We are here to show you what you can expect when you log in to register for Add-On Workshops, Electives, and Tracks this Wednesday, May 29th at 7pm Central (that’s 8pm Eastern, 6pm Mountain, and 5pm Pacific). We’re going to try to keep this short, but there is a lot of important information here, so bear with with us!

If you’re not sure what all these terms are, you can go to our website at CookieCon.com. Just click on the “Classes” link and you can click on each of these class types. Along with other information, you'll also see a link to a short video for each of these class types.

However, here is a quick summary!

Add-On Workshops are longer, concentrated classes, most of which are Hands-On. These occur on the Tuesday and Wednesday during the week of the event. Add-On Workshops incur an additional cost beyond the CookieCon Ticket. These are awesome learning experiences and a great way to take full advantage of your trip. If you choose not to purchase any Add-On Workshops, CookieCon is still a full experience, with LOTS of stuff to do - all included with your Attendee Ticket.

Electives are also Hands-On experiences in smaller groups. We include up to 2 Electives for each CookieCon Attendee without any additional cost! Electives take place on the Thursday and Friday of CookieCon and last about 45 minutes each.

Finally Core Classes! These are lecture and demo style classes, taught by our Core Instructors. These are taught on Thursday, and every CookieCon Attendee will have the opportunity to attend every Core Class. You will choose a Core Class Track, which is your Friday Core Class Schedule.

You will be choosing your Track and Electives to cater to your individual needs and interests.

To clarify further, let’s show a quick Example!

Let’s say that you’ve chosen Track B. Just like any other Track, this includes the times that you’ll be able to see ALL of the Core Classes! You see that you have a break at 10am. Well, one of the Electives you’re interested in, happens to have an opening at 10 AM on Thursday!

So, this might be a perfect slot for you to choose one of your Electives!

A couple reminders on Electives, you can only choose 2 before the event. You can put them both on Thursday, both on Friday, or one on each of those days. In the example above, we chose to put one where we have a break. Of course, you’re welcome to attend an Elective instead of any one of the Core Classes as well, if, for example, the topic of the Core Class is something you’re already familiar with.

We’re not going over much about Friday in this video, but just know that it will be VERY full of other things to do. There will be Open Demos, Open Breakouts, the Tasting Event, Open Decorating, Shopping the Vendors, and more!

One final note on Tracks. We set these up so Attendees can choose them, in case they have a friend they are coming with. They may want to stick together throughout these classes. Selecting the same Track as a friend, will put you in the same Core Class Schedule. Please know that if you are not coming with anyone, there is no need to worry! Simply choose any Track, and you will be with lots of great new Cookier Friends! In fact, there will be LOTS of people coming by themselves, just like you!

Ok, so before we open up all these fun options, we’ve got some homework for you! First, have your email address (the one that you used to purchase your ticket) and your reference number ready! You will absolutely need these to sign back into our Registration website. The reference number is in the confirmation email you received. You can visit our Registration Site before then and have it emailed back to you if you need. However, be aware that the Registration website may not be available for about 2 hours prior to Registration time - while we're setting up. If you will be making purchases and choosing options for another registrant, you will also need to have their Email Address and Reference Number handy as well!

Next, take time to review all of the Add-On Workshops, Electives, and Tracks on our website. All classes should appear in the same order when you choose them through our Registration Website, so it will be helpful to be familiar with them!

Finally, your first choices may not be available when you come along to choose them! There are SO many great options here, so don’t worry! Have several alternatives noted down so you can select those instead.

Ok, let’s go over what you can expect on Wednesday, the 29th of May! Sometime before 7pm (Central time), we will publish this button to the home page of our web site (at cookiecon.com). You may refresh occasionally if you do not see it. Once it's there, you’ll simply need to click the button, and you’ll be taken to our queueing website. This will be familiar as it’s the same experience from Ticket Sale night… but let’s review it quickly!

Before 7pm Central, you’ll be put in a virtual waiting room (as seen on the left), to wait until registration starts. When 7pm hits, it will randomize the order of everyone in the waiting room and put you in the actual queue (as seen on the right). This is a little “lottery” feature that randomly places everyone in the queue, who was on the site before 8pm. Anyone who comes on after 7pm will be placed in the queue in the order they arrive.

So, you’ll want to just wait on this page. You will see the number of people who are ahead of you. We will be allowing a few people in every minute to make their selections.

As a quick reminder: this number is often larger than the actual number of people trying to get in (one reason being that some people are trying to get in with multiple devices). So don’t worry too much about this - just be patient, and hopefully we’ll get everyone through in a reasonable amount of time.

Ok, once you are at the front of the line, you’ll be taken to our Registration Website. This is pretty simple! Just click “Modify Registration” to get started! When you’re permitted into the website, you will NOT be the only one on the site and you're only given 10 minutes to make your selections. So you’ll want to move through your selections fairly quickly. You might want to write down your selections, including alternate choices, ahead of time so you don’t have to think much while you’re in there.

First step here, is just to enter your email address & Reference Number, and then click “Continue”. If you have forgotten or lost your reference number, hit that “Click here to be emailed a reminder” link, enter your email address, and we’ll send you the Reference Number. This will take a few minutes to arrive in your inbox, so it’s better to just have your number handy ahead of time!

After signing in, you’ll just go through pages that you filled out during initial registration. You’ll just scroll to the bottom of each page, and click "Continue".

And speaking of these continue buttons… for every page of this process, you must always scroll to the bottom and click “Continue” to advance, even if you didn’t change anything on that page.

Here we are on the Add-On Workshops page for your Tuesday selections!

Add-On Workshops here should be in the same order as they are on the website - so if you’ve seen this list already, it should look familiar. You will simply check the box next to your desired selection, scroll to the bottom, and hit “Continue” to temporarily lock your options down until you make your payment.

Now if you click “Continue” you might be unable to advance and it will suddenly show your class as Sold Out. This means that the last spot in that class was filled while you were on that page. You’ll need to make another selection, and then click "Continue".

Once you’re finished on the Tuesday page, the Wednesday page will function exactly the same. Just click “Continue” on the Wednesday page to advance.

Ok, we are now on the “Options” page. If you’d like to add an Official CookieCon T-Shirt you can do so now. These will be available for pre-purchase only. If you're not purchasing a shirt (or if you already did), just scroll down past the T-Shirt info and you’ll get to the Class Track section.

But first a note: It is very important that you Do Not uncheck anything after you have completed your purchase and log back in! We are all very used to “Shopping Cart” systems, where you purchase an item, and then the next time you log in, you have an empty cart. That is NOT THE CASE with this system. This account is keeping track of every item you have purchased. When you log back in later, if you UNCHECK an item (including shirts and classes), it will be DROPPED from your registration and schedule. If you drop a class this way, someone will be able to jump in there and purchase it, and we very likely won’t have a way to get it back for you. Please be careful!

Ok, next option will be "Tracks"… before making your selection, you can click “More Info” next to each selection to see the track schedule, but you can also review these ahead of time by going to our website and clicking on the “Classes!” link, and then click on “Core Classes”.

Once again, if you select a track, then you click “Continue” it may suddenly show as “Full”. This means someone took the last spot while you were on that page, and you’ll need to select another.

On this same page you’ve got your Electives, which you’ll see as you scroll down. This is quite a long page, so once again, please be familiar with the list on our website. We alphabetize these by Last Name of the instructor within the Day that they’re teaching.

You will simply check the box by the Elective and Time Slot you want. You can ONLY select TWO Total Electives. We tried really hard to set it up to only allow two selections, but the software wouldn’t let us do that. So this is on YOU to remember. If you select more than two, we will remove them at our discretion.

Once you’re finished with your Track and Electives, just scroll to the bottom and click “Continue”.

Ok, at this point you’ll be taken to the Payment page where you’ll purchase your Add-On Workshops and review your other selections.

You can make your payment securely at this point. If you did not purchase Add-On Workshops or a T-Shirt, you’ll simply be taken to a page to review your Registration and Selections.

If you Registered for another person, and would like to make selections for them as well, you can just click "Modify Registration" to return to the start, where you will enter the second registrant's email address and reference number and proceed to choose options or make purchases for them, if desired.

As a reminder, you have 10 minutes total after you enter the site from the queue - even if you're making selections for another Attendee. Please make sure you have all of the necessary information handy, and proceed through the process quickly.

Here are just a few points to remember:

We will be actively monitoring this process on the 29th! There are a lot of moving parts and if any part of that process goes down, we will work to get it resolved.

Next: Hopefully we get everyone through in a timely manner, but we won’t be allowing too many people in at once. If you’re not in yet, be patient. If you are in, try and make your selections, and complete your payment fairly quickly.

Remember that multiple people are on here at once. The best way to secure your selections is to continue through the process quickly, clicking “Continue” on each page, and make your payment as soon as you’re done.

Let’s just emphasize a few final points...

Once again… if you’re a returning registrant Do Not uncheck anything that you want to keep.

Next, there are no waitlists for Add-On Workshops, Tracks, or Electives.

Another note: we need to remind everyone that Early Add-On Workshop registration (which runs between May 29 and June 5) is a benefit for CookieCon Attendee Ticket holders. Any Ticket holder who decides to cancel their Attendee Ticket, will also forfeit any Add-On Workshops purchased during the Early Registration window.

Finally, you really don’t have to sign up for anything! We will assign people to tracks (who didn’t do so themselves) before CookieCon starts. Add-On Workshops and Electives can be chosen later (even on site at CookieCon), but please be aware that selections will be more limited as time goes on. If you don’t have any real preferences on these selections, don’t worry about it - just show up and you’ll have a great time!

And that should be it! As always, we’re very excited to have you be a part of CookieCon! If you have any questions, shoot us an email! Thank you!