Breathe new life into your community after a year of being indoors! In this Meetup Live event, you’ll hear from seasoned organizers who’ve successfully reconvened their groups IRL (in real life) after hitting the pause button. You’ll also hear about the best ways to host in-person events, from venue selection to greeting new members.
Watch Alaina Forte organizer of Fairfax Beginner’s Dungeons & Dragons and Kim Foster organizer of Miami Figure Drawing Saturday Morning Group as they share what it’s been like to revive their community, engage group members, and host rockin’ IRL events.
Main Takeaways:
- What was it like to restart your Meetup events after a year of hiatus?
- Kim: In our group, everybody was thrilled. The energy of the room was amazing. You’re very concentrated when you are drawing but then in between poses and stuff like that, people were just electric, happy. I noticed new people coming in from Meetup, people who joined late in the pandemic. We’re getting younger people and older people, I’m talking 18 to 80 year olds, and everybody is so thrilled to be there.
- Any challenges of meeting back in person?
- Alaina: It’s been really good so far. I think I anticipated a lot more problems than there were. I thought people were going to be uncomfortable to meet in person, people were going to feel unsafe, but I guess people who would feel unsafe, they wouldn’t come.
- What would you tell organizers who are thinking about meeting back in person?
- Kim: Let everybody find their comfort level. If they’ve been vaccinated and they still want to wear a mask, that’s fine. If not, let them. Let everybody come to their own comfort level whether they want to participate now or wait, that’s up to them. But it’s good to get the ball rolling.
- Alaina: Just use all the tools that Meetup gives you. You can add RSVP questions like I’ve done to ask people if they are comfortable following CDC guidelines, you can add notes to your Meetup event, start a discussion on your Meetup and see if people want to meet up. See what the community is feeling.
Top Q&A Questions:
- Did you get any pushback for requiring only vaccinated individuals to attend your events?
- Alaina: I didn’t have any pushback so far. I also don’t require much proof of vaccination. I just trust that people are being honest.
- Kim: We’ve had a little bit. Some of our members were not happy but we have a sign on the door that we follow CDC guidelines.
- What’s your favorite thing about being a Meetup organizer?
- Alaina: It’s really building the community and seeing everyone come together and knowing that I helped them do that.
- Kim: That’s it exactly. It’s really heartwarming to be in a group that’s fostering friendship and community. It’s rewarding to see people come back over and over and over again.
- Alaina: It’s so hard to meet people and make friends as an adult. It’s mostly you go to work, you go home, it’s good to have somewhere else to go.
Last modified on September 10, 2021
