Background: Temporary event supply chains are assembled rapidly, operate under strict timepressure, and dissolve shortly after the event ends. This creates specific challenges forcoordination, information sharing, accountability, and traceability, especially when multipleactors, suppliers, resources, and responsibilities must be managed across planning, setup, liveoperations, teardown, and post-event evaluation. Existing supply chain research mainly focuseson permanent supply chains, meaning that temporary event contexts remain underexplored.

Purpose: The purpose of this study is to examine how traceability and coordination work intemporary event supply chains, with particular attention to how temporariness shapesinformation sharing, accountability, and operational control across the event lifecycle.

Method: This study followed a qualitative research design based on empirical material fromtemporary event contexts. Data were collected through interviews with event organisers andsupply chain stakeholders, supported by observational data from Temporary Event A. The datawere analysed through thematic coding informed by the Gioia methodology in order to identifyhow traceability and coordination develop, break down, and are managed across different eventphases.

Conclusion: The results show that traceability and coordination are deeply interdependent intemporary event supply chains. Traceability is not only a technical issue of tracking goods orequipment, but also a social and organisational process involving responsibility, ownership,communication, and knowledge across event phases. The findings show that traceabilityweakens when information, responsibility, or ownership becomes disconnected, whilecoordination breaks down when roles, handovers, or communication channels are unclear.Overall, the study concludes that temporary event supply chains require both formal structures,such as checklists, schedules, and documentation, and informal practices, such as trust, memory,and real-time improvisation. However, these practices remain fragile unless they are connectedthrough clear responsibility and shared information.