It’s that merry time of the year again where year-end events are aplenty, be it Christmas parties or New Year’s Eve celebrations. The adage “the more the merrier” though is a constant headache for event organisers, for how are they supposed to locate a venue in such a short period of time—what more for a big group of guests?
Venue matchmaker portal aptly named Venueville may sound like any other Facebook game along the sorts of similar-sounding ones such as Cityville and Farmville. However, be rest assured that their trade is certainly no child’s play to them.
Having just graced Dublin at the prestigious WebSummit event, Venueville has earned their place for providing an avenue to look for places to host events, and vice versa, for event places to advertise their spot for absolutely free of charge on the Venueville site.
A Place For Everything
The startup which launched late last year lists a myriad of venues on their site, which ranges anything from fanciful places like yachts and wedding venues, to more laidback spots like cosy cafes or bars. Using the website, you can customise your preferred venue through a series of useful filters.
Venue types are segregated into categories and prices range anywhere between under RM1k to well over the RM10,000 mark, as it all depends on the duration of the rental and what type of venue is needed.
Moreover, depending on whether or not you opt for a smoking venue or availability of a projector/tv for instance, these options are customisable as well. Venue are aplenty on the site that lists over 800 locations, with plans to include more in the future.
Where, Oh Where?
The team behind Venueville founded the company due to a simple problem faced by many these days whereby they have an event to host but nowhere to host it at. It all started one day when the team wanted to do a sales team discussion for a full day in the golden triangle area of Kuala Lumpur, away from their office in Bukit Jalil.
“We wanted to find a small room/place that could accommodate the five of us with good environment for a closed discussion,” the team shared on their blog.
What they required for the day was a space with unlimited supply of papers and a white board so they could sketch their ideas and write out their plans. “Of course, it would be great if there was a free flow of coffee and tea to keep our focus and attention for the whole day. And not to forget, we did not have that big of a budget, so a 5-star hotel meeting room/space was definitely not part of the plan,” they said.
Boulder In Midst Of Plans
However, they were met by a problem, as they simply could not find a quick and easy way to locate and reserve their preferred venue, other than Googling for it. The search results they received were not particularly helpful as well.
In the end, they spent hours getting a few venues that did not exactly fulfill their requirements. Another conundrum was that the contact details, availability and pricing were not up-to-date either. Hence, a lightbulb went off, what better way to solve the problem than to create a startup for that?
“Now, if you have a space, a room or a venue that could accommodate us, wouldn’t you want it to be discovered immediately?” the team relayed. This proves a valid point because many event venues would love to have a space to advertise their locations, but they do not have a suitable portal to do so—and with Venueville, it is made possible.
An Avenue For Growth
Venueville is comprehensive with their services provided and it is a breeze to utilise the site. There are also so many options to look out for so I can search between various price points and locations. However, one thing the site could work on would be to do away with the signing up with Facebook in order to view the site.
Though many people are on Facebook these days, not everyone would like to disclose their personal details and users have also reached out to Venueville’s official page to voice their concerns. One user commented, “It’s irritating that we need to login to view your website.If we choose to be a member, then perhaps, we will need a login.”
Venueville’s swift response was to take the user’s concern into consideration as they replied with, “We’ll take that into our consideration on improving the whole site experience.”
Overall, the user experience is most certainly there, and each venue is provided with complete details. As such, it makes for a convenient and comprehensive place to look for a place (no pun intended). In the coming days, Venueville aims to list 2,000 venues on their site, and hopes to expand to Singapore as well.
To begin on your venue-booking experience, click here.
