Ever since COVID-19 was declared a pandemic, a wave of cancellations and closures have rocked the event industry. This is going through one of the most challenging times of its existence. The Coronavirus outbreak has forced an incredible amount of events to be postponed or canceled. But the question is until when to be postponed? Or when to cancel it.
It is so obvious that we are discussing a new event industry these days — one swept away by the most tragic and shattering epidemic. This coronavirus pandemic is going to change the world forever.
As soon as event professionals realized the severity of the Coronavirus impact, two options were taken into consideration:
- Cancel
- Re-schedule
Many event professionals soon rushed to avoid cancellations. And according to the present situation, cancellation should be the last possible option to be considered.
As the chant ‘Don’t cancel, postpone’ rose, many event professionals announced the postponement. While that gives temporary relief, there are several issues associated with the decision to postpone.
Postponing all the events is a necessity in today’s world but it turns out to be a crisis when back to back all important events in two or three months are going to be postponed?
Below are some strategies to be noted when such a crisis takes place:
- Many events are postponed or rescheduled to conduct after 3-4 months approximately. For now, this is the safest choice for those postponing to summer.
- Established events that happen during this time will have a competitive advantage, and the production of events that happen at the same time every year may not be as smooth.
- This is provided that the economy bounces back and the virus does not make a reappearance.
Many events have re-scheduled and postponed to summer with a hope that the heat would kill the virus. This is quite a risky and productive strategy.
The only fact we know is that we are not at all aware that how long will the outbreak last to the world. Countries like Italy, China, and South Korea are some lethal examples to define the crisis of this outbreak.
China has implemented unmatched quarantine restrictions and is now claiming to be in the descending phase of the outbreak. Three months in, China is still reporting cases — far less, but it is still happening. The country is also exposed to its neighbors importing the virus back into China once economic recovery measures are initiated and borders and industries open back up.
Looking at the current situation around the world, the end of June is a popular prediction for more containment and safety. Not accurate and very risky.
Of course, we are hoping that the virus may go down altogether because of summer serving back our healthy environment to the country.