thought he was in India when he arrived in “The New World” and, therefore, named the pheasant a “tuka,” an Indian term for peacock.

Who would have thought that you could “collect people, places, and things with a touch”? Poken, is a small device that stores all of your personal information, such as, your name, business, and contact information. This information can be traded with other individuals at the touch of another Poken. This would be great for an event! Rather than trading business cards, you can simply exchange your information through the Poken, and in return, Poken creates a timeline of the people you met with all of their information. This is a great way to generate business leads and gather brochure information at your next event! Here are some of the benefits:

For You:

• Generate high quality business leads
• Simple and easy to deploy infrastructure
• Reduce paper waste and send a message of social consciousness
• Minimize printing and logistics costs of leaflets
• Track networking success with post-event analytics

4000 people were hosted in Orland, Florida and participants were allowed to collect information via Poken, click here to see the results. ABCey Events hopes to use Poken at our upcoming events!