Procurement-grade guides for event buyers.
Compliance explainers, trade-show playbooks, and buyer's guides written for the people who actually sign the contract. No fluff, no rate sheets, no upsells.
Compliance & Risk
4 POSTS
W-2 vs 1099 Event Staff: A Buyer's Risk Guide
When a brand ambassador agency sends you 1099 contractors, the IRS doesn't audit the agency first — it audits the company that controlled the work. That's you. Here's how the math actually breaks down.
AB-5 / AB-2257 Compliance for California Event Staffing
AB-5 codified the ABC test from the Dynamex decision. AB-2257 carved out a long list of professions — but event staffing wasn't one of them. If you're staffing an activation in California with 1099 brand ambassadors, you're already non-compliant.
COI Requirements for Event Venues: A Practical Guide
Every major convention center in the country — Javits, Moscone, McCormick, the LA Convention Center, Mandalay Bay, NRG — has a published insurance rider. If your staffing vendor can't issue the COI by 5 PM the day before load-in, you don't have a vendor. Here's how to read the requirements.
The Event Staffing RFP Checklist (12 Questions to Ask Any Agency)
Most event staffing RFPs ask three questions and miss the ones that matter. Here are the twelve questions that separate a procurement-grade vendor from a problem waiting to happen — and how to score the answers.
Trade Show
3 POSTS
How to Staff a Trade Show Booth: The Procurement-Grade Guide
Most exhibitors treat booth staffing like a line item. The ones who win treat it like a campaign — with a captain, a script, a brief, and a debrief. Here is the full operational playbook.
How Many Staff Do You Need for Your Trade Show Booth?
Booth size × expected daily traffic × what you are actually trying to do = staff count. Here is the math, and the reason most exhibitors quietly understaff and lose qualified leads.
The Trade Show Lead Capture Playbook
Lead capture is the part of trade shows where most exhibitors quietly fail. Here is how to design a capture workflow that actually converts booth traffic into pipeline — across every major U.S. show.
Buyer's Guide
2 POSTSHow to Hire Event Staff: A Buyer's Guide
Most botched event activations don't fail on event day. They fail in the brief. This is the buyer-side process we wish every marketing and procurement team ran — lead times, scope, quotes, paperwork, and the negotiables versus non-negotiables.
How to Evaluate Event Staffing Agencies
The gap between a mature agency and a marketplace-style staffing app is invisible in the proposal and obvious on event day. Here's the 8-factor framework procurement and brand teams should run before signing anyone — and what good answers actually sound like.
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