KCON LOS ANGELES
Dates: July 26–28, 2024
Venues: Los Angeles Convention Center, Crypto.com Arena, and Gilbert Lindsay Plaza in downtown Los Angeles
Event Overview
KCON Los Angeles 2024 was one of the largest and most operationally complex fan and entertainment events in the U.S. with over 125,000 annual attendees in Los Angeles alone.
The three day festival spanned multiple venues across downtown Los Angeles, including the Los Angeles Convention Center and Crypto.com Arena, with programming running simultaneously from early morning through late evening.
The event combined live concerts, convention programming, fan experiences, brand activations, meet and greets, press moments, and retail environments — all in one tightly coordinated footprint. This created a uniquely demanding staffing environment that required scale, consistency, training, and centralized coordination.
Our team was responsible for staffing the full event across all zones and formats.
Bilingual & Cultural Staffing Requirements
One of the defining operational requirements for KCON Los Angeles 2024 was the need for a bilingual workforce that could operate fluently in both Korean and English across all levels of the event.
Because the event brings together Korean artists, Korean production teams, U.S. partners, global sponsors, and an international fan base, language was not a “nice to have” — it was an operational necessity.
The Requirement
The client required that approximately half of the frontline and management team be fluent in Korean and English, including:
A minimum of 37 Korean-speaking staff members per day
Korean-speaking coverage in management and lead roles, not just frontline positions
Language coverage across:
Artist and production zones
Brand and sponsor activations
Registration and guest services
Back of house operations and internal coordination
This meant bilingual capability had to be built directly into the staffing structure, not layered on afterward.
Types of Staff Provided
Talent Preparation & Management Readiness
Because bilingual capability was mission-critical to the success of KCON LA 2024, we did not rely on last-minute recruiting or ad hoc staffing. Instead, we built the team deliberately over a six-month preparation period.
A Six-Month Talent Build
Six months prior to the event, we launched a targeted initiative to identify, onboard, and evaluate Korean-English bilingual staff.
This process focused on:
Referral-based recruiting from trusted internal and external networks
Vetting candidates for both language fluency and professionalism
Prioritizing candidates with experience in hospitality, events, production, or brand environments
Rather than onboarding for a single event, we treated this as a long-term talent investment.
Performance-Based Selection
Once onboarded, bilingual staff were intentionally placed into other live events ahead of KCON.
This served two purposes:
To generate real performance data, not just resumes or interviews
To observe how candidates performed in fast-paced, real-world environments
We evaluated staff on:
Reliability and attendance
Communication clarity and tone
Ability to handle pressure and ambiguity
Leadership instincts and problem-solving behavior
Professionalism with clients, guests, and internal teams
Only staff who consistently demonstrated high performance were selected to move into supervisory and management tracks for KCON.
Management Training Pipeline
From this performance pool, we invited the strongest candidates into our internal management training program.
Training focused on:
Zone leadership and escalation protocols
Cross-cultural communication and professionalism
How to manage both guests and internal teams
How to represent the event, the client, and our agency in high-visibility roles
By the time KCON arrived, the bilingual managers on site were not new, untested, or unfamiliar — they were experienced, evaluated, and prepared.
125,000
Attendees Managed
4
KPOP Fans Safely Escorted To Medical After Seeing Their Favorite KPOP Star
Why This Worked
This approach allowed us to:
Eliminate risk from unproven hires in critical roles
Replace subjective judgment with real performance data
Ensure that language fluency was paired with operational competence
Build trust with production teams before the event even began
Instead of staffing for KCON, we built a team for KCON.
Result
The outcome was a bilingual leadership layer that was:
Operationally fluent
Culturally aware
Calm under pressure
Trusted by both Korean and U.S. stakeholders
This reduced friction, prevented miscommunication, and created a smoother experience for artists, producers, brands, and fans alike.
Get an Instant Quote
Thank you for your submission!
Our Team will contact you regarding your staffing needs momentarily.