2020 Dinghy Show

Originally posted by ian.r.mcdonald I am hoping that the RYA throw away the " How we run the show" file and start with a clean screen/ piece of paper in the new venue. Looking forward to seeing an all new format, based on the fact that 75% of the visitors are repeat customers and need some all new stuff to encourage them to visit. With Winter becoming a rarity, and a free car park perhaps the drive south is viable.

75% repeat visits. Maybe they actually want fresh blood?!

What *should* the show do - forget what. It does that doesn't enthuse you - that is irrelevant it may enthuse others. What is it that you feel is missing...

Originally posted by polc1410 If it's £££ - then there is a question about financial viability of a class...

A pukka Class with an RYA registered Class Association gets a heavy discount on the cost of a stand, anything else pays full price.

It actually doesn't take that much money to run a Class Association (after all you don't employ anyone unless you're a Laser class or something), and as JS says the cost of the show looms large. Large as in by far the largest single item in the budget. Second to that used to be printing and postage for newsletters, but that's largely on line now. The smaller and more interesting classes at the show might have 50 paid up members paying say 30 quid a year, and that's their entire income. In my CA committee days our entire publicity budget consisted of the show and ads in Y&Y for the show issue and the Racing Classes review. There was no money for anything else. The only other expenditure I recall was newsletters and the like, plus prizes for Nationals and Travellers, and events weren't subsidised by the class, they had to break even.

I suspect to an extent Social media is an issue for the show. It used to be that it was a once a year meet up to see your friends who were now in other classes, compare notes, gossip and the like, but I expect that mostly happens electronically now.

Edited by JimC - 04 Mar 20 at 9:12pm

The " trapeze tacking competition " was part of my suggestion to include within the new appealing 2021 show.

Lets hope the RYA take the opportunity in the new halls to try and get some of the people who used to go, back as visitors

AllyPally: 9126msq
Farnborough: ~16,000msq

As CA member I’ve been around this particular buoy , about 10 years ago the CA has to buy a stand at the show just to show it was alive. I remember everyone thinking that if we chose not to go it would signal the decline of the class and start down the slippery slope of losing the critical mass, so from that point of view the show had us and every other strong CA.

Around this time I recall the Phants who are a very strong association decided not to bother, and it had little impact on them. ( apart from saving circa £1500). From that point every year more decided not to bother, we took this view as well and threw in with our builder instead, which is ok but not the same for the visitors.

To my mind the rightbprice to the CAs is critical to ensure the show feels like a true representation of the Dinghy scene. That feel has been my main concern about the show, and this time was the worst, fewer dinghy classes, more industry/commercial stands and most worrying lots of non Dinghy stands taking up vast swathes of floor space, making it feel like the RY A was desperate to fill the room..

If Farnborough reverses this trend it will be worth the extra 25min in the car.