We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Dee Astell a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Dee, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. Can you talk to us about a project that’s meant a lot to you?

I remember my first time chairing a convention. It was Westercon 70 (a western regional sci-fi convention) and I was like a deer in the headlights, wondering how the heck I had gotten there. I’ve learned a lot since that event, especially about building trust and good working relationships with local fan groups, because they can have lasting results. In my case, the WSFA (Western Science Fiction Association) and CASFS (Central Arizona Speculative Fiction Society) became sponsors for Westercon 70 and my husband and I went on to become members of both groups.

In 2017, my husband had an idea to start a small local convention and, working together with both groups, they now co-sponsor a local non profit sci-fi/fantasy convention, CoKoCon, which my husband and I take turns co-chairing. It’s been a fun and exciting ride learning to build a convention from scratch and giving it sustainability for years to come.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.

I started small, doing fashion shows here and there at various cons, and built up to running lead on programming tracks for big and small events.
Now I chair and/or run programming for several non profit conventions,
as well as being the Fashion Manager for WWWC (Wild Wild West Steampunk
Convention), coordinating their fashion show and costume contest.

I’m proud that people believe in my skills enough to let me sit in the
captain’s seat and steer the way an event will be run.

This year I’ll be chairing CoKoCon 2023. CoKoCon is a traditional
science fiction/fantasy con in the Phoenix, Arizona metro area which
will return to the Labor Day weekend in 2023. We’ll have a books and
authors track, filk, pop culture, science and workshops and panels for kids
of all ages. There will be plenty of fun events like a sketch off, an
Art Show and Charity Auction, an Ice Cream Social, as well as spotlight
panels for our Guests of Honor and lots of other great programming.
Evening programming includes a film festival and 21+ Drag Show, starring
some fabulous local drag queens.

Our Author GoH will be the multi-award winning Seanan McGuire. Our Local
Author GoH, sponsored by Arizona Fandom, is Bruce Davis. Celtic duo
Margaret & Kristoph from California are our Filk GoHs, sponsored by the
Phoenix Filk Circle. Our Artist GoH is andyvanoverberghe from Portland,
also sponsored by Arizona Fandom. We also have an Artist in Residence,
who is Gilead, partly sponsored by TG Geeks.

What sets us apart from other conventions is our intimate experience.
We’re capping members at 500, so that everyone can do everything they
want over the four day weekend, including sitting down in the consuite
to grab a free bite to eat and chat with fellow fans, participants and
guests. So many conventions are huge and impersonal. Ours is all about
community, the sort of event attended by a few hundred of your best
friends that you haven’t met yet.

Can you share a story from your journey that illustrates your resilience?

Like so many other conventions, COVID took a toll on the last few years for us. We had to cancel our scheduled CoKoCon convention in 2020, which entailed having to cancel our guests, panelists and our hotel contract. Luckily for us, our hotel didn’t make it too hard on us and we were able to renegotiate a new contract for the next year.

Sadly, we once again had to cancel our in person event, but were able to roll our contract over to 2022. We decided that we wanted to still host some type of event for our fans, so the committee and crew learned all that we could about hosting a Virtual event and managed to host CoKoCon online between two platforms, Discord and Zoom. I’m pleased to say that, even with a few minor hiccups, Virtual CoKoCon 2021 was well received and attended by many local fans as well as many from different countries.

In 2022 we were able to host an in person convention again, but some folks were still a little hesitant on attending events, so our attendance wasn’t as good as previous years, but we’re back for 2023 with hopes of seeing more fans. Our resilience is strong and we plan to offer our attendees a great convention experience.

In your view, what can society to do to best support artists, creatives and a thriving creative ecosystem?

The best thing society can do to help support them is purchase their art, attend their conventions and volunteer to help events happen to showcase what they do, even sponsor a guest.

In our case, since we are a 501(c) non-profit, purchasing memberships for our convention and booking hotel rooms at our host hotel help keep us coming back year after year.

For those who don’t have the funds to do so, something as simple as mentioning their favorite artists, creators and conventions on social media and sharing their posts goes a long way to helping get the word out and is greatly appreciated.

Contact Info:

• Website: cokocon.org
• Instagram: instagram.com/cokocon
• Facebook: facebook.com/CoKoCon
• Twitter: twitter.com/cokocon1
• Youtube: youtube.com/channel/UCMVs_NTbHzdjunawywAbovw
• Other: History page and archive of newsletters: cokocon.org/history.html

Image Credits
Dee Astell Bill Mullins