Do you love Bournemouth? Are you keen to showcase the best that Wheels Festival has to offer? Do you have great customer service skills? Or perhaps you were a ‘Games Maker’ during the London 2012 Olympic Games? If so, your town needs you…
For the second year running, Bournemouth Tourism has teamed up with Bournemouth University to run the ‘Festival Makers’ scheme, where local people and the university’s Event Management students are invited to experience the town’s fantastic festivals in a unique way: by becoming volunteer information stewards at the events. This year, the scheme aims to recruit and train 70 Festival Makers!
The initiative was launched last year, and proved to be a highly successful way of utilising the knowledge of Bournemouth residents with the expertise of events-specialist undergraduates. Feedback from the 2014 event showed that the volunteers provided second-to-none information and did so with a friendly and approachable manner.
Jon Weaver, Bournemouth Tourism Marketing and Events Manager, said: “This is a brilliant opportunity for local people who are passionate about their town to not only enjoy the major events which take place but also to feel proud to be part of them. It will not only be an amazing experience but people will also have a good story to tell about how they were involved. The festival makers recruited last year, for both Wheels and Bournemouth Air Festival, were a huge asset to the events. The feedback from those who attended was very positive and the festival makers were an integral factor”.
Festival Makers will be lead by Bournemouth University’s Festival Maker Coordinator, who will be recruiting for Team Leaders as well as general Festival Makers. Volunteers will receive full training including specific festival information about security and public safety, information on Bournemouth as a holiday resort and customer service training provided by the National Coastal Tourism Academy.
Debbie Sadd, Bournemouth University’s Festival Maker Coordinator, said: “To become a Festival Maker is a great and invaluable experience for our Event Management students who will be able to see what they’ve learnt in practice by being part of a major festival attracting around 500,000 visitors to the town. Anyone aged 18 or over can apply; we only ask that people are enthusiastic about Bournemouth and are willing to go that extra mile to help deliver a superb event for local people and visitors.”
Anyone interested in being part of this fantastic ‘Festival Makers’ scheme should visit bournemouth.co.uk/festivalmakers or send their expression of interest to [email protected] by Friday 1st May. Interviews will then take place between 7th – 9th May
