EP 93: Derby Day Debrief: Lessons from 19 Years of Event Planning

This conversation is for informational and educational purposes only and is not professional advice.

Positioning review: Minor adjustments made throughout. Reframed a few prescriptive statements into experiential/descriptive language. References to Handbid's mobile bidding software are kept as natural first-party experience. No outcome guarantees or statements interpretable as professional advice found. Overall, the conversation is naturally experiential, describing the hosts' firsthand event planning and execution.

Jeff: Should we kick it off? What are we talking about today?

Elise: Yes, we are going to talk about the Derby. We had the Derby event, and it went off. I thought it was better than last year, personally. I thought the seating arrangement was a little bit better. I also thought the music was pretty great.

Jeff: And the food was better this year, in my humble opinion. Our goal every year is to make it better than the last year. That's why we have this podcast called Elevate Your Event.

Elise: Then you did it.

Jeff: Well, in other areas, maybe not. But it's funny when you're doing events -- people come up and they ask you while you're at the event, "So how's it going?" And I'm like, I'm really superstitious and not sure I want to answer that question because things are going pretty well. So let's go kind of back through our process. I think that would be helpful.

Elise: So you got there Friday and started setting up for the event Saturday. And then I heard that you guys had to go back Sunday.

Jeff: Yeah, we have some luxuries with this event that a lot of our charity partners don't have. And that is we have access to this venue in a much broader timeframe than most. But this is an outdoor venue. And so we are really spoiled with where we do this. If you're running events in Denver, you really do need to think about doing them at the Museum of Outdoor Arts.

Elise: Absolutely. Marjorie Park.

Jeff: It's connected to Fiddler's Green and they're owned by the same family. But the reason is they just have everything. When I say they have everything -- our catering truck wanted to drive over our high-speed internet cable. And he looks at me and I'm like, yeah, that's a solid no, you will not be doing that. He's like, what do we do? I'm like, we're going to have to find one of those cable trays. And we're going to have to put it out -- the thing that looks like a speed bump. So I say, "Hey, Sky, do you have a cable tray?" He's like, "As a matter of fact, I do." Just those little types of things -- and bathrooms and all these other things where, especially if you're doing an outdoor event, you have to think about details. Like, you forgot about the soap.

Elise: I did notice the soap. Well, there are soap dispensers on the wall that did work behind the sink. The ones in the women's restroom did, but it did take me a minute to find them.

Jeff: Let's give our listeners some context here. We're riffing on this event like you all went to it. And if you're listening to this podcast, next year you should go because it's awesome. But just to kind of back up -- this was our 19th year of doing a Derby fundraiser for PWSA of Colorado. We have over the last couple of years shifted it to be more of what I would call a Derby event. It does still obviously support the charity, but we are trying to establish what we would consider to be Denver's classiest Derby event. It's in the south part of town. One of the best parts about Fiddler's is that it is really easy to get in and out of there. You're in Greenwood Village. You're not parking downtown. You're not dealing with all of the traffic. So we felt like this is a nice alternative.

Elise: Traffic, parking, and hobos.

Jeff: Okay, TPH. That's what I got. Or Port-a-Potties or anything else that's associated with other Derby events. So anyway, the goal here is to create that premium experience. Over the last couple of years, we've started to make that climb. And we always take feedback from our guests. We throw QR codes for surveys up on the big screen at this event, and we do it at the event itself. So we're always gathering feedback.

This year, we sit down and look at what our guests told us last year and what we want to change. Some of the things we worked on -- the way this event works is we have two bands, two concerts. The event starts right around 2:30 in the afternoon in Denver, and it goes until about eight or nine PM. We have a band that goes on stage around three. Then we break and actually watch the Kentucky Derby. We have a massive LED outdoor screen -- a portable Jumbotron. It takes them half a day to put up and half a day to take down. So we put that up there, and then we watch the race. People can bet on the horse race with our fake Derby dollars that you get when you arrive. And we have auctions and wine pools and all the other kinds of fun fundraising activities -- cornhole games that you can pay to play.

You buy tables, right? And so we have tremendously good -- I'm biased on this -- but tremendously good food and drink at this event. This is top-notch stuff. This is high-end. It is catered. Brandon and his team from Coast to Coast have done it for the last couple of years. And it is phenomenal food. Then Rocker Spirits rolls in with their 1920s trash truck bar. They serve all of our mixed drinks -- the flame throwers, the mint juleps, the old fashioneds, the Admiral's Daughter vodka drink, and the Kill Devil. We added a new drink this year. We're going to talk about all this stuff.

So it is fantastic. You can rent a fire pit table or an even bigger sectional fire pit table. Then there's other seating available as well. That's the nature of the event.

What we heard loud and clear last year was: make some adjustments to the food -- not major ones, but make some minor adjustments to where it's located, how you're serving it, and what you're serving. Maybe another mixed drink that isn't vodka and bourbon. And tables -- upgrade the wine a little bit and pull those tables away from the stage. Because the way we laid out this park, if you had a fire pit table, you might have been right up front next to the stage. And when those bands are playing, it is loud. So we got, "Hey, look, I'm spending a lot of money, Jeff, on this table. Can I sit farther back?" Kind of like a suite experience.

Elise: Yeah, exactly. A box experience.

Jeff: So those are the things we decided. It was time to change up some of the music, and we did that as well. The biggest adjustment was, can we get all of these fire pits pulled back? Can we still fit them? If you look at the pictures from last year, you wonder where you're going to put them. We have four sectional sofas because we're filling this park with fire pit tables. We can only fit about 20 fire pit tables in this park. Then we have these four sectionals, and they take up an entire tier of this park.

Thank God we show up on Friday morning for a Saturday event because we weren't exactly sure if these were going to lay out right, but they did. We had everything there. We start laying out the fire pits. It's going to work. We're hustling through it. We get it all out. Our event planners had built a map because we had done this online first -- this is what we're going to do, we're going to move these. So we have a map of the park and they're dropping in these little circle tables. I'm like, I just hope they fit. They're like, no, we scaled it. I think it is. And we only had to make one switch.

Elise: Yes. So we're like, no, we can't put eight on that level. We had to put eight on this level where you had six, and six had to go on that level, and it all still worked out.

Jeff: And then my sister-in-law shows up, of course, and she's like, "I don't like it." I'm like, I thought we had these on the other level. Too bad you showed up at noon.

Elise: Exactly. You want an opinion? Come early.

Jeff: That's right. The opinions are all done at 9 AM when we were personally carrying chairs and fire pit tables everywhere. So we did an inventory. We had to replace some chairs. We had 25 or 26 propane tanks to get filled and put out. A lot of that stuff was happening. We were like, okay, that's a solid upgrade.

Elise: And then we moved the food to a different spot, but we left the appetizers where they were last year. We're going to talk about that.

Jeff: So we served appetizers over here. We're going to leave that there. And we're going to move the food over to this other section of the venue, and that was better.

Elise: That was great. Less traffic jams.

Jeff: We still have struggles we've got to figure out with food, but that was definitely an improvement. And we have worked with Rhythm FX and Shape Music out of Fort Collins. It seems odd -- you're working with companies out of Fort Collins for a Denver event. They're the best. We did a country music concert one year as a different fundraiser, and the sound vendor was awful. I just don't want to mess with any of that anymore. These guys showed up on time. They got the sound working. They know each other. They can work together. They can borrow equipment from each other without getting into a fight over it. They solve their own problems. We had no issues with sound.

So Friday, they're setting up. All of that is working. Then the next day, the day of the event, everybody needs to start showing up. One of the things that absolutely floored me is my wife actually came to the venue with me at 9 AM. She's usually doing something else. She's like, "I'll be there at noon or one." This thing starts at 2:30. I was like, well, Jeff's going to be there at nine. She's like, "I really want to take one car, so I'm coming with you." I'm like, okay, the car is leaving at nine -- which means 8:45, we've got to be there at nine. So she's like, "I'm good." And that was awesome that she did that.

Oh, and I forgot to mention -- in the spirit of upgrades, we completely rewrote all of the betting software. That's a big one. It was time. Our betting software was built on a framework that is no longer installable anywhere on the internet. It's so old. I think Amazon told us, yeah, enough, we're done. You can't run this software anymore. So we took a developer and rewrote it from the ground up. The better part of that was we actually had the developer at the event. Now she totally gets it. She's like, "I get it. I see how this thing works." We were testing it the night before the event.

Elise: And the morning of.

Jeff: There is nothing like writing code and launching it at 10 AM for your event at two. It's exhilarating.

So we upgraded the betting software. The staff who run the betting tables loved it compared to the old stuff. It's just faster and easier. You can make more modern interfaces, more modern software. One of the things we focus on at Handbid is that we understand what people are doing because we do those things too -- we check in people, we bid, we do all of the same things everybody else does. So we know how to make that experience seamless and fun.

So we got through all of that. Friday night, I think I went to bed at a normal time.

Elise: I left your house at 9:30. I mean, normally at 2 AM we're still putting things together. We were in good shape.

Jeff: Because we give away fake money at the door based on what you've bought -- and this is not normal for most charities -- we pre-build these packets. Here's your table packet. It doesn't have your name and paddle number on it necessarily. It's more along the lines of, you bought this package that includes a fire pit table for six, and here's all your money in an envelope. So when they show up at check-in, we're not counting out Monopoly money. It's all pre-done, and that helps speed the check-in process up. So there's a lot of prep going on in advance. But the silent auction was ready to roll.

I'll tell you what -- AI has revolutionized building out silent auctions because you're no longer sitting there trying to figure out how to word it just right. I go in and I always go into the ones where people get a little wordy on the description. I'll tell ChatGPT, "Here's their description. I need a TLDR. It's going up at the top of this item -- just give me the four bullets of what this item is and what's included." So all of that was in good shape. We actually opened the auction on Thursday or Friday, which never happens.

Elise: No, that's great.

Jeff: Saturday rolls around and things are going well. Everybody's showing up on time. Well, Dustin doesn't -- but that's just Dustin. He's our trash truck. That's Rocker Spirits. I think he just says he'll be there at 10 knowing he's just going to get there at noon. But when vendors show up, we have to install them into the venue. There are no trucks that just drive through this park. So we're forklifting these trucks and equipment through the venue. The venue owners need that scheduled -- you can't just have people showing up whenever they want.

But it was largely happening. I would say it was certainly more organized than it has been in years past. It really was. It was definitely an improvement. And we had a run of show.

Elise: Yeah. I had an awesome script, and it was easy for me to follow. And when you've done it 19 years, you don't have to change it much. We just pull it up from last year and make adjustments. What do we want to change in the program?

Jeff: All of the signage, everything was ready to go Saturday morning. We got the photo booth done. The photo booth presented a couple of technical challenges, namely for me. Lesson learned for next year -- set up the photo booth on Friday. We had to put together a green screen background. Then we can overlay whatever backgrounds we want in the software.

Elise: Which is super fun.

Jeff: And it's fun to see everybody's images up on the big screen. Our photo booth integrates with our screen system. As people take photos, they go up on the big screen. People like that interaction. The software we use is really cool because not only can we throw photos up there live, they call them "ads" but we can throw slides in there. So it'll show the race card -- what's going on at what time. Or we'll show a sponsor thank-you. We'll throw the survey QR code up there, the donate QR code. And then more pictures. Our AV company loves it because they don't have to do anything but turn it on. It shows up on the screen.

So all that was finally working. I had to renew my Simple Booth subscription -- that was the challenge. It expired yesterday. I know exactly when I bought this software -- right before a Derby event several years ago. I was ignoring the renewal notices all day. Their service is great. We got all that working.

Then someone came up to me. It was about 2:30. They were like, "How's everything going?" And I'm like, I don't want to answer that question. Honestly, I'm usually freaking out by now because something's not working and guests are coming in the door. But I've already changed. I have nothing on my plate other than MCing. The MC showed up on time. That was the best part.

Elise: I feel like everything about this event this year actually was that way. I kept saying the event planners kept asking me on Friday, "How are you doing? How's it going? What do we need to do?" And I was like, I just kept going back to them. I'm like, I need to see this checklist because I have all these volunteers.

Jeff: We had our issues. Should we talk about the issues we ran into? Or do you want to keep talking about all the amazing things that went well?

Elise: Well, for the most part, when I think back, it felt like a leveled-up experience from last year. And it felt a little bit more organized right when I came in. I got there around 2 o'clock or 1:30 or something. It felt very smooth -- I checked in on my app, the Handbid app, logged in, checked in, and came in. There were no traffic jams. Check-in was smooth. Everything was just moving really well. It just felt like a really well-run machine. Nothing stood out that was off. My radio didn't go off much, which is a good sign.

Jeff: Yeah, that's good. It just felt a lot less chaotic.

Elise: And the pimento cheese -- oh my gosh.

Jeff: We'll talk about the food in a second. So let's talk about the things that I wouldn't say all went wrong, but they were a struggle.

Elise: Sure. We all have them.

Jeff: The first one was where we put the appetizers -- same as last year, right next to one of our fire pit tables. It just got crowded up there. It was a bad spot to put them. And as much as I love Brandon, and he's an amazing guy, I think he overdid it on the apps. There were too many. He was sweating, getting them out. He has to run them through the crowd because they're on these massive carts. He's running this massive cart through our venue to go stock the apps, and it was a delay. They were fantastic, but hangry people were lined up sucking these things down. He could not keep them stocked fast enough. I think that was a bit of an issue. Maybe you shouldn't have the appetizers and the main meal in the same space because the main meal area felt very empty.

Elise: We just made a mistake of saying, let's just leave them over here, it'll be different. I think part of the problem with the crowding was that we left the appetizers there this year. That wasn't a problem last year, but we changed all those fire pits, moving them up to the top next to it, so we added more people up top.

Jeff: We kind of created the problem ourselves. At the very top level of MOA's park is a big sidewalk -- their fancy entrance into Fiddler's Green Amphitheatre. It's the VIP entrance. But it's also a park, and we use it as our venue. Up at the top they have umbrella tables. Those aren't the tables we sell, so we pulled all of those back against the far wall and put the fire pits up front facing the stage. Well, everybody flocked to those umbrella tables because they were essentially free -- we didn't charge for them. And it was a hot day, so people started commandeering those. Now you have all these people sitting at umbrella tables on one side of the sidewalk, all the fire pit tables on the other side, the appetizers right next to the fire pit tables, the bar at the other end, and the betting area next to the bar. It was just too much going on. We did not think this through well.

We needed to move the betting area from the year before because it was in a spot that was not easily accessible and people didn't like it. But we didn't need to put it where it was. There's just a lot going through your head as you're watching this play out. But one lady came up to me and she's like, "It's too hot." I'll take that complaint all day long. It's the first Saturday in May. It could be snowing in Denver.

Elise: Exactly.

Jeff: So mental note -- fewer apps, keep some of the same ones. They were phenomenal. Just move them to a different spot. Move those umbrella tables somewhere else or sell them. I almost think we should sell them. They're awesome. So you're taking mental notes of all this.

Then the band comes on -- Nathan Dean and the Damn Band. They're awesome. They headlined for us the year before. People are flowing in. It's going well. Our friends start coming in. I'm able to socialize with people, which is awesome. We fixed some of the sound issues from the year before.

Elise: The other thing I liked is that it was a smaller stage this year and I kind of liked that. The band was lower and you felt a little bit more connected.

Jeff: Last year's stage was higher. And this was a cheaper stage. It just felt a little bit more intimate, having the band lower and not so high up on a massive stage. And it fit through the gate. I was super happy about that part -- we didn't have to take parts of the gate off to get the stage in. These stages are trailers. This came on the back of a pickup truck and it literally unfolds like a pizza box into a real stage. These things are awesome. We put a skirt on it -- we branded it with a Derby Day stage skirt so you don't have to see all the ugliness below the stage.

The sound was better, everything was working great. And so it's time for the Derby. I can see the caterers are there, busting their butts to get the food out. The apps are done. There's a new food tent on the other side of the venue. They're stocking that up. They've got a smoker going. We had brisket, we had pulled pork. They're over there hustling. I'm like, okay, that looks like it's rolling. No one's on the radio saying there's a food disaster, so I think we're good.

But then I look over and Kisha, who's one of the ladies that works at Rhythm FX, has this look on her face. I'm like, everything okay? She's like, "No." That's the oh-crap moment. And it's like 4:24, probably close to 4:30. The race is usually around 4:50, 4:55. It varies because they've got to get horses into the paddock. She's like, "I can't get the live feed up."

Now, we can't use YouTube TV because YouTube TV doesn't let you export your video to an external display for copyright reasons. But NBC.com streams the Derby for free, as does Peacock. So we had primary and backup. They happen to be owned by the same company, but it's primary and backup. We've got Peacock up, NBC.com up, both logged in. We go there and it's just black.

She's like, "I think our internet's down." Our internet is not down. We have a hard-wired line -- a thousand-foot cable wired from one building down to their station. So they've got internet. She's like, "I don't know what's happening." Finally it pops up with a Peacock error -- the NBC logo, and it says, "We apologize, we're experiencing technical difficulties. We'll be back to you soon."

This is the Derby event. I said, this is the Kentucky Derby. Everybody's here to watch it on this 20-foot screen that's above my head and NBC crashes. Are you kidding me? Everything's perfect. The guy didn't burn the brisket. The guy showed up with mint for the mint juleps -- that's happened in the past. The buns aren't stale. The sound works. The weather's gorgeous. And it can't be NBC that takes us down.

So we're scrambling. I pull it up on my phone -- it's working on my phone. We try YouTube TV, because on your phone YouTube doesn't see that as an external display. It's when you try to export out the HDMI port. So we're trying to figure this out. All of a sudden, one of their guys is like, "Peacock is back!" So it loads up and we're like, no one touch it. No one hit refresh. No one breathe on the keyboard. Everybody step back.

And it worked. We got through the horse race. Thank God. But at that point, it was almost funny -- NBC was going to crash at my event showing the Kentucky Derby.

Elise: I actually did not know this was happening. Being there, it didn't feel like something was going on.

Jeff: We weren't going to announce it. I know we had the race up for a second, and then we went to music and put some slides on, and then the race was back. So as far as the audience was concerned, everything was great. And the Rhythm FX team was awesome. I'm glad they care as much about this as I do.

Elise: That's how you know you have a good partner.

Jeff: So we got through that. The betting software worked. No crashes there. That was all perfect. We got up on stage and -- just logistically, we could not secure a live auctioneer. So that had to be yours truly and Mark.

Elise: I think you guys did a decent job.

Jeff: The lesson learned is we needed to get off the stage. Because we had pushed all the fire pits back, they were far away. My eyes don't work as good as they used to. I'm trying to see who's raising their paddle. But here's the biggest challenge -- besides my amazing auctioneer chant, which I thought was really cool --

Elise: It wasn't.

Jeff: One of the guys who manages the apartment building next door had given out these oriental hand fans as a promotion. So you look out in the crowd and you just see people waving fans. Are you bidding or cooling yourself off? I'm confused. And the bid cards were about the same size. Mark's like, "There's a bid over there." I'm like, is it? She just looks hot -- temperature hot. So we needed ring men and we needed to train them. We needed something where we could see -- a flashlight or something.

Elise: Couldn't we just grab the mics and go out into the audience?

Jeff: I asked. He said, "You can venture away from the stage within reason." And I asked what reason meant and he just winked at me. Maybe we should have gotten off the stage. We should have walked around. We should have had some ring men helping us. The mics were cutting out last year when the auctioneers were doing it. We would have had to test that. But that's something we need to do next year.

If I have to be an auctioneer again, I need to go to auctioneering school. But outside of that, the other struggle was -- I actually got reprimanded by one of our guests who kept outbidding herself on an item that I host. It's a dinner that my brother-in-law and I do for up to a party of eight at one of our houses. It's gourmet, wine-paired, five or six courses. We even did the little sorbet palate cleanser. We went all out. And it's hard to sit up there and be like, "Hey, we're actually really good at this. You guys should bid on our item because we're amazing chefs."

So she comes running across the field right up on the stage -- she's the winning bidder from last year -- and she's like, "You're not doing a good enough job selling this item. This is so good. You guys need to bid on this." I'm like, Michelle, aren't you also bidding on this? Like, don't you want me to do a bad job? She's like, "No, to raise money for your charity." That one was a little tougher because I'm not the type of person to brag about how good we are at this. So we probably need to change how we introduce some of the items.

For not being professionals -- this is not our profession -- I've just seen 6,000 auctions. But I think overall you did a decent job. If we bring back a classically trained auctioneer, it would be different, but we just couldn't find one. And we didn't really have items until the week before.

Elise: Mark put on his best radio voice and tried to read those descriptions.

Jeff: Especially when we got to Yacht Rock. That was great. He started singing.

Elise: I wanted to bid on Yacht Rock, and I'm not even going to be there.

Jeff: It was fun. We had a good time with it. We got through the live auction. We got through the presentation. I think next year we're going to shorten the presentation. There's some good feedback on it from our survey results.

Then on comes Mitch Rossell. He was great. He was on America's Got Talent. He also opened for Garth Brooks. He's written some songs for Garth Brooks. He was the headliner. Not only was he amazing, but he brought a fiddler with him. She was late because she was playing with Travis Tritt the night before. But she was fantastic. Between the two of them, it was unbelievable. This is top-quality music. KYGO is one of the sponsors. They were there. I think their team was impressed. Nathan Dean and the Damn Band are regulars at the Grizzly Rose. Grizzly Rose is a sponsor. They had a table there.

If you're a country music fan in Denver and you like Kentucky Derby, you should come to our event. It's an upgrade.

Elise: So I appreciate you saying it was an upgrade. As you can imagine, there's always something that goes sideways. We did a blog post on this once, maybe even a podcast -- when something goes wrong at your event, not if. You just need problem solvers around you. You can't, as the event host, solve every problem yourself. Some of them might fall on your lap, but there is no reason I needed to set up the photo booth on Saturday morning. That could have been done on Friday. Those are the things you go back and fix and adjust.

Jeff: Micro-adjust.

Elise: We send out a survey. We got some feedback that day. If someone's upset, I want to know right away. There's a survey card right on your table. Just scan the QR code and fire away. So what were some of the feedback results?

Jeff: So overall, on a scale of 1 to 10, we got a 9.2.

Elise: Whoa. That's good. If this was a pizza review, that would be tops.

Jeff: What's the best part about the event? The venue, the location. People love the venue. The overall environment. The silent auction. The music, the food, the hospitality, the Derby, the drinks, the community, gathering with friends, the weather, the atmosphere. Going on and on.

Okay, so what do you hope will change or improve for next year?

Elise: A better MC.

Jeff: Oh, I'm sorry. That's not on here. How about a larger auction? Have some more canopies set up to provide shade for families. Cocktail tables -- I wanted more places to stand and eat.

Elise: I agree. We need more umbrella tables. That's my feedback.

Jeff: "I would change nothing." I love this person. "Lower prices." No, it's a fundraiser. Sorry.

Some people nailed their feedback. I've got some people who have been coming to my event for so long I know who they are. More umbrellas. It was a little unclear how the betting worked -- maybe some additional clarity on that process. Chairs. The music was great but it was too loud.

"How about you show all the warm-up races so we can bet on those?" Do you all realize that the Derby itself is actually like the ninth race that day? We could show the other ones.

Elise: One other thought I had -- what if we made a little tutorial video on how to do everything? Then we could play that tutorial video on how to place your bets and do all that kind of stuff.

Jeff: Hey, do you know anybody that could do that?

Elise: I do know somebody who can make a tutorial video.

Jeff: "I have no thoughts on improvement. It was a very nice event." "Keep the race coverage on the entire time." I'd love it if NBC would cooperate with that. "I thought you did a great job. This is my first year." Maybe more options for shade. "Please move the betting tables." Yeah, we agree.

Did you enjoy the food? It was 100% yes. Good for Brandon. That team busted their butt to provide that food.

Elise: My only thing -- I'm not a fan of the cookie. My wife loved it though. But I wanted more than one cookie.

Jeff: Are you saying cookies with an S?

Elise: Yes, cookies. What do you want? I tried each one. Did you come to the after party?

Jeff: No, I didn't come to the after party.

Elise: Well, that's your problem. We had cake. It was Terry's birthday. We had birthday cake, and our caterer provides all the food for the after party, so we had an entire spread -- a second meal.

Jeff: I think I saw some stuff going by and was like, wait a second, where's that food going?

Feedback on catering -- the only thing people were a little mixed on was the hot brown, which I kind of agree is a little messy. But we had brisket, pulled pork, this mushroom tart which was fantastic.

Elise: The mushroom tart was delicious.

Jeff: The okra salad thing. I'm not a fan of okra.

Elise: You didn't eat it because you don't like okra.

Jeff: Guess what? 52% of the people loved the cookies. More than half. 78% were in the "liked" or "loved" range. 14% were meh.

Elise: So you were in the meh category. That's fine.

Jeff: Any other feedback? Great service, line was great, quick. Brisket was fantastic, pulled pork was a little dry, enjoyed the options. The band was incredible. So I'm sure the caterer wants to hear about that. The sliders were awesome. And these deviled eggs -- oh my gosh, the pancake one. They had a deviled egg that tasted like a pancake. It was unbelievable.

What did you think of the drinks? Rocker got a 4.9 out of 5. Who gave them that 0.1 negative? Somebody gave them a 3 and someone gave them a 4. Everybody else gave them a 5.

Elise: 100%. I'd give them a 5 too. And they're such cool dudes. Just sitting back there hanging out like they're part of the event.

Jeff: We keep breaking records. Every time I go over, I'm like, "Dustin, how's it going?" He's like, "This is a new Rocker Spirits record." It's not just a record for our event -- it's Rocker Spirits' any-event record. In drinks consumed.

Elise: And do they make a little bit of money there too? Selling bottles and stuff?

Jeff: He actually bought tickets for 20 people to come to our event. He's a great sponsor. They sell bottles, and they actually donate a percentage back.

This is where we added a new drink. People were like, "I'm kind of over the vodka and the bourbon." So we added a drink called She Ain't Cute, and it got an overwhelmingly positive response. It's a rum drink with some pineapple and jalapeno. It is really tasty, but it just looks kind of gross. That's why he called it She Ain't Cute -- it's good but not good-looking. If you get it in his restaurant, he rims it with something -- cinnamon sugar, I think. I guess we'd better go back for another tasting because I don't remember what he rimmed it with.

Elise: That's really good. Next team building.

Jeff: Breckenridge. People love the Breckenridge beer. Breckenridge has always been an amazing sponsor for us. They donate beer. We upgraded the wine this year. We brought in Piatelli wines. They were very generous. Piatelli is out of Argentina, and their wines are fantastic. We blew through rosé because it was so hot. That Piatelli Rosé of Malbec is just unbelievably good. Go find that in the store.

Elise: I think one hour into the event it was gone.

Jeff: We had backup wine. We always have backup booze. So we're not going to run out. Any other feedback? "Wonderful event, amazing cocktails, keep them coming. Love the old truck and service." Dustin lied to some people and said we ran out of cups, but there was a whole other box that we found. So we got all that fixed.

Were the activities engaging? Yes. Horse betting -- 75% participated in it and loved it.

Did you bid on either the silent or live auction? Yes, 80% bid in one of the two. That's great participation.

Elise: That is really good participation. That's really high.

Jeff: Silent auction items -- 42% said great. 60% said could be better.

Elise: I didn't bid on anything. I feel like the silent auction items could have been a little better.

Jeff: Well, let's get started on it earlier.

Elise: Sounds like he just volunteered to be on the auction committee. I think he did just volunteer.

Jeff: I got a good getaway to Grand Lake, which I think is going to be awesome.

Elise: You won that?

Jeff: Yeah.

Elise: Oh, that's good because the woman who donated it was like, "I hope it's not some creepy guy that won this."

Jeff: It's me and my family. No creeps allowed. She'll be excited to hear. The live auction -- 47% said great, 47% said could be better. We can upgrade all that stuff. We just need a little bit more time. Mobile bidding software -- 90% said it was great.

Elise: Good job, Handbid. Who are the other 10%?

Jeff: 5.6% said "could be better." I'm going to go look them up. I'm doubling their price next year on their ticket. Just kidding. I want to know what their feedback is.

What did you think of Nathan Dean? He got a 4.7 out of 5. Mitch Rossell got a 4.5 out of 5. What feedback or advice do you have on the entertainment?

Elise: Would you guys ever consider doing like, instead of two country bands, doing an 80s cover band and a country band as a headliner?

Jeff: Yeah, we thought about actually doing Yacht Rock. In the beginning, it's more background music. It's like, you can kind of watch, or it's great background. And then the headliner is country. It's a country event, right? The Kentucky Derby -- there's all that element to it. But it might be fun to have a little diverse music styles. We'd have to tell one of these guys they're not invited back.

Elise: It's not you, it's me.

Jeff: We could do that. How likely are you to attend future events? 92% said very likely or extremely likely to attend. That's good. That's the kind of stuff we want.

Any other feedback -- more people want more umbrellas on a sunny day. "I think working on even a little paid PR marketing would go a long way. I saw an article in 5280 about the best Derby events in Denver and yours wasn't listed."

Well, what is 5280 now? I don't disagree. We could definitely do some more of that. There's a balance too of making it an intimate fun event but not too crowded.

They're suggesting we do a Westword campaign. One year we did do a Westword campaign and advertised for the Derby and we lowered the ticket price and attracted a clientele that we just didn't want. They showed up, paid the entry fee, donated no extra money, spent no extra time in the silent auction or betting or anything -- they just drank a lot and we found some of them passed out in the bathroom. Like 10 or 15 people. That's not our jam. That's not Denver's Classiest Derby event.

So we raised the ticket price back up to where it is. It's not outrageous -- it's $175. And I actually think it should go up from there. That covers our ability to not only create Denver's Classiest Derby event but also give some money to this charity. We're not looking for people passed out in the bathroom. I want you to come and have a great time. I'm going to provide you high-end drinks and high-end food. I'm not going to put a limit on it, but I expect people to be responsible.

"Keep it up." "Maybe reduce the price." Nope. "Make a bigger push for the drawing so more people know about it. Maybe announcements about the prizes." "Great job, guys. Classy fun, great food." "Love the presentation. I learned more in that presentation than I had in the past three or four years of exposure to the Prader-Willi Syndrome Association." That's awesome. That video was great.

Elise: The video was amazing. That was the presentation.

Jeff: My mother-in-law actually commented on the video. She thinks we need to do a new one. And I would agree -- soup to nuts.

Elise: Well, we did it last minute. I think you produced this video for us on Thursday or Friday before the event. We had people come in the studio on Monday and Wednesday and do short recordings. So you talk about last minute. Thank you for whipping that out. It was awesome.

Jeff: But I think we're at a point now where it's like -- last year we had to make the decision, hey, we really do want to turn this into Denver's Classiest Derby event. So we built our website. We built our brand. We did all that over the fall. And now we have that. We have a website -- DerbyDenver.com. This was almost like our first year in some ways.

Elise: You spend the fall shifting the event -- not actually working on the event. You're shifting the branding, the direction of where you want to take it. You don't actually work on the event; you work on the brand of the event. And then some of these things came in last minute.

Jeff: Now we have no excuses. We're ready to roll in the fall. So we'll talk video. We'll talk PR, 5280 magazine. Auction items. Sponsorships. We're going to get on this way sooner. The folks at MOA appreciate that they're part of Denver's Classiest Derby event. It is the perfect venue for it.

Elise: Absolutely. And definitely some room for growth.

Jeff: Everybody who's doing events has to go through this in your head. Do I want a thousand people paying me a hundred bucks, or do I want a couple hundred people paying me a thousand? There's a big difference. And there's a big difference in the ambiance and the overall experience. We have clients who run events that have 1,500 to 2,000 people and they may raise half a million. And we have one particular client that has 500 people in the room and they raise $3 million.

Elise: A lot more room to walk around. There's no line for the bathrooms.

Jeff: Anyways, we'll do another recap and talk about all the major improvements we're going to make next year.

Elise: I love the applause at the end. This was fun.

Jeff: Yeah, it was good. It was long but fun. All right. Hopefully people got some good little nuggets out of this. I think the idea, to kind of close off what we were talking about, is what kind of event do you want to have? I think each person or each organization is going to have a different thought. I don't think that it has to be one way. Every event can do it differently.

Elise: And who do you want to reach and how do you want to reach them? Because if you're throwing a party and people see it as a party, they're not going to get as connected to your charity. That's my opinion, at least. But if you're throwing a party and people see it as a fundraiser because of the price point and because of how you structure it, then you might be able to start a relationship with somebody that could become a long-term donor of your organization.

Jeff: Very good. All right, let's wrap up this episode of Elevate Your Event.

Elise: Sounds good.

Jeff: Until next time, make sure you like and subscribe. Click that bell icon so you get notified every single time a new episode is released. And elevate your event. Happy fundraising.

Elise: Happy fundraising. All right. Bye.