How to assemble FE participants list

[Biggsfamily]

I am in charge of the Fish Extender group on my upcoming Spring Break cruise. Does anyone have an old copy of how facilitators arrange all that information. On a spreadsheet? Word doc? I don't feel like reinventing the wheel. I don't have any aspiration to build a better mousetrap. Just looking for a template. Also how do I communicate at port upgrades to everyone once we are on the ship?

 

[DynamicDisneyDuo]

PM me an email address and I can send you an excel spreadsheet that should help. As for updating folks, you really only have 2 options.
1. Have a meet for a short time onboard early on the first day where folks can come get or communicate any updates. That will require bringing enough copies of the list for everyone in your carryon. I have the DIS app on my phone so I can check for PMs here up to boarding so if anyone upgrades/etc.. I can work on updating the list prior to the meet.
2. Have any changes communicated to you at your stateroom (notes, phone msgs), make the changes on the list and schlep it to every participant yourself.

Option 1 is obviously the easiest choice for all involved.

 

[owensamo]

Even when I don't organize our FEs, I usually build a Google Spreadsheet with all the participants so I can plan my gifts early. It's actually very easy to put one together in Google - then you can share it out with the other participants (read-only if desired) so that everyone can see and update you as necessary! Since it's on Google, I can access it directly from my phone any time, so my master copy can be up to date.

One thing that we did on our EBTA in 2010 is one of the DISers that was close to mid-ship volunteered to have the DIS message board - she had a whiteboard outside her stateroom that anyone in the group could post updated stateroom numbers, etc. to. As long as the person who volunteers to host the board doesn't get moved, it's a good way to keep people updated!

Regardless of how well people plan, I think almost every cruise we end up with one or two staterooms we can't deliver to - I assume they moved and I never got the updated stateroom number, because the room number given didn't have an FE or any indication on the door that the correct person was in the room. We ususally walk almost *all* of the stateroom decks looking and will double-check if we see a FE outside an unexpected room, and often we'll never find the who we're looking for!

 

[tinkmom2]

I can send you an old one to show you what we did. I made the FE list and another Diser made out a map so we knew where we were going on the Dream. We broke the list in two and had two different exchanges of about 10 families each. Otherwise, you are walking all over the ship. We had our Dismeet right away on the first day so anyone that needed a copy of the list could get one. We had a cutoff date, probably about a month before, for people to sign up and updated that constantly on our Dismeet page on the DIS. We did have a few people try to sign up at the end but many of us all ready made handmade gifts and didn't have additional ones.

 

[Tabologist]

How far in advance did you start getting people interested? I'm going on one leaving July 4 th. And so far only my family and 1 other has commented on the post. I'm hoping to get more and unless someone else is dying to do out I will probably be the one to set It up. How many people would be minimum in your opinion to be worth organizing one?

 

[mrp4352]

Even when I don't organize our FEs, I usually build a Google Spreadsheet with all the participants so I can plan my gifts early. It's actually very easy to put one together in Google - then you can share it out with the other participants (read-only if desired) so that everyone can see and update you as necessary! Since it's on Google, I can access it directly from my phone any time, so my master copy can be up to date.

We've done this on some past cruises and it works really well. Especially once the special requests start coming in (ex. food allergies, ages/gender/names of kids). It can be password protected, so you're keeping everyone's information safe- they will only get the password from you. You can update the list with a new column when needed, then send out the message that everyone needs to update their own information. Also, as those with gty rooms get assigned, they can also update their info.

mp

 

[chateau]

Pay close attention to what FE participants put as their NAMES. We had a Facebook site, where we communicated. I use my middle name (on Facebook) as my last, for reasons suggested by my job, and all the personalized items were to the ".... Family" and we'll never use them. I had told the person making the list several times (with every "updated" list put out), put a message up on the private FB site (that all participants could see). Not all items were personalized, but those that spent the time and money making those that were, wasted 6 items on our family. A few items that had first names personalized MISSPELLED our kids names too. I'm grateful, but it's wasteful.

 

[ItAllStrtdWAMouse]

We created a spreadsheet that contained the following:

Cabin number

Dis Id

Primary contact (first name)
email

Deck
Section (aft/bow/midship, port/Starboard) based on Proximity to which elevator

total in cabin
Male adult 1
Male adult 2
Female adult 1
Female adult 2
Boys
Girls

Food Allergies (for any candy treats)
Special Celebration (if you wanted to share)
Alcohol (this was a confirmation you would except a gift with alcohol)

We had everyone PM the information to coordinator and a copy of the spreadsheet was emailed directly to the email provided. We did not ask for last names.

Updates were emailed up to the day before departure. After that those who would be upgrading at port either informed people at the meet and greet. Or left a business card announcing their cabin change on the first day.

We had a enough participants we ended up with two groups. Those who participated in both groups were at the bottom of the list for their group and highlighted in both lists. This was so they would know not to duplicate cabins amongst the dual participants.

 

[love280mickey]

Pay close attention to what FE participants put as their NAMES. We had a Facebook site, where we communicated. I use my middle name (on Facebook) as my last, for reasons suggested by my job, and all the personalized items were to the ".... Family" and we'll never use them. I had told the person making the list several times (with every "updated" list put out), put a message up on the private FB site (that all participants could see). Not all items were personalized, but those that spent the time and money making those that were, wasted 6 items on our family. A few items that had first names personalized MISSPELLED our kids names too. I'm grateful, but it's wasteful.

Agreed, something to be careful of. Some people like to personalize so the gifts don't grow legs and walk away with people they were not intended for.

 

[lodge]

I never thought of that reason to personalize... not a bad idea. Usually the personalized items are quite nice, it's sad to not use them.