Post
by TomMc » Wed Sep 26, 2012 12:48 am
Jabbawocky - You make a valid point, but equally you have to understand what goes on behind the scenes to form an educated judgement. At this point I’ll apologise in advance if I start waffling, but the “why should I pay to display my vehicle?” question is something that crops up time and time again during the show season, so should be explained properly.
First off (in my opinion) a Club Display Stand at a show should feature representative vehicles of said club, perhaps 2, 3 or 4 vehicles depending on size of the pitch. Ideally these should be the very best vehicles the club has to offer, only due to time and money, everyone knows this isn’t always possible. Personally, as an enthusiast I would rather see 1 or 2 good examples of a particular vehicle than row after row of mediocre models that tell the public nothing. Far from ‘highlighting’ the club, I feel they make a display look drab and boring.
Then there are clubs such as LRCC, that, by their very nature, almost all the member’s vehicles are interesting and worthy in their own right of gracing a Club Display Stand to represent their club. The problem is, owners expect free entry every time. Fair enough if you’re displaying a Rolls Royce at village garden fete, it’s ‘standoutable’ (good word) so deserves a complimentary pass, but you wouldn’t expect free entry at Rolls Royce Show,. If that happened then nobody would pay to be there and therefore no money would be taken to hire in the toilets at £750 a unit! That’s the dilemma.
So what is an event organiser to do? Well if you’re a BIG outfit with pots of money to spare, not to mention a massive county showground to fill, you can hand out 5, 10, 15, 20 complimentary passes knowing full well that is both filling up the place and importantly - you can afford it. Of course you can afford it because you’re charging visitors £15 per adult per day, and an extortionate £8 for kids! In these hard financial times I find this obscene, so will shout this from the rooftops at every given opportunity.
Then there is the likes of me, a true enthusiast (unlike 99% of the big Land Rover shows in recent years that have been run solely for profit), which can only afford to hire a relatively small venue and will charge £10 adults day admission, children under 16 years are free – that makes it a reasonable family day out. Mum, dad, the saucepan lids … and even the neighbour’s kids for £20, that’s the big difference.
Can I therefore afford to hand out unlimited passes to clubs, even though they may have a whole array of good, presentable vehicles to display? Well the answer is obvious. Instead I allocate four passes per Club Display Stand, these I would hope to be distributed to the people that really matter to a club – the officials who do the donkey work and keep the balls in the air year in year out. To be frank, I couldn’t give a jot if they never even reach the members who have a pretty vehicle and are only seen two or three times a year for the big shows, then disappear and contribute nothing whatsoever to the club for the remainder of the year. Grrrrr!!!! Makes you wanna spit!
This is why the pass allocation is relatively low at ADVENTURE OVERLAND compared to ‘other shows’. It’s us against them, always has been, always will … unless of course I win the lottery, then I could give all the good guys a proper day out ‘on the house’. Until that day comes, I’m afraid you’ll have to dig deep – well, relatively deep – to attend an event which I believe will be far more interesting than every other Land Rover/4x4 event that has taken place this year. Fighting talk indeed, now all I have to do is deliver; help!!!