THE IMPACT OF COVID-19 ON EVENT MANAGEMENT INDUSTRY

Abstract

COVID-19 stands for Corona Virus Disease, which is an infectious disease that was detected in China in late 2019. This disease has become a pandemic, causing a threat to human life globally. The impact of COVID-19 is not only on humans health but is affecting economies at both national and global level. The $1000 billion Event management or event planning industry is one of the most affected industry of this pandemic globally as it is a business for people coming in huge numbers and celebrating an occasion. This study is about the impact of COVID-19 on Event businesses and how they are tackling in this situation.

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International Journal of Engineering Applied Sciences and Technology, 2020
Vol. 5, Issue 3, ISSN No. 2455-2143, Pages 533-535
Published Online July 2020 in IJEAST (http://www.ijeast.com)
533
THE IMPACT OF COVID-19 ON EVENT
MANAGEMENT INDUSTRY
Jaskaran Singh Madray
Department of Business Administration
Chandigarh University, Gharuan, Punjab, India
Abstract— COVID-19 stands for Corona Virus Disease,
which is an infectious disease that was detected in China in
late 2019. This disease has become a pandemic, causing a
threat to human life globally. The impact of COVID-19 is
not only on humans health but is affecting economies at
both national and global level. The $1000 billion Event
management or event planning industry is one of the most
affected industry of this pandemic globally as it is a business
for people coming in huge numbers and celebrating an
occasion. This study is about the impact of COVID-19 on
Event businesses and how they are tackling in this situation.
Keywords— COVID-19, Pandemic, Events, Economy,
Impact
I. INTRODUCTION
Coronavirus is a large family of virus that infects animals or
humans and COVID-19 is an infectious disease caused by a
newly discovered coronavirus which was detected in Wuhan,
China in December 2019. This disease has now outbreak into a
pandemic affecting humans life globally. It is spread normally
through small droplets from the nose or mouth, which are
expelled when a person with COVID-19 coughs, sneezes, or
speaks. This is the reason the precautionary measure till its
proper medicine is discovered, are social distancing, staying
atleast 1 meter away from others, isolation of sick people
(especially respiratory illness), wear a mask and wash hands
regularly in a day.
Event management is defined as a well-planned and organised
occasion with the view of meeting or achieving specific
objectives for the benefit of person, group of people or an
organization. The professionals in this business are known as
Event planners. An event can be a Celebration (festivals,
weddings, birthdays, and anniversaries), Education
(conferences, graduations), Promotions (product launches,
fashion shows, and conventions) or Commemorations
(memorials, civic events).
COVID-19 has irrupted the global markets and various
industries drastically, though innovative minds and leaders of
respective fields are struggling and bringing new ways to
survive in this condition. But, still the Tourism and hospitality
industries are still suffering the most. The threat of disease has
homed in the minds of the people and the policies of travel,
entertain and organise events by certain countries are leading a
major setback and an edge to recession for such and interlinked
industries.
In the recent studies around the globe, it has reported that
maximum loss of about more than $666 million till April is
noted in event industry, due to cancellation of events worldwide
and have 85.9 million jobs at stake. The businesses are suffering
for huge capital shortage to sustain in long run though use of
technology and measures like live chat, webinars, online
discussion shows, podcasts etc. are being used by companies to
continue their services but they cannot replace the revenue from
big fat events or events at large scale in terms of money and
people inducement. The daily wage workers associated with the
industry, the small and medium event companies who do not
have the platform or the target customers to provide such
services are suffering more harshness of this pandemic.
II. LITERATURE REVIEW
1. Sergio Correia, Stephan Luck, and Emil Verner (2020),
Pandemics Depress the Economy, Public Health
Interventions Do Not: Evidence from the 1918 Flu
This study is to depict the effects of COVID-19 pandemic
on global economy through Non- Pharmaceutical
Interventions (NPIs) by referring to 1918 Influenza
pandemic. NPIs include social distancing, isolation and
shutdowns of public indulging platforms to reduce or
control the spread of infection. The analysis in the study
shows that the effect on economy depends on the severity of
pandemic and how aggressively and earlier the actions are
taken by government against disease. If it is tackled at
primary levels rapidly than post pandemic time can cause a
relative growth in the economy but more the delay in
tackling, the more worse it will affect the mortality rate and
the economy simultaneously. It can cause a relative decline
in manufacturing employment, manufacturing output, bank
assets, and consumer durables.
2. W.Qiu; S. Rutherford; A. Mao; C. Chu (2017), The
Pandemic and its Impacts
The study explains about the concept of pandemic i.e.,
widespread of a contiguous epidemic disease effecting a
whole country or one or more continents at a same time.

International Journal of Engineering Applied Sciences and Technology, 2020
Vol. 5, Issue 3, ISSN No. 2455-2143, Pages 533-535
Published Online July 2020 in IJEAST (http://www.ijeast.com)
534
Furthermore, impacting health, economy, social and
security at different levels. The impact of a pandemic leads
to huge economic loss and instability of economy through
direct costs, long term burden,
and indirect costs.
The direct costs of a pandemic is huge as to tackle and
control it requires high costs in conditions of awareness and
treatments. The long term burden is inevitable and severe as
the burden of loss of earnings from people who died are in
huge numbers and the indirect costs include everything that
contributes to a decline in GDP are also heavy.
The social impacts are also very clear as movement of
people are restricted and with rime grew the fear to travel
and indulge in any sort of public affairs or people
gatherings, affecting the social life of the society as whole.
3. Made Gede Yudiyana, Andrew Sumichan, Ni Wayan Sri
Ariyani (2018) Management Information System of Event
organizer
The study represents the assistance of management
information system in event activities in terms of providing
ticket sales, booths, accommodation and activities which are
outside of events such as tours for guests. This is to highlight
the importance of technology helping in the event industry
to work more efficiently and easy for organizers or planners
to handle other such business domains of the event
management. The upgrading technologies are opening
gateways for better performance, providing information,
economic benefits through cutting additional costs of labor
and time, better efficiency and service to the customers
alongwith maintaining control of data regarding the event
and guests digitally which are much better than manual
keeping.
4. Joe J Goldblatt, Seung-won Lee (2012) The current and
future impacts of the 2007-2009 economic recession on the
festival and event industry
This study is to show the impacts on business performance
of festival and event industry in the period of global
economic recession from 2007 to 2009. It depicts that
during economic crisis in the world, the event industry is
also affected dramatically and it takes solid strategies to
overcome after recession. During this period, the industry
had suffered decrease in profit margins caused by decrease
in sponsorship, high cost of products and services and
recession on all sources of revenue. The strategies that lead
to survival and a conservative growth pace after recession
were to increase marketing efforts, control overall expenses
and the use of technology in different ways to get
sponsorships and target customers accordingly.
III. RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
The nature of study is descriptive. The source of data is
secondary. The data is collected and interpreted from various
academic journals, research publications, news releases and
websites.
IV. DATA INTERPRETATION
1. Report of Events and Entertainment Management
Association (EEMA)
EEMA has conducted a survey of their members with 170
companies which are affected by COVID-19. These 170
companies represents over a 1,00,000 companies that are
struggling in this pandemic.
The report depicts a huge loss of business, employers livelihood
at stake, revenue being affected globally and requirement of
funds to attain stability in long run. The major statistics found
in the study were:
 90% of the business being cancelled of around 52.91%
of companies between March-July 2020
 Around 7 companies envisage a 50%-80%
retrenchment of their current workforce and 35
between 25%-50%
 63.1% companies i.e. around 107 companies suffered
from a revenue loss of up to 1 crore each.
 Around 97 companies will need to raise capital or debt
from institutions or shareholders, VC funding etc., to
survive.
 The ideal working capital/ loan expected to keep afloat
for the next 6 months is around 2-5 CR for 39
companies and 1-2 CR for 118 companies.
This shows that the business in various sectors has seen a huge
downfall due to this economic disruption. The major cause of
this rising difficulties for the industry is either the increasing
cancellation of events of 2020 or the postpone of these to 2021
worldwide. Furthermore, the daily wages workers, small and
medium associates businesses are also facing brutal economic
conditions leading for sudden support else there will be an
increase in unemployment ratios.
2. Report of Professional Convention Management
Association (PCMA)
The survey of more than thousand Event professionals were
done by PCMA to know the impact of COVID-19 on their
businesses. The outcome of the survey were:
• High Rate of Cancelled/ Postponed events-
The survey highlighted that 88 percent of respondents marked
the cancellation of events they have been booked for and 66
percent have postponed their events to organise after COVID-
19 affecting the business and dependant sectors drastically.

International Journal of Engineering Applied Sciences and Technology, 2020
Vol. 5, Issue 3, ISSN No. 2455-2143, Pages 533-535
Published Online July 2020 in IJEAST (http://www.ijeast.com)
535
• Using Time productively-
63 percent of respondents claim that they are using this free
time to upgrade their skills and majorly focusing on virtual
technology and online platforms for organising events . To
learn the benefits and software required for online events and
use them to overcome operational costs and meet day to day
expenditures.
• Virtual Events-
The future of events using technology or the survival means for
event industry in this pandemic are virtual events. 7 out of 10
respondents or the businesses having facilities to upgrade
certain events for their customers online are using virtual
medium in this pandemic. The reason is because of the losses
they are inculcating and no certain get away from COVID-19
encouraged virtual events. Due to this, there is a certain increase
in webinars, online discussions and live chats to keep the
industry active.
3. Other impacts on Event industry:
a. Increased Personalisation-
The positive outcome for online live events are the increase in
the sense of personalisation and ease of accessibility to the
customers. In conventional events, there are lot of people and
large area during performances which effects the experience of
customers as they get disconnected or due to overcrowding.
But, the events in this COVID-19 has overcome this hurdle
through the opportunity of enjoying the event while staying at
own premise.
b. Global presence-
Another impact is the reformation of global village or getting
close to each other by removing border barriers through this
virtual growth. Though, people are waiting to pass this time
rapidly but the events and festivals in this online manner has
grown new opportunities for businesses around the globe and
gave a sense of togetherness in this harsh times.
c. Modern Advertising Techniques-
The impact of COVID-19 on advertising techniques are well
seen as in this condition when people are confined to stay at
their homes the usage of social media platforms have increased
and methods have grown more consumer- centric, dynamic and
engaging. This lead to organisation to promote more on these
platforms and strengthen their services by claiming to take
proper care and sanitization measures. Event companies are
also promoting their webinars , live events and chats through
providing free masks, webinar certificates, engaging audiences
through their COVID-19 measures and increasing their web
traffics and participation.
d. Low costs-
This is both positive and negative for the industry as the virtual
events costs very less than conventional events which means
low revenue also to the company due to the low charges. The
usage of these forums affects the sectors and workers who are
solely dependent on traditional manner of events leading to
their unemployment.
V. CONCLUSION
The study shows different impacts of COVID-19 on Event
management industry. The major effect of this pandemic is the
severe loss in the industry due to huge cancellations and
postponements. The pace of industry is very slow and surviving
with the help of virtual events. The revenue and the workers are
drastically impacted and require funds to survive and sustain at
longer run. The innovative leaders of event industry are
working on different strategies like use of virtual technology to
connect people and make them participate through organizing
webinars, live chats & discussions, live artist performances and
podcasts. They are promoting these through different unique
marketing strategies on social media platforms majorly.
Therefore, the impact of COVID-19 on event management
industry is severe and require support of governments and
sponsors but they are still active and trying to survive through
the means of virtual events.
VI. REFERENCE
[1] Joe J Goldblatt, Seung-won Lee (2012) The current and
future impacts of the 2007-2009 economic recession on the
festival and event industry,
https://doi.org/10.1108/17582951211229690
[2] Made Gede Yudiyana, Andrew Sumichan, Ni Wayan Sri
Ariyani (2018) Management Information System of Event
organizer, https://doi.org/10.24843/ijeet.2018.v03.i02.p19
[3] Sergio Correia, Stephan Luck, and Emil Verner (2020),
Pandemics Depress the Economy, Public Health
Interventions Do Not: Evidence from the 1918 Flu,
https://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3561560
[4] W.Qiu; S. Rutherford; A. Mao; C. Chu (2017), The
Pandemic and its Impacts,
https://doi.org/10.5195/hcs.2017.221
[5] https://brandequity.economictimes.indiatimes.com/amp/n
ews/media/eema-examines-the-impact-of-covid-19-on-
event-and-entertainment-industry/75268619
[6] https://www.pcma.org/covid-19-impact-events-industry-
planners-survey-results/
[7] https://www.financialexpress.com/brandwagon/writers-
alley/how-event-industry-is-adapting-to-the-covid-19-
period/1961184/lite/
[8] https://www.who.int/emergencies/diseases/novel-
coronavirus-2019/question-and-answers-hub/q-a-detail/q-
a-coronaviruses
[9] https://www.who.int/health-topics/coronavirus#tab=tab_1