2017 JW Conventions

Christian Gutierrez

Hey guys! Are there less assemblies in your country or area this year? I'm noticing trends that they are becoming fewer and fewer. Must be low on money this year

That sounds intriguing Christian. Have you got any figures so to speak of the conventions they used to have in your country compared to now? Sometimes they reshuffle circuits and even expected congregations outside circuits to amalgamate for conventions - the suspicion is that it looks like overall fewer are attending. But with the re-shuffling and amalgamating, it's hard to be certain.

darkspilver

Hey guys! Are there less assemblies in your country or area this year? I'm noticing trends that they are becoming fewer and fewer. Must be low on money this year

What's your proof? If it's a 'trend' you can point it out to us please....

No, they're getting more and more venue/date-wise albeit each one smaller - with a lower number of publishers assigned to each one.

The exception to this is if your country has got 'Special Convention' like here:

https://www.jehovahs-witness.com/topic/5695993188188160/_post/6018766154498048

darkspilver

Here's the 10-year trend for the UK:

2007
125,000 average publishers
14 English venues / dates (mainland, excluding Guernsey)

2017
135,000 average publishers
21 English venues / dates (mainland, excluding Guernsey)

In addtion in the UK they're starting to get conventions running at the same venue over a number of weekends.

2007 data - scanned image below

2017 data: https://www.jehovahs-witness.com/topic/5695993188188160/_post/5998711073144832

polish clarinet

in northern France, our major assembly has been divided into 8 p arts in the Assembly Hall, every week end from June 23rd.

Richard Oliver

A lot of the requirements now for how many people a venue can hold is how well people can see the monitors. if you can't see the monitor then most of the convention is lost. They are increasing the number of dates and sites but reducing the number of people at each convention.

steve2

Unless I have missed something, the question was about numbers attending conventions, not publisher numbers.

Do you have comparisons of attendances at conventions over the same years (2007 compared with 2016).

BTW, you say the publisher number is from 2017 when it is reported in the 2017 Yearbook but from the 2016 service year report.

Richard Oliver

Steve2:

Are there less assemblies in your country or area this year?

It is the number of actual events not the number of people attending the event.

Mikh

Interesting. I didn't know the convention at the SkyDome this year was going to be a "special convention". I heard of conventions taking place in the SkyDome somewhat routinely in the past. I wonder if they were all "special".

steve2

RO,

As far as I know, there are 4 Regional Conventions in New Zealand - it fluctuates between 3 to 5 from year to year. I think JW org gives the number for each country this year - but I have yet to check that out.

In terms of whether the key variable is the number of conventions for the Regional Convention OR attendance numbers, I'd have thought it was the latter. Given that some venues do have restrictions on numbers attending (to comply with local local Health and Safety regulations), you could assume that fewer convention venues reflects fewer attendees - but to be certain, you'd need to know actual attendance numbers.

Years ago, the Watchtower magazine gave running accounts of attendance numbers as they rolled out across specified countries such as the USA. The magazine doesn't appear to have done this for several years - which leads me to speculate it is due to stagnating or declining attendances. But I completely acknowledge that's a guess in my part - not borne out by any evidence such as attendance numbers.

Edited to add: A check on JW.org shows there are about 10 Regional Conventions this year in New Zealand with most of them in our biggest city Auckland at the South Auckland Assembly Hall. They appear to have moved away from bigger venues that can hold 3,000 to 4,000 to smaller ones such as specially designated halls. I'm not sure what this means in terms of total attendances, though, because I don't know the seating capacity of that assembly hall.

2017 JW Conventions

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