Charene Henderson advertised the 2010 Fall Holistic & Enlightenment Faire located in Ann Arbor Michigan in October. Charene hosted this event through her business, Rescue Rangers OPES based out of Southfield Michigan. Charene advertised to potential vendors that there would be 97 vendors and 1500 projected attendees. She charged premium prices to participate in the 3 day event. Charene did not adequately advertise this event and it became apparent that she had no experience running an event like this or advertising effectively for an event of this projected size. The Charene had advertised minimally and the result was less than 50 people attending and under 20 vendors. This was a huge waste of time for all involved and many vendors traveled from out of state to pay for an opportunity to expose their services or products to the Ann Arbor area. Charene continued to make claims that she did all that she could and that she "did what she was supposed to do" when confronted with the subpar service she provided as event coordinator. It was evident by the turn out there was nowhere near the amount of advertising needed for an event like this to make the vendor fee reasonable. Vendors had not seen any advertisements on TV, radio, or local news papers. There was no visible signage anywhere near the event location other than a couple small yard signs within 1 block of the location. There was not adequate parking for an event of this projected size. There were so many things wrong with this situation it is impossible to even explain. Charene Henderson chose to spend her time on ineffective forms of advertising like having 1 minute commercials of each vendor playing inside the venue, 3 people set up to check in attendees when there was no one to check in, lectures scheduled with no attendees, and misspelled programs. She charged for prime location vendor spots when there is no such thing as a prime location when only 50 people attend and there are only 20 vendors spread out over 3 rooms. Never rent a booth from this woman if she is running an expo of any kind. She does not have the level of experience nor professionalism necessary for this type of event. She did not even apologize to the vendors, offer refunds, or explain this was the first time she organized this event. She told varying stories to various vendors defending her position. This was a tremendous waste of time and money for vendors and attendees.
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