Inside NGLA's 25th Anniversary: A Case Study in Event Production

A Partnership in Event Planning

Challenges To Overcome

Solutions By a Solution Driven Team

Results Through Care

Interview Transcript

Jimmy (NEC):

 Can you please introduce yourself and tell us about your organization?

Nicole (NGLA):

Absolutely happy to introduce myself. So my name is Nicole Buckley. I am the assistant conference chair and rising conference chair of the Northeast Greek Leadership Association. I've been volunteering for about eight years now.

Jimmy (NEC):

Beautiful. Next thing is tell us about NGLA's latest conference in Baltimore this year.

Nicole (NGLA):

Yes. NGLA's latest conference in Baltimore, Maryland was our 2025, 25th anniversary of the event. We were really excited to head back to Baltimore, beautiful location right on the water. We hit just about 700 people at the event. We had a good amount of NGLA alumni coming, some brand new schools joining the event. And overall it was a really great success, a three-day event from Thursday to Saturday that we started very early in the morning. We went to some late night entertainment and we wrapped up on Saturday evening.

Jimmy (NEC):

How did you originally hear about National Event Connection?

Nicole (NGLA):

I originally heard about NEC, National Event Connection, when I was working at Long Island University at Brooklyn, working with the branch Enjoyable Entertainment. So I was there for about a year. We did a lot of fun events like Casino Night, a welcome carnival, our organization fair. So when I started doing more serious work with NGLA, I was like, I know who would be really fun because we wanted to bring a carnival. I work with this team, enjoyable entertainment. And I think I just filled out the info form online and was like immediately onboarded and had a call with Will and Dylan right away. They're like, okay, so the branch is called NEC, you worked with a small branch of us, but let's figure out how to get everyone all connected.

Jimmy (NEC):

What type of challenges were you facing before working with NAC?

Nicole (NGLA):

Before working with NEC, we were mostly at the A/V Mercy of the on-site venue. And from my personal opinion, I didn't think we had a lot of room for creativity. It was very easy working with the hotel, but I didn't think it was like as fun as it could be and harder to bring things in and see a vision come to life. And also I have 10,000 other things going on with the event. I do the sponsorship, the marketing, I have a whole team. So figuring out like, lights, the sound, the carnival all at once. We were really looking for a partner to do some of the creative work with us because that's just not where my brain can be throughout the year. I'd love to do all the creative work. So now working with NEC, we have more room for fun and creativity and flexibility.

Nicole (NGLA):

Yeah, that's okay, for sure. So we decided to work with NEC over other options, mostly because of the work that we saw and the wide breadth of things that could NEC could provide, ranging from the carnival to A/V, different marketing, and then printing was a big thing. So we're trying to get our brand to be more recognizable. So we've increased our merchandise and things like that to help get our name out there. And it was great to see that you could customize things like the Carnival with our brand and NEC's to kind of show the collaboration there.

As well as we were looking for people that can kind of go on this road show with us and NEC's ability to travel to our three conference locations made it very easy to be like, okay, we want this team long term because we could go by all over the world, all over the world in the northeast with the team.

Jimmy (NEC):

Nice, very cool. Can you describe the process of working with NEC leading up to the event?

Nicole (NGLA):

Yes, so working with NEC leading up to the event, we start with initial calls, at least from the sponsorship side, to see what they did the year before and what we want to do for the upcoming year. So for example, at our 2024 event, we had a closing carnival, which was a lot of fun, looked great, but we didn't get a lot of people because people are going home. So collaboratively, we decided as two teams to move it to a welcome carnival on Thursday. We knew everybody was going to be there.

We discussed the games that were working extremely well and ones that we maybe wanted to adjust. Then on the AV side, a very similar of like what went really well. And I'm not on the tech teams. I don't have all the answers. But the things that went extremely well and then areas that we could increase creativity. So for example, going from 2024 to 25, we lowered the amount of education block rooms. So that was less of the AV and microphone and all of that in in projectors in each room, which gave us more flexibility in other spaces, like working with a similar package with NEC to have more fun things like uplighting and better light and sound in a performance stage, all of that.

Jimmy (NEC):

And how did our team address your challenges?

Nicole (NGLA):

NEC addressed our challenges by meeting with us one-on-one, which I find extremely helpful. I personally, I'd rather like meet with someone in a Zoom capacity than like over the phone or over email. So some of the challenges this year were working with a space that recently did some construction that we weren't as familiar with. So it was extremely helpful to have the NEC team on site with us for our original walkthrough so we could all identify things as a team that maybe we wanna move this event, this space, because the lighting works better, the sound works better in this space.

One of the challenges that we had this year was wanting to make sure that everyone came into the carnival seamlessly. So we wanted to use the entire space and use pipe and drape to allow people to move from one space to another, not having them go in a hallway. That way we would capture everyone and be like, you could just get up and go. And it was very dramatic, which I love the drama and so does NEC. So we had really great lighting from the team, do a little drum roll to have everyone go in there. So it was fun to have members of the NEC team also opening up the pipe and drape as well as my student staff who were like so excited to be part of a big event. So it was cool to see one of those things that definitely increased the engagement and the attendance at the event this year.

Jimmy (NEC):

Lovely. Now we talked a lot about challenges, so let's switch over and talk about results. So can you share any specific results that you may have achieved through working with NEC?

Nicole (NGLA):

Let me think. There are so many, so I'm trying to figure out the best way to frame them.

Jimmy (NEC):

Sure, and you can also think about it in relation to the response that you've gotten from the attendees.

Nicole (NGLA):

The response we got from the attendees and overall for our own personal marketing, because we take, have over 2,000 photos from this year's event that I think the printing made a huge difference. So between the posters that we work on, the designs internally, and then we work with Dan and company to get everything printed and on site. We also got a brand new step and repeat this year, which like doesn't sound like a big thing, but it was much bigger than what we used to have because everyone's like heads were being chopped off in photos and we were seeing like ballroom walls, which are never very cute and aesthetic for photos. So it was really nice to have something that made very accessible for large groups and inclusive of everyone so they can all fit in the photo and people weren't all crammed in.

In addition, we really loved last year having the ability to have like a pop cam-esque thing in front of the step and repeat for people that are coming as solos, coming on their own, don't have a friend to take a photo for them. So having NEC move the photo pop up from the carnival the first night and have it stationed near their booth. So if there was anything going on and near registration, if anything was going on that people could take their own photos, it definitely yielded a lot more marketing for both teams.

Jimmy (NEC):

Gotcha. And again, this might be a repeat so you can pass on this. But tell us about something we were involved in, NEC, that stood out in a big way. So maybe a big win. And it sounds like what you just said was kind of that. So if that was it, then we can move on.

Nicole (NGLA):

Yeah. No, I'd say another, a big win this year and which gets better and better every year; So it started last year and it continued this year was the lighting for the keynote speakers on stage. So ballrooms are notorious for having horrible lighting and we have people of different abilities, different colors, different heights. And we want to make sure that everybody who's coming on stage is photographed well, that the attendees can see them well, regardless of height, color, shape, how fast they're moving around the stage. So a big win this year and last year with NEC doing the lighting is our speakers were well lit on stage. You can see them from the back of room to the front of the room. So it came out really great for everyone because that is a concern we get from speakers every year, especially dark skinned speakers, they're like "Are people gonna are be able to see me?" Yes, they can see you for sure. We can see you from every angle. So huge win for everybody.

Jimmy (NEC):

Beautiful. All right, so I might want to speak. right, all right, here we go.

Nicole (NGLA):

You gotta apply, Jimmy. Come on, jump in.

Jimmy (NEC):

Okay! Were there any unexpected benefits that you gained from working with our team?

Nicole (NGLA):

A thought partner. So an unexpected benefit that we got from working with NEC; We're usually the ones that have to come up with like the creative on our own and we kind of just execute. So it was cool to have a team that worked with us from beginning to start on like where the games would go, what the layout would look like, what everyone's activities would be, changing things last minute. Hey, Will got this new game at a big convention. We think it's going to be a good hit. Let's try it at the event. So it's fun to have someone to collaborate with and like bounce off of like
"Hey, we have this crazy idea. What do you guys think?" And NEC is usually like, yes, crazy idea, let's do it. So it's been a lot of fun having a team to collaborate with. And it feels like a very fun equal partnership where we're all able to do exciting things and bounce off of each other's energy. And it's not just my team who's impacted by that. It's the education team. they're working on things with soundcheck for our big speakers and our big grand ballroom. It's our tech team who always wants to have fun things like uplighting and great sound throughout the event and the LED walls that now are able to flex a little bit of creativity and level up the event through being able to have a thought partner in any scene.

Dylan (NEC):

I know you guys were big fans of the snow falling on the Baltimore logo.

Nicole (NGLA):

Absolutely, absolutely. So just like little things like that, like even things get changed last minute. Like I'm very, I'm type A leading up to the event, but once they're there, there's not much more that you could do. So just being like, for sure, change the logo. I don't care. Do what you guys need. Put some lights up. Like let's just have fun. So it makes it very casual and relaxed in a very high stress environment when you have a reliable partner that you can be like, all right, I'll just talk to them and we'll figure it out. And they can talk to us and we'll figure it out and it'll be great regardless.

Jimmy (NEC):

Nice, nice. How has working with us impacted your overall event success and strategy?

Nicole (NGLA):

Working with NEC has impacted our event success tremendously because the same like reliability that I keep going back to, it's very important for us. We are all type A, very stressed. We want everything to go perfectly and we know when NEC is on the floor, they have the same mindset that they want everything to go very well for us, with us, for them, for us. So we know no matter what they're doing, it's going to be done well. So I don't have to stress and be like, "What are they doing? Why are they doing that?" I know it's going well, so I'm less stressed about the things that they're doing and I can focus in other areas.

Jimmy (NEC):

Would you recommend NEC's services to others and if so, what would you say?

Nicole (NGLA):

I would absolutely recommend NEC's services to others and we did on site and I'm already seeing really fun site visits that the team is getting. Overall, it's important to work with someone that's going to be as high energy as higher education professionals are, especially student life. So I do share all the time that NEC is going to have fun with your team. They're going to come on site. They're not going to stress you out. They're going to add to the enjoyment of your event as well as being extremely organized.

So sometimes working in higher education, there's a lot of red tape. So working with a partner that's flexible, writes things down, very communicative, is always thinking months ahead is important. And that's what we have with NEC is that they're very detail oriented. They're always planning ahead with us. So it does make it easy working in an environment where it might not be the easiest to have them partner with us there.

Jimmy (NEC):

And final question is, is there anything else you would like to add about your experience that I may not have asked you?

Nicole (NGLA):

Ooh, I said this last year, NEC, we are big groupies. NGLA is a huge fan. We say it all the time, we'd follow NEC on tour just because of how well the teams work together. And we always have members of our team floating in and out, but we have a lot of us who are remaining consistent over the next few years. So it's nice to have the camp friends in NEC. You see them, you know them, because we do every single event together. You've worked with the same people leading up to the event as the ones that are on site. So that consistency is extremely important when getting on site. So overall we're big fans. We're going to keep, being NEC fans. So excited for 2026 in Pittsburgh. It's going be great.

Conclusion & Gratitude