Switch from early bird pricing

I believe that part of the reason we didn't switch last year was neglect, but I think there is also a reluctance every year to raise the price if registrations are not coming in strong enough. We keep extending it, with the hopes of getting a registration boost.

I think that if we're going to have early bird pricing, we should communicate it clearly and stick to it. If there is an extension, it should be short. In a sense, we've trained users to expect an extension and to not take early bird pricing very seriously.

Personally, I'd vote for skipping early bird pricing altogether. Just pick a reasonable price like $65 or $75 for everyone. Early bird pricing makes sense to me for higher cost events where getting registrations really early is important. I'm not sure that we derive much benefit from early bird pricing.

But, I don't feel strongly about this.

I don't know if this is the best place to add on, but I had some thoughts on early bird pricing to share. I think we should explore having a true early-bird pricing that expires (for real) on a specific date, and make the pricing very different between early bird and "late" bird. For example, $50 early bird and $100 regular pricing. (with community sponsor always at $150).

Reasons for early bird
1. People don't register until the last minute, which is stressful for camp planners. Let's incentivize!
2. Raise a few more bucks for camp

But it hasn't worked in the past?
1. We are never clear (or firm) on when the pricing changes
2. We didn't have enough of a difference between early-bird and regular. Going from $50 to $100 is much more significant.
3. Talking with a Midcamp planner, they have a similar experience of late registrations and are looking for solutions. While they have one price now, they are considering implementing early bird pricing next year.

What if that's too expensive for someone?
1. Register early!
2. Ask us for discount, happy to give it on a needed basis

My suggestion (and open to yours)
1. $50 early bird starting now, $100 regular starting on May 1st.
2. $150 for individual/community sponsor, all the time

A few thoughts on early bird pricing.

I don't like using early bird pricing, unless we are really going to stick with it. I don't like advertising early bird pricing and then perpetually extending it or never implementing regular pricing. That just feels dishonest to me.

1) If we advertise early bird pricing and registrations are coming in slowly - are we/should we really risk doubling the price?
2) What problem and who does early bird registrations serve?

I understand the desire to encourage early registration. I also understand the stress of not having accurate head counts until the last minute. But, I would spend some time considering who is effected by early bird pricing?

Early bird pricing is a great way for those who have good cash flow, company support, and/or are fully committed to attending camp to save some money. It's not great for those who have cash flow issues, unable to commit to camp 30+ days in advance for personal or work related issues, or who are not that invested in Drupal and would rather wait and decide closer to the event.

I don't register in advance for Wordcamp, because it's not my priority and I don't want to commit myself to Wordcamp 30+ days in advance. I keep it on my schedule and might decide to attend in the final two weeks if I'm not overwhelmed at work and my weekend is free. But, if I come back to register in the last two weeks and see that price has doubled, it might just not be that important to me.

If camp is focused on those who are deeply committed and involved in Drupal already, the value proposition is good and the risks of early registration are low. If the purpose of camp is to bring in new voices and introduce new people to Drupal, these are the people who an early bird pricing scheme might discourage from attending.

What mission or value statement does Early Bird Pricing support?

In my view, Early Bird pricing contradicts the goals/values around reducing the barrier to entry and encouraging new people to attend camp.

Early Bird pricing does make camp planning more predictable and reduce stress on volunteers, which are also legitimate goals.

Personally, I'd vote against early bird pricing. I prefer picking a reasonable rate and sticking with it. I think we can find other ways to encourage early registration (free swag, stickers, free drink at reception, recognition, encouragement, etc).

I think of early bird pricing like this: (1) anyone who finds the normal price too high can register early for a discount (2) getting more early registrations helps us greatly with camp planning (3) anyone who doesn't register early pays the normal price -- not a penalty or unreasonable rate, just the normal rate of $100.

Early bird supports reducing barrier to entry by making a cheaper ticket available. All we ask in exchange is you register 31+ days before camp. Since we've been so lousy at implementing this in the past, we don't know if it will help or not. So let's try it out? If numbers go down, we try polling users to find out if that's the reason.

I'm more than happy to offer a heavy discount at any time to anyone with financial issues, and we can state that on our registration.

May 6th is fine, I agree with that Chris.

What problem does early birding pricing solve?

I don't see a compelling reason to justify it. What benefit does it provide?

I do see a potential for losing last minute registrations because of price.

The most important thing is to increase attendance, and this works against that.

Let's start some serious messaging and start asking for registrations and sessions instead!

I need to agree with Tim and Wilbur. I'm not sure what goals this serves. I've always had mixed feelings about early bird, and I've often been one of the few sweating the registration numbers on a daily basis as camp approached. I agree with Tim's sentiments about how this could negatively impact registration and broadening access. I don't see how doubling our ticket price is going to benefit the camp short of some small possible financial gain, but that could easily be negated if we get half the registrations due to the cost increase.

Asking people to ask us for help if they feel $100 is too much isn't a solution either. This approach was discussed a lot when DrupalCon raised their prices. People don't like asking for help, it's embarrassing. Giving them an opportunity to do it isn't enough. Our outreach goals in that regard need to be specifically targeted and not just a form to request a discount.

I'm pretty heavily against a $50 -> $100 jump personally. I don't see that being good for camp. We've already increased our base price from $35 to $50. Increasing it again to $100 in less than a month is probably not going to have the results we'd hope for.

From a planning perspective, I've started to accept that we will ultimately get around the same number of registrations. It's been easier to track our progress against previous years and see where we might land. If we want to boost registrations increasing the cost of camp from $35 to $100 (effectively) isn't going to do it. Outreach and marketing is what we need to be thinking of. Along those lines, we've had registration "open" for a week and have had minimal marketing go out. To date we've received 1 registration.

I'd like to see us put our efforts into things like revamping the product page as Dan outlined rather than debating this and trying to come up with a system for making the price transition.

Ok, since I'm the only one advocating for it, I will remove the early bird option, and keep it as $50 and $150.

I do want to add, to the comments "What goal/purpose does it serve"– again, the purpose of early bird pricing is to cut down on the huge huge numbers of people who register at the last minute. I don't think we've ever really tried it.

But let's call it and move on, that's fine.