Organizing FE Groups Advice, size and participation

[Amunet]

FE groups are like ingredients in a recipe; it's always better to sprinkle little bits at a time and add more later, then to dump it all in at once.

 

[firepuppy]

I have been apart of FE for several of our cruises. Most of the time we have about 10 cabins in the group. I normally see one group with just adults for the ones that want it. If you are setting up the groups remember you will have some that will not get their cabin number until closer to the sailing. The way we have handled this is we leave the cabin number out and as they update you send out the updated list.

 

[fritz1215]

I am a DCL newcomer, but am organizing the FE for our cruise on the DIS Board. When dividing up the groups, do you find it best to do it by room numbers so people aren't traipsing all over the ship? Or does that not matter?

Also, I seen a Pixie Dust list being mentioned, what is that?

 

[PrincessShmoo]

I am a DCL newcomer, but am organizing the FE for our cruise on the DIS Board. When dividing up the groups, do you find it best to do it by room numbers so people aren't traipsing all over the ship? Or does that not matter?

Also, I seen a Pixie Dust list being mentioned, what is that?

You can divide up the rooms as you wish. I've seen people who prefer to have only rooms within close proximity of their rooms, and others like traversing the whole ship. Personally, I like visiting the various decks and seeing the doors/fe decorations.

Once the main FE list is closed (typically around 30-45 days out from the cruise) there will be people who join the cruise meet thread and want to participate. Often a "pixie dust" list is created. This list may (or may not) be used by others on the regular list to include in their already closed list. If the people joining the pixie dust list wish to give gifts to others on the regular list, they do so with the knowledge that they may, or may not, get gifts in return from those people.

Not all groups have a pixie dust list.

 

[Floridatinaherb]

Have you participated in any Dis ones very recently? I wouldn't mind a small group. By "pretty dead", I mean that only a few people have posted that they're on the cruise, then silence.

That's how the cruise meet thread for my cruise next year is...there is literally less than 10 people on it right now. I would think that things will get more active once the PIF date passes and we get closer to cruise date (I hope at least LOL)

 

[jlynch924]

I'm organizing the FE for our January Wonder cruise and I've definitely noticed over the past month (so, starting at 5 months out from cruise) that more people have signed up. I anticipate that we'll end up with 5 groups of 15 cabins (some people are in more than one group)... that's how it's looking right now and our cut off is in a little over a month.

 

[amwhitaker]

I've never had trouble joining a group on these boards. But joining a 200+ group is way beyond what I would join.

 

[PrincessShmoo]

I've never had trouble joining a group on these boards. But joining a 200+ group is way beyond what I would join.

Typically, when there is a large group, organizers will separate it out into smaller groups, with the option of being in more than one group (depending on how many rooms you want to participate with). Our WBTA cruise had something like 6 different groups of 20 rooms. Now, some rooms were on more than one list, while others just on one, and a few on all the lists.

Just depends on the what group as a whole decides.

 

[Doran bound]

Does anyone have information on how to use the ships deck plans with the cabin numbers as a map and to be able to include the family names on that sheet? My last FE group did that and helped a ton. Thanks for any ideas.