The hidden cost of campus career fairs

The most common thing we hear when we ask employers how they recruit students and new grads is, “We go to campus career fairs.”

A few more questions usually reveal these employers travel to 10 to 20 career fairs each September.

Campus Career Fairs are expensive

Employers mistakenly believe campus career fairs are inexpensive.

For example, a recent conversation with an employer revealed the perceived cost of a campus career fair is “only $400…the cost to set up our booth.”
But the cost is so much more. There’s the cost of travel (surely there are not 10-20 campus career fairs in your company’s immediate geographical area), including transportation, lodging, and food, and then there’s the cost of materials for your booth. And don’t forget the biggest cost of all: your time!
When all of these costs are taken into account, some employers have reported a price tag of closer to $10,000 PER HIRE as a result of campus career fairs.

No way to track ROI

The hardest pill to swallow – for me at least – is that there’s no great way to track the return-on-investment from campus career fairs. It is very rare that employers actually accept resumes at campus career fairs anymore…Applications are strictly completed online! And even when students report they’ve applied from a particular school, it is hard to know if it was the campus career fair that convinced them to apply, or any number of other influences they may have been exposed to over the course of their education.

Students tell us that they don’t go

On top of all of this, as part of our day-to-day at TalentEgg, we routinely ask students how they are looking for jobs. Answers have certainly varied - from campus career centres to online resources to networks – however one thing has remained consistent: The answer has never been campus career fairs.

For these reasons, and because there are so many other, more cost-effective options, I find it very hard to believe that it is still such a common practice.  What am I missing here? Is it legacy internal policy?