To Naughty or not...

Written by: Bob Hannaford, Founder & CEO

Warning: This blog is long, rambling, can be sad at points and goes into a rant. If you read it till the end, I want to thank you for listening. 

If I’m anything, I’m pretty open and honest. I live my life on my sleeve for the whole world to see. I’ve asked questions and challenged leaders when it wasn’t popular to do so. We have taken progressive stands on condoms, STD’s, consent, BDSM and bisexuality and there is a new topic that is now the uncomfortable elephant in the room… COVID-19 & swinging. 

Ok, that’s two things, but you know what I mean.

How could we possibly be naughty in a COVID-19 world?

When COVID-19 first came out, no one knew what to do. No one could have predicted this unprecedented, pandemic. The shutdowns, the all-clear, the spikes and now we are heading towards more shutdowns.

In the early days and weeks, I met with several lifestyle leaders virtually, through video conferencing. It was an effort to brainstorm how, as an industry, we could possibly handle this situation. We didn’t all agree. Some clubs are still shut down, some are open with little to no restrictions or protocols and many are somewhere in between.

We talked about sanitization procedures, shared links to chemicals that were well researched, we talked about liability, hygiene standards, but most of all, we talked about the safety of our members.

I created a document and shared it with the group and we all shared ideas and solutions. In many cases, it was just opinions that changed over time, but what we were really doing was trying to figure out how to navigate within this industry in challenging times.

Following these brainstorming sessions, I started to think if there was a way to go virtual, at least for a little while, until things went back to “normal again”, or whatever normal means anymore.

I collaborated with a talented team of programmers and business owners to create the first real virtual parties. Pretty soon the virtual parties were bringing in over 100 couples per night and couples all around the country got to see old friends, and strangers set up post-COVID-19 dates. It was a great substitute during these last several months.

A very close friend of mine decided to be one of the first lifestyle business owners to reopen. When I heard he was doing this, I didn’t hesitate, I called him up and asked why. We talked for over an hour and I could sense the burden he was carrying for his employees, his partners, his shareholders (yes, it is that big of a business), but most of all, his loyal customers.

I told him that I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t risk having people at our party getting sick. I also wondered about their own safety and they assured me that they would steer clear of the parties because they have medical conditions that put them at very high risk.

I felt conflicted. On the one hand, if they did shut down, their employees would all be out of work and the place could go under. Most business owners can’t sustain 6 months of no income without giving up.

On the other side, I thought to myself “I will never throw an event that Tess & I would feel unsafe at”. Knowing that Tess has a compromised immune system, the bar would have to be pretty high for us to reopen.

At first, we re-scheduled our event for August and later, because of a July spike, we moved it one more time to November. If we couldn’t have an event in November, we would skip this year and hope to make it until our next big event.

As November neared, the numbers in New Orleans kept trending down, way down. By mid-October, New Orleans was one of the safest big cities in the US. The restrictions got lighter and lighter, more restaurants and bars reopened.

I know a lot of service industry (waiters, bartenders, cooks, etc.) and restaurant owners who were just dying to get back to work. They needed the income badly. I felt for them and I understood the burden my friend experienced. We have five full-time employees that counted on us too.  We also knew that so many of our favorite local businesses and friends were counting on us to come and help boost the economy for one weekend.

To move forward or not, this was the question…

As the dates of the event drew closer, we were tracking the data daily. What were the trends, what is the positivity rate, new cases, hospitalizations, etc? I started to think that this event might just happen and it was time to start getting all of the details worked out (many of which were ready to go, awaiting our final approval).

We consulted with one of the nation’s top virologists, someone who is one of the top experts in the world on this subject. Together, and with the help of a few other event planners and friends, we wrote the protocol for our upcoming event. This was going to be very different from any other lifestyle event that we have seen operating since this “thing” happened. We were going to do everything we could to make our event as safe as possible.

People wondered if it was possible and more so, was it moral or ethical. We asked ourselves this question over and over again in the weeks leading up to our event. We continued to seek advice, track the numbers and trends (many times a day), we talked to city and state officials, with the Convention & Visitors Bureau and we continued to talk within our staff, about whether or not we could (and also if we should) do this.

We decided that we would strongly encourage everyone to get tested or bring us proof that they had the antibodies. We wanted to create a “bubble” that would not be considered safe, but it certainly would be safer.

To attend or not to attend…

We warned people with comorbidities not to come. If they had diabetes, are over 65, had heart problems, asthma, or other health issues that made COVID-19 a higher risk. As I was writing everyone to try and convince high-risk people not to come, I thought of my own wife (Tess) who has a compromised immune system.

How could I ask her to attend when I was telling others in her situation not to come? How could I move forward with the event without Tess? More moral and ethical decisions to make. I decided to send Tess back down to Mexico where it was a lot safer than the US.

Our decision was also influenced because we were working on a new business in Mexico, our own little Zen Lounge Bar, and it was falling behind schedule. Tess got the team back to working more efficiently and I felt relieved knowing that she was in a safe place. 

Naughty N’awlins continues moving forward 

We went to extraordinary measures for check-in and instituted a touchless process with required temperature checks, social distancing in line, and sanitizing upon check-in. We issued wristbands in one color to indicate who had antibodies and therefore was not contagious. We issued a second color to those that showed us a very recent negative COVID-19 test. The wristbands even had each person’s date of their test circled. 

Over 50% of our attendees had the antibodies and many of the rest got tested right before the event. We were feeling better and better about the risk potential as the event was about to kick off. 

We required masks in all public places and told them they would have to wear them in elevators and even in our parties and while up on the rooftop pool.

Of course, in accordance with city and state protocols, they did not have to wear a mask if they were eating or drinking, which gave attendees plenty of options to be unmasked. We had staff on hand to break up crowds of 9 or more, but we rarely saw any big groups, it was mainly paired with 4 people conversing.

We encouraged everyone to social distance when possible and made it mandatory in lines. We knew that would be hard, given that many of the attendees wanted to see each other people. I was still very happy to see so many people taking all of the protocols seriously. People really did wear their masks a LOT. Almost always in the hotel and in the elevators. We never saw anyone crowd into an elevator (a common sport at big events).

Note: You can see the rest of our protocols and what we sent to all of our attendees, prior to the event, just click here.  

We did not install a dance floor, because the city protocols say ”No Dancing”, but you see, I saw Footloose, so I knew that you couldn’t really outlaw dancing. But seriously, there never was a packed dance floor like most of our events. People bounced and moved by their tables, and even though people were more spread out, I saw a lot more eye contact and positive acknowledgment of short flirts and teases. This seemed to be working.

All in all, the event seemed like a big success. We pulled off a lifestyle event with the strictest protocols and we were able to create an event that we certainly would not advertise as “safe”, but it was the safest possible version we could plan.

Even with all of the restrictions, so many attendees kept telling me that they were so glad we put this together for them. Many told me that they had already recuperated from COVID-19 but were being kept from socializing, even when there was no risk to them. There were a lot of happy people at the event.

We went out to eat with friends on Sunday night, celebrating the success and contemplating the future.

Then the texts started…

The next day the texts started. We had our first positive case. It was a wife who tested positive on Monday night after our event. Her husband tested negative. Both were tested prior to coming to the event.

Then the emails started. We had 5 people that tested positive on Monday. On Tuesday we got up to 14. On Wednesday we jumped up to 29 cases and by our last count, we have 41 positive tests, out of 300 people. Most would consider that a positivity rate of 13%, but there’s more to a positivity rate.

You see, we have no idea how many people got tested after our event, nor if anyone tested positive and didn’t tell us. There could also be people that are positive, but without symptoms, so they never got tested. We immediately reached out to everyone and urged them to get tested, whether they had symptoms or not. We also urged each person with a positive test to contact us so we could start contact tracing.

We have been very aggressive with contact tracing. During check-in, we issued diaries to everyone so it would be easier to track who they interacted with. We didn’t just mean sex, we strongly urged everyone to keep a diary for everyone that they were in contact with for more than 10 minutes, especially without a mask. The diaries really paid off and allowed us to reach out to more and more people that were documented in their diaries. The diaries were part of the advice given to us by this extraordinary expert doctor we have been consulting.

Now what?

As the numbers were coming in, I reached out to many other lifestyle leaders to let them know that we were getting positive tests back after our event was over. I was honest about the results in an effort to shine a light on this issue that is not going to go away.

Many will shout “I told you so! You never should have done an event in the first place”. It is easy for those on the sidelines to be critical, especially when most have never produced an event like ours before. They have no idea of the financial risk, the amount of effort, the number of people (it truly takes a village), instead they just yell “You are bad, you are bad”. I even saw Twitter feeds, from lifestyle podcasters, asking for people to call the media, the city, and the state to “out” our event.

Note: Time for a rant…

You’ll have to excuse my language, but that is a chicken shit thing to do. I would have respected them a lot more if they would have picked up the phone and called me with their concerns or sent me a text or an email. I mean, I get it, we had a lot of second thoughts each and every day, but it is far more productive to call someone up personally to talk about protocols and risk management rather than call people out on Twitter (are we still in 3rd grade?) and even worse, seeing “lifestyle” podcasters call on people to out a lifestyle group.

One of my favorite sayings is to bring me solutions, not complaints. Be part of this industry and help steer towards safer futures. All of us in the lifestyle are looking for acceptance in this world, I think we should come together to find solutions, support one another and clearly communicate. That is the structure our community is based on.

Sorry for the rant, O.K., back to the story…

I have been hearing a lot about “clusters” from other parties and resorts. I have called all of them, visited one and went over all of their procedures in an effort to collaborate and be able to educate ourselves so we could respond to questions coming from our members.

It is incredible some of the measures these clubs, events and resorts have had to endure in order to open. I just don’t see a lot of the mandated protocols going away anytime soon.

We heard about a party that was held early on (in June) where 30 people tested positive, another group had 50 positive cases. Holy cow! I thought. Fifty positive cases from one party. Then I heard about a group with 150+ positive cases. Yep, you heard that right, over 150.

These groups took a lot of time researching what to do and they put protocols in place, but the same thing happened that happened at my event: complacency set in.

When we contacted the people that were positive, we asked them several questions to find more potential positive cases and try to find out where the biggest risks took place. In almost every case, they admitted to us that they were super diligent on the first two days (Wed & Thurs) and then they relaxed a little on Friday and then they said “Fuck it, it’s our last day” and many admitted that their lax effort on that final day is probably why they ended up positive.

If I could go back in time… 

Would I do it all over again? I’ll answer that in a minute, but while we can’t go back in time, all I can do is look at the data we had at the time. All of the important metrics were pointing in a positive direction. On the day our event was to start, New Orleans went to Phase 3.3 (we had a heads up that this was going to happen) which is the least restrictive option the city & state can give until a vaccine has been, not only approved but distributed effectively.

Since then, the state has gone back to Phase 2 with much stricter protocols and we certainly would not have gone forward with our event if the state was in Phase 2.

Turns out, the weekend of our event had some good timing, the numbers trended down until two days after the event started and have been rising quickly ever since. Most are calling it the Halloween spike.

I keep asking myself if hadn’t held the event then, when could an event be held? In 3 months? Next August? When the vaccine is distributed? What about the people who do not believe in vaccinations? When the virus “disappears”? I don’t have that answer but I do have this answer:

If I could go back in time, I would not produce this event again. Even though most of the 41 positive cases have mostly been asymptomatic or very mild cases. The reason I wouldn’t is that I know of two people who had a tougher time and they were suffering. One of them, a good friend of mine, was hospitalized in serious condition.

Note: My friend is out of the hospital and looks like he will be fine.

If I thought for one minute that he or anyone would end up in the hospital, I would certainly not have had our event. It is the first hospitalization I have heard about, but I know it isn’t really the first, it’s just that no one is talking about this.

Maybe we could host an event in August, but only after the vaccine has been distributed. After all, if people have not contracted it by August and they refuse the vaccine and they still want to attend… do I let them in? I don’t know.

Sometimes it is O.K. to admit that we do not have the answers. I don’t have the answer now, and I didn’t have the answer on November 11th, the day our event started. But I wouldn’t do it again if I knew then, what I know now. It weighs on me and it will continue to weigh on me until everyone is 100% better.

I am not sure what to tell you all about whether any businesses should be open or if people should attend any type of event. If they had the virus and they are better, I sure hope they get a chance to live their life and have a great time while everyone else is locked down. I do know that I do not think it is right for people with underlying health issues to risk a hospital stay, or worse, just for a party.

There is a lot of hope with the new vaccines being close to approval. I hope we can round the corner before everything is shut down again. I am more fortunate than most in this industry because we can take a break from producing events. There are many clubs out there that will not last long enough to see 2021.

I apologize for this long and rambling story. I am simply trying to bring up very real questions when many will not speak of it or they will point fingers from afar. I am moving this discussion into the light so we can all make informed decisions.

Anyone can spew hate on Twitter, we need to work together to find real solutions, and support, not only our industry but the people that have open minds and open hearts.

Be safe out there… and feel free to email me with your thoughts and opinions at Bob@Naughty-Events.com.