For event organizers, before the first commitment

Cash TroughA profitable budget can still run out of cash. See the day it does.

Enter the cost lines with their quotes and payment dates. Free in your browser: Good, Better and Best costed, each with its own break-even, the fees that come off the top, the contingency floor and pad, the reserve line, a dated cash schedule with its lowest point, and the cut order priced net of the sponsorship each cut loses. A run writes the budget section by section, or the plan for when revenue falls short.

Try a sample:

1 The edition free

Event

Format

Charges for attendance

This budget is

Tier you plan to run

Expected show-up (people)

That number is

Editions in this budget

Speakers reimbursed

Ticket price, as set ($)

Comps from agreements held

Fiscal-host share (%)

Payment processing (%)

Sponsorship at Good ($)

Sponsorship at Better ($)

Sponsorship at Best ($)

Annual-funding allocation in ($)

Cash in hand now ($)

Sponsor money lands

Ticket money lands

First go/no-go checkpoint

Event date

Contingency floor ($)

Pad on estimates (%)

Reserve policy

This edition adds to the reserve ($)

Reserve balance today ($)

Organization's fixed yearly costs ($)

Audience attends on employer budgets

Membership gives ticket discounts

A vendor gives a real early-payment discount

Someone tracks sales through the window

Major spend needs a second approver

Who confirms the tax question, by when

Cost lines - CSV with a header row: line, tier (good/better/best), per (fixed/head/speaker), amount (or a range), quote (a date, or "no quote yet"), pays (date it leaves), locks (last date it can change)

2 The model free

What the page flags

Three tiers, each with its own break-even

Cash schedule at the planned tier

The cut order, net of sponsorship lost

Every line

3 Budget or shortfall plan metered

Pricing as soon as the session is ready...

The reply could not be read. Here it is as it came back:

NOT RUN YET

The page's check of this reply

4 Saved budgets

How it works

Every line is a dated quote or a labelled placeholder - never a number invented to make the model balance - and every line is fixed, per head or per speaker. Per-head lines are driven by the expected show-up number, not the registration count. The fiscal-host share and processing fees come off every inflow before any line is funded. Good, Better and Best are costed cumulatively, each with its own break-even, and sponsorship is estimated per tier because sponsors pay for reach.

The cushion is a stack: a floor, an optional pad on the estimates, and the downgrade ladder - and neither the floor nor the pad is an event-industry convention. The cash schedule puts every payment on the day it leaves and every inflow on the day it lands, because deposits go out before sponsor money comes in. The cut order drops the extras first and the fixed structural lines last, and each cut is priced net of the sponsorship it forfeits. Tax treatment is written as a question for the fiscal host or an accountant, never answered here.

Cash TroughA profitable budget can still run out of cash. See the day it does.

1 The edition free

2 The model free

What the page flags

Three tiers, each with its own break-even

Cash schedule at the planned tier

The cut order, net of sponsorship lost

Every line

3 Budget or shortfall plan metered

Posture and what comes off the top

Targets

The three tiers

Contingency and reserve

Lowest cash point

Open tax question

Record

Caveats

The page's check of this reply

4 Saved budgets

How it works