Film Fest survey measures economic impact

Estimating attendance at a festival is no simple task. People go back and forth between events, which makes the job of the head counter nearly impossible. It’s also tough to figure out how many ticket buyers came from outside the city, stayed overnight and spent money in shops and restaurants.
The True/False Film Fest and the Columbia Convention & Visitor’s Bureau asked MU researchers to conduct a survey to get a better understanding of the event’s economic impact on the city.
They surveyed 771 attendees during the weekend of the film festival, March 3-7.
The results of a preliminary data analysis indicate that nearly 6,000 people came to Columbia from outside Boone County, spent an average of three or four days in town and spent about $200 per person during the course of the weekend.
Overall, the 2011 True/False Film Fest had an estimated economic impact of slightly more than $1 million, according to the results of the study conducted by Dae-Young Kim and his research team.
The True/False Film Fest unspooled more than 60 films, organized more than 15 parties and mixers and hosted more than 50 guests who flew in from various foreign countries.
T/F received money from the CVB’s festival event fund program and is therefore required to conduct an economic impact survey. The survey was designed to find out how many people an event is bringing in from out of town, how much they’re spending, where they’re staying and how they’re enjoying the event.
The most important factor for the Visitors’ Bureau is the number of overnight stays, CVB Marketing Director Beth Mead said.
The CVB itself receives no city funding. Instead, its funds come from the Occupancy Tax, a 4 percent tax on each hotel room purchase.
An event organizer can choose to supplement the CVB’s standard survey with more questions and in that case must cover the cost increase. T/F organizer Jeremy Brown chose to add more items to the 2011 survey.
“Originally, the CVB was only going to survey people from outside of Boone County,” Brown said. “We paid more for the survey organizers to include people from within Boone County as well in order to gather a broader range of information about Boone County residents attending our festival.”
The survey found that 93 percent of the visitors were either very satisfied or extremely satisfied with the festival and 91 percent were very likely to return to the annual event.
The survey was conducted in all festival venues, including the Missouri Theatre, Ragtag Cinema and The Blue Note. The survey sample was randomly selected. The margin of error is plus or minus 5 percent.
Elliot Reed is the media liaison for the True/False Film Fest.
T/F Survey Estimates
Attendees: 12,000
From outside Boone County:
5,784, or 48.2 percent Economic impact: $1 million
T/F Survey Averages
People in a trip party: 2.64
Spending by a trip: $517