Following the ongoing success of our Cuenca Events Calendar, we experimented with opening up a similar Manta Events Calendar. We created it to help the Manta expat community easily find events in and around Manta (including Santa Marianita etc).
We’ve now decided to retire it and we’re comfortable being transparent with the reasons why.
Why we’ve retired the Manta Calendar
There are a few reasons:
1. Lack of community participation to upload and/or find events for us to upload
This project was always going to require the support of the local community to help with either:
- Uploading their own events
- Finding events for us to upload
We don’t have a commercial presence in Manta, so it’s simply not feasible for us to continue to pour resources into this alone. This calendar was never designed to make money (uploading events was free). We would make a very small amount of revenue via advertising, but this would not come close to breaking even.
2. Blocked from a prominent Manta Facebook Group
Ecuador’s libel laws don’t allow me to go into detail. Suffice to say that we had a very disappointing encounter with a Manta Facebook Group. Our only guess is that they saw our community effort as encroaching on their own personal interests.
Yes, we could start our own Manta Facebook Group, but as we don’t live there (we are in Cuenca) or have a commercial presence, it’s not viable for us at this time.
3. Lack of events in Manta
I’d personally spend hours every week searching for events in Manta to share with the community. COVID certainly had an impact on the feasibility of organizing events. But, even COVID aside, the reality is there aren’t that many events in Manta – especially compared to Cuenca.
One of the aims of the Manta Events Calendar was to help grow the number of expats seeing Manta as a viable, vibrant community. We still want to support the growth of the Manta expat community, but it’s hard to do this with a lack in both variety and quantity of events in Manta.
That isn’t to say there are no events in Manta. Several individuals do a terrific job of putting on regular events for the community. In particular, shout-outs to Linda Flierl Hooks (owner of Donkey Den), Reid Scott Anderson (co-owner of Voyager Hotel & admin of Manta Live) & Ralf Warren (admin of Young Expats & Friends Manta). We’ll always support these organizers as best we can and hope that you do too. Manta needs events for the expat community to thrive and these individuals add a tremendous amount of value.
Where to next for Manta?
We have a soft spot for Manta and really love spending time in the Manabi area. Escaping the mountains for the beach several times per year is something our family has done for many years now. So, we have a vested interest in helping grow the Manta expat community and will continue to do so when we have the resources to do it properly.
Reboot?
We aren’t opposed to getting the Manta Event Calendar back online. But, it would require someone living in Manta to help with the finding and uploading of events. The time requirement would be approx 2 hours per week.
If you’re this person, do feel free to reach out to us to start a conversation.
Until we find someone to take ownership of publishing Manta events, we’ll be concentrating on ensuring the Cuenca Event’s Calendar remains of significant value to the Cuenca expat community.
Saludos,
Jason & Michelle
YapaTree Owners
