Proposed 2009 Events Calendar

[Mac-1]

So then Ladies and Gents,

I have given a bit of thought during the year about club meets, both interest and attendance. We have had volunteers who have taken the lead and organised meets to fall at the hurdle with little interest and very few attendees, this can be quite demoralizing for the meet leader.

Talking to some members its down to a few reasons, they may not like some of the people who will be attending the meets, this is purely a personal issue, people may not like the type of event/meet planned, others just cherry pick the meets that they want to go on and finally the group who may feel a bit intimidated by some of the more senior club members.

I have met and listened to a number of WR1OC meet attendees over the last two years and it’s difficult to actually pinpoint why we can get enough members together at least a few time a year. It also seems to be a problem to get a proper meet coordinator; Frazer made a valiant attempt with a great Highlands tour planed where he obviously put a lot of thought and time into the route, hotels, ferries and even fuel stops for those pick people who wanted V power. As usual, this failed due to lack if attendees and some people say cost.

Equally, we have had some great meets where we have had great turnout, such as Bruntingthorpe, the DSA Rolling road day, and a couple of Christmas and social do’s.

I am therefore going to have a go for 2009 and arrange a number of club events that are open and agreed by all members. Given the events I would propose that we agree meet leaders for specific events and they can plan the detail and using the lead from Rosy and Chris and there Bruntingthorpe meets, can lobby and gee up the attendance.

The following proposed events list is a start, I kindly ask if people can review the list and add there names, I sagest that we pick the top six events that people want to attend and then start the planning. I would also like to see volunteers for the meet leader for specific events, I have taken the liberty of adding meet leaders to a couple of the events below, I hope you don’t mined but please feel free to amend. I have not added meet dates; I think we can do this when we know the kind of events that we are planning.


1-Social Meets

North
Midlands
South

2-Rolling Road Day (Leader-Bro)

3-Track Days

Donnington
Silverstone (Leader-Robin)
Brandshatch

4-WR1OC 5th Anniversary Party (Leader-Mac-1 & 1 other)

5-Bruntingthorpe (Leader-Rosy & Chris B)

6-Road Trips/Tours (1 Day events)

A5 Road Trip (Leader EVO 3695)
Derbyshire
Yorkshire

7-Weekend Meets

Stirling
Cornwall (Leader-Imposter)

8-Spa & Ring (Leader-Dan)

9-Other

Please recommend an event

[WR 1mposter]

Excellent post Steve well thought out.

[RobinSherwood]

Good idea Steve.

Happy to do what you have got me down for and will try and help out elsewhere when I can.

[Megaman]

Hi Guys,

I am always happy to organise another Dales run in 2009 if anyone is interested. As some people may come a long way I suggest running it over a weekend so people can kip over the night before so we can get an early start.

Cheers

Martin

[Houdini]

Well done, Steve I do wish you the best of luck in getting the events section resuscitated, and I'm sure there will be great success ahead. I will continue to offer whatever support I can to the club and whilst I might have downgraded my cars somewhat I'm sure we can overcome this for a WR1 event.

[WR1 Bro]

whilst I might have downgraded my cars somewhat I'm sure we can overcome this for a WR1 event.

Fraser who?

[The Swede]

Good luck, Steve.

I think you are touching upon a few reasons.

Some are hard to believe. Given we have very few senior members and very few actually go to the meetings, people can hardly say they're intimidated...

Cherry-picking seems the key word to me.

Looking at it, the decision to 'cherry pick' or i.e. go to a meeting will depend on the relation between activity-attendees-cost.

The activity and cost are generally defining the initial interest. If that is low, then people are even less likely to go.

One could argue cost is the key driver, but since people are prepared to pay for something they value, I want to turn the question around:
Do we fail to organise events that are actually attractive for people ?
So far the only activities we managed to get a reasonable turn-out on, are the ones with a very low cost. That might say something about the attractiveness of our events.

From experience, we know the members here are a different public than the hard-core car enthusiasts we can find on other sites. People are not prepared to pay for / invest time in events that are very car focussed (see Spa trip, Fraser's road trip, etc).

Ideally, we'd get a questionnaire going to check people's preferences, not necessarily for events directly, but just to gather their interests. That could help steering the kind of events to be organised.

Anyone an experienced marketeer on this site ?

[rossjamieson999]

Hey is the stirling meet hapening and wat dates?

[Ferret WR1]

I'll be sorting out a Rolling Road Day at Prosport in the near future.