Case Study: How Serpentine Galleries in London manages gallery capacity with zkipster

A trusted partner for the Serpentine Galleries events team.

The Serpentine Galleries events team relies on zkipster for their VIP and press management and uses its session management feature to manage capacity and keep their venue in line with social distancing and safety protocols.

Challenge: Make social distancing measures part of a positive and relaxed event experience

• Press and VIP customers of Serpentine Galleries in London are used to getting the white-glove treatment when a new show opens.
• For the opening of their highly anticipated Jennifer Packer show in December 2020, Serpentine needed to follow local restrictions and implement social distancing measures.
• The events team at Serpentine wanted to set up a special preview day for VIP and press and personalize their experience by dividing their attendance into 30 minute slots.
• To add value to their experience, the events team needed a seamless way to notify Serpentine’s key personnel upon the arrival of high profile guests so they get the attention they expect.

Solution: Capacity management controlled through zkipster

Event setup
For the special preview day, Serpentine Galleries creates a zkipster event starting at 10am to 4pm with 12 sessions of 30 minutes each.

Registration
When guests register, they have to pick an available slot and commit to the allotted time. Each 30 minute session offers spots for eight attendees. Once a session has no occupancy left, zkipster’s registration form automatically closes.

Check-in
At the event, Serpentine’s event team carefully monitors capacity of sessions. Key personnel gets notified via text at check-in of their VIP’s.

Post-event
A post-event report includes the number of total guests and whether they attended, if needed, all filtered and broken down per session.

"The Sessions feature allows us to give VIPs and press room to enjoy the show in their allotted time. Being able to control arrivals and capacity lets us design a better experience for our guests. It's a milestone for safety. Everybody in the gallery feels more safe and relaxed."

DUNCAN WELSH | HEAD OF EVENTS | SERPENTINE GALLERIES

Next steps for Serpentine Galleries

The Serpentine Galleries in London are planning to use zkipster’s Sessions tool for in-person events in the future. Not only does it address their capacity concerns, they also found that staggered events are brilliant for their leadership to spend more time with key customers. To identify them on site, Serpentine will implement zkipster’s Facesheet feature.