Meet Adrienne!

Adrienne Gardner is a sales strategist, event industry consultant, and fractional CRO who helps creative businesses get their act together—without losing their spark. With over a decade of leadership experience, she's led high-performing teams, turned around underperforming businesses, and coached dozens of entrepreneurs out of burnout and into growth. How does it work? A mix of proven sales systems, tough love, and a deep understanding of what it actually takes to succeed in the fast-paced, people-driven world of events. She’s not here for fluff, toxic hustle culture, or pretending everything’s fine when it clearly isn’t. Adrienne brings the kind of energy that makes hard things feel lighter, calls out the nonsense, and reminds people that leadership doesn’t have to mean losing yourself. Equal parts strategy, real talk, and bad jokes, her sessions leave people feeling fired up, seen, and ready to make real changes that actually stick.

Full Group Session:

Pipeline Panic: The Science of Lead Movement for Busy Venues

A pretty brochure won’t fix a broken pipeline. If you want more tours and more bookings, it’s time to think like a salesperson (just a cooler one).  In this hands-on session, you’ll learn how to map your pipeline to real buyer behavior, separate your active vs. passive funnels and use strategic “mini closes” to keep leads moving. From first inquiry to final yes, we’ll walk through how to warm up slow leads, re-engage the quiet ones, and move more of your pipeline to the tour stage—even the ones who say their wedding is “two years out.”

Presentation Takeaways:

  • How to align your pipeline with todays current buyer

  • How to build a 5-stage sales pipeline that matches your actual sales flow

  • The difference between active and passive lead funnels (and why you need both)

  • Mini-closing tactics: how to get micro-yeses that lead to the big YES

  • Smart follow-up habits: what to automate, what to personalize, and what to stop doing

Workshop Breakout Session:

Pipeline Panic: Live Lab Edition – Build It, Test It, Use It

In this 90-minute live lab, we’ll roll up our sleeves and build a sales pipeline—for your venue, your team, and your buyers. You’ll define your real sales stages, plug in strategic mini-closes that guide leads toward a “yes,” and build out a communication flow —from the ones ready to tour this weekend to the ones planning two years out.

You’ll also get hands-on with messaging: we’ll write real emails, try out 1-line re-engagement tactics, and learn exactly when to send what. By the end of this session, you won’t just talk about your pipeline—you’ll have one that’s clear, functional, and ready to use the minute you get back to your inbox.