You likely know there's a Friday night football game and then a Saturday night concert this weekend at Doak Campbell Stadium.
Imagine trying to clean up the 80,000-seat stadium after a night football game, prepare it for a concert the next day, and then clean it up again that night. That sounds like a lot of work ... until you realize there's more to it than that. Like a lot more.
In a weekend when Florida State is hosting a home football game and a "Doak After Dark" country music concert, the university is also holding an NCAA regional cross country meet, both men's and women's basketball season openers and an NCAA first-round women's soccer tournament match.
Welcome to the world of FSU facilities management.
"It's certainly a new challenge for us," said Stuart Pearce, who is the Seminoles' assistant athletic director for operations and event management. "We've been talking with lots of our partners that we engage with. We've had really good buy-in and support based on those talks."
The madness starts at 8:30 a.m. Friday with the cross country meet. Women's basketball plays at 12:30 p.m. that afternoon at the Tucker Center. The day's final event is FSU's football game with Boston College at 7 p.m.
It re-starts Saturday with men's basketball playing at 1 p.m. Saturday at the Tucker Center, and women's soccer playing at 2 p.m. at the Seminole Soccer Complex. Then, the marathon comes to an end with the Doak After Dark concert at 7 p.m.
While getting the facilities ready for these events is one challenge, another is cleaning them up quickly to return to their original state.
"It's primarily asking folks in-house, on campus and off campus, to just give us a couple more hours getting [the venues] cleaned and turned over," Pearce said. "We have a great partnership with the Tucker Center."
Pearce said the Tucker Center's staff will be responsible for cleaning that arena, while FSU's facilities department can focus on the on-campus venues.
Not surprisingly, Doak Campbell present the greatest challenge. The stadium's maximum capacity is 79,560 people, and it takes between 150 to 175 workers to clean and maintain.
* Also See: Matchup Analysis and Game Prediction for the FSU-Boston College game
Pearce said a crew of about 20 people will enter the stadium around midnight Saturday when the football game ends. They'll work an eight-hour shift and concentrate on cleaning the 100, 200 and 300 levels in the south end zone, where the concert will be held.
Another group will enter the stadium at 8 a.m. on Saturday and begin cleaning the rest of the stadium. Normally that process begins on a Sunday, but the concert has sped things up.
Those Sunday cleanups begin with Kyle Slaton and his staff. Slaton, who is the assistant director for athletic turf, and his crew handle field maintenance and stadium cleaning.
There's also another crew, which goes around and collects recyclables and trash on the ground and concourse levels.
"Between the solid waste and recycling, we'll need about four or five of those big, 40-yard roll-off dumpsters that can hold eight to 10 tons," Pearce said. "Sometimes, we'll get up to six, and we'll fill a good number of those for an average game."
Pearce said the average post-game waste tonnage comes in between 20 and 30 tons. Last year's waste total for the stadium was 160 tons, he said.
Slaton said there are hundreds of trash cans around the stadium to help manage the trash.
"We go around and put three trash bags in every trash can," Slaton said. "Soon as one gets filled up, our guy can rip it out, take it to the side and keep some trash cans from overflowing."
Slaton said the most popular item his crew picks up are water bottles -- especially for an afternoon game such as the 3:30 p.m. kickoff against North Carolina earlier this season.
"It was hot out and people were there for the entire game," Slaton said. "When we started doing clean up -- with all the plastic bottles -- we had to call in for a second dumpster. It was probably double the amount of plastic water bottles we usually have."
After the major cleanup is done on Sunday, Pearce said, another group comes through on Monday to blow away and collect any remaining debris from the bleachers, concourse, pathways and ramps. He said this process usually lasts through Tuesday.
"They walk all 85 rows of the stadium," he said.
By Wednesday, the stadium is pretty much clean. The process usually restarts Thursday and Friday to prepare for game day on Saturday.
Pearce said those days are used by the concessions and vendors to get their areas and merchandise ready.
"Doak Campbell is a little bit unique from our standpoint on campus because of its size," Pearce said. "It's not all that much different than Howser or track or soccer. They all comprise the same thing, which is seats, access pathways and restrooms.
"But nothing quite meets the magnitude of 80,000 seats."
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