For all intents and purposes, Magic Box Event Campus — the event venue I’ve managed in downtown Los Angeles since 2014 — should never have been an event center. It was a large, 12 story concrete box with an unconventional interior layout of narrow hallways and small rooms. Its most notable feature was a giant chair sitting in the middle of the parking lot.

I took over the venue after decades in the event production and rental worlds. I knew I wanted to reimagine the venue model to incorporate more of these services, rather than just offering space rental. But when I took over Magic Box, our operations were scattered and inefficient: we were a team of five, managing everything on a disconnected combination of paper, Excel spreadsheets, Google Calendar, QuickBooks, and email. We held a few events every month, but they were small and generated minimal revenue. Just like the event venue itself, we were boxed in by systems that didn’t scale. When I spoke to my industry peers, they all shared the same challenges: they were running on a patchwork of 5+ disconnected tools and they saw their venue only as a space to rent, not as a business with multiple revenue opportunities.

I knew that to change our business, we needed better, specialized tools — ones that would allow my team to work more efficiently while also giving us the systems to turn our venue from simply a space rental into an operation with multiple revenue streams. At the time, there were no softwares built specifically for event venues. So we built our own.

The outcome of that endeavor is ShoSoft, an all-in-one event venue operating system, with two primary goals: to help you increase efficiency and maximize revenue at your event business. After two years of building ShoSoft and refining it with our early customers, I’m excited to bring you the platform today.

What's inside ShoSoft

ShoSoft brings everything we learned from transforming a venue operation into one platform. It connects all four layers of the event industry — venues, producers, exhibitors, and attendees — in one place, and it’s built on eight core modules:

A master calendar, which serves as the single source of truth for your entire operation, making double-bookings a thing of the past.
End-to-end event management, allowing you to create, manage, and close events in one place without switching between tools.
Task management, so you can assign tasks, set deadlines, and keep your whole team accountable.
Workforce management, for you to know exactly who’s working and when, and so you can say bye to scheduling conflicts.
Inventory management, which lets you track every piece of equipment in your venue.
Ticketing, so you save your attendees from exorbitant booking fees with a simple flat $1 booking fee per ticket.
Accounting, so that every part of an event is tracked live, and you’re paid exactly what you’re owed.
Exhibitor management, allowing you and your partner event producers to sell booths and booth extras directly in-platform, and turn trade shows into a structured revenue operation.

ShoSoft is not a generic project management tool; it was built specifically for the event industry, by the industry, so every feature is intentionally designed for the way we work. ShoSoft is also not a $30K enterprise platform that takes more from you than it gives: its feature set is tight, not overwhelming, and it offers the same value at a fraction of the cost (plans start at $99/month). Unlike other event management softwares which take weeks to roll out, implementing ShoSoft and onboarding your team takes hours (and we’re here to help you every step of the way).

The results

Our existing customers can testify to the power of using ShoSoft: Green Box Arts, a nonprofit in Colorado, replaced five tools with ShoSoft and saved 10 hours per month. The Center for Rural Development, a 35,000 sqft event space in Kentucky, gained a single source of truth, modernized their operations (they used to use paper binders!), and saved five hours per month. And at Magic Box, ShoSoft has allowed us to save 15 hours per person per week, add multiple new revenue streams, and scale our business from hundreds of thousands of dollars of revenue to the multi-millions.

Now it’s your turn to try it out and see how it can transform your event business. Start your 60 day free trial today, no credit card required — there’s no pressure to commit before running a real event on it, and you’ll be up and running in a few hours. Plans exist at three tiers, so you’re not paying for features you don’t need: Essentials at $99/mo, Professional at $199/mo, and Enterprise at $299/mo, with a 20% discount if you commit annually.

Today is a big day for me both personally and professionally. I care deeply about this industry: it’s my passion. ShoSoft represents more than 30 years of experience, lessons, and innovation, all brought together in a single platform. Every feature and workflow reflects decades spent understanding the industry, and my commitment to making it better for everyone.

I hope you start your ShoSoft free trial and see what it can do yourself, or forward this to a venue operator who you think might need it. And, more than ever, I’d appreciate your feedback once you try it out.

Let’s go!

Wayne