4 Tips for Effective Corporate Event Budget Planning
Are you in charge of creating a budget for your workplace’s next major event? This responsibility, while challenging, is crucial for shaping every aspect of your event’s success. If you’re feeling overwhelmed, you’re not alone—even the most experienced finance professionals will spend quite a bit of time weighing questions about fund allocation, cost-cutting, and expense management.
Whether this is your first budget or your fifth or sixth one, here are several tips you can use to ensure event success.
1. Identify Fixed & Variable Costs
One of the easiest ways to organize event expenses is by breaking them into fixed and variable categories.
Just as an example, here are some of the most common event planning expenses separated into fixed and variable categories:
Fixed
- Venue (fee could include AV equipment, in-house catering, etc.)
- Streaming service (typically, non-negotiable)
- Event registration/ticketing platform
Variable
- Speaker and entertainment fees (may come at an hourly or fixed rate)
- AV equipment (sometimes rolled into the venue cost)
- Video production costs
- Catering
- Rentals
- Hotel fees
- Parking fees
- Transportation fees (this could include charter buses to shuttle attendees to predetermined locations or reimbursement travel costs for employees)
- Advertising or marketing fees (could include ads, content marketing, branded merchandise, and more.
- On-site labor
2. Don’t Forget These Expenses
Even with the best-laid plans, surprises are part of the event game. Although you already know to expect the unexpected with variable costs, there are a few expenses that are easy to forget about that should be factored into your budget. These include:
- Tips for service staff
- Meals for volunteers, vendors, or other workers who aren’t officially part of the attendee list
- Overtime charges if the event runs longer than scheduled
- Last-minute equipment rentals for extra AV equipment, microphones, projectors, and other tech
- Transportation surcharges
- Drayage and material handling (especially for tradeshows, conferences, or any event where oversized materials need to be shipped to the venue)
- Additional charges for last-minute printing of materials, agendas, or signage
- Weather-related costs, like tents, umbrellas, heaters, or cooling fans (only for outdoor events)
- Wi-Fi overages
- License and permit fees (not needed for every type of event)
- Event insurance
- Post-event cleaning (if not included in the main venue rental fee)
3. Get Creative With Revenue
Even if the event is not expected to be profitable, there are still some strategies you can use to generate revenue, including:
- Amp up ticket sales with tiered options, each with its own set of perks.
- Find sponsors for your event.
- Add raffles and auctions to your event.
- Sell company merchandise.
4. Partner With an Event Planner
Even if this isn’t the first time with event budgeting and expense management, working with a professional event planner can help you save time and overcome last-minute challenges. Event planners can help you find great deals or opportunities, negotiate with vendors, source budget-friendly venues that still align with event goals, and find other cost-saving strategies.
Get Help Planning Your Next Corporate Event
Sometimes, corporate event planning can be too much to handle on your own. If you need an extra hand, Special D Events is always here to help.
We specialize in coordinating conferences, business anniversaries, virtual gatherings, and other important corporate events. Our services include project management, speaker coordination, theme development, ROI tracking, budget management, and more. We tackle every occasion with a fresh, inventive approach and can work with all types of budgets.
Contact us today to get help planning your next corporate event!
