I agree. I have a customer who is an event management firm and the complexity and size of their events (long running events that last over several days) makes the operational side of running the event the biggest challenge.
In a lot of ways it's tricky, but easy at the same time. We end up trying to build strong concepts that can be mapped onto a few different problems within the event. A lot like an online store product, but with a better grounding in events.
We then try and provide the right management/reporting/organising tools so that they can work with it better.