Dan,
Housing is NOT my problem, nor the driving. I live less than 12 miles from the convention area! It perturbs me that I have to spend $60 (and that proposal was CHANGED six days later!) for a ONE DAY pass to enter the vendor hall ONLY. AND then I want to buy stuff. I have to pay premium price to spend my money at the show? Remember the $110 for all others attending, is for 4 days. The proposal to me ($60) was a one-time, one-day deal to enter the vendor’s area. I don’t think so.
I guess what needs to be done then is for a lot of people to email the organizers of the pasadena convention and persuade them to have the dealers room open to the general public for one day at a more reasonable price of like $25.00. If they did they, would make a lot of money to go towards paying for the hall rental, especially if they also advertise it locally so, it gets the general public to come in. Lets face it, kids love trains, as well as Dads, so it should be a win win situation and a no brainer for them to do. The organizsers get the door receipts and the dealers have an even larger crowd to sell thier wares to.
Maybe getting the dealers to also talk to the organizers about having a public day might help as well.
Dan S.
Hear is an off the wall idea. contact one of the dealers that you know will be there and make the proposal that you will work for him for free for one day or two days which will allow him to be able to leave his area and walk around some to meet with other dealers and such. This gives him some free time with you helping him out and that way you get a dealers badge so you can also be able to walk the room and buy stuff when the dealer is there in his area.
Couldn’t hurt to try.
One other idea is to contact a local community paper and see if they would be interested in doing a story about the convention and you could be a non paid reporter for the paper and intervue some of the attendies for the story and have access to the dealers room to intervue some of the dealers. The paper should be able to provide you with a press badge if they are interested in doing a story.
Press Badges get you into most anywhere.
dan S.
The website is asking for “volunteers” what that entails I do not know.
I do know I applied to have 2 passes, one for myself and one for a helper, which I currently do not have, so as we get closer to the show (its still two months away) I might be able to offer a “trade” for the pass if whoever gets it offers to help watch over the pizza (I’d like to walk around myself ya’know)
How this would work over the 4 day show I’m not sure yet, I dont know how the folks at the show would react to possibly having different people show up on different days using the same pass.
Dan Stuettgen said:
I guess what needs to be done then is for a lot of people to email the organizers of the pasadena convention and persuade them to have the dealers room open to the general public for one day at a more reasonable price of like $25.00. If they did they, would make a lot of money to go towards paying for the hall rental, especially if they also advertise it locally so, it gets the general public to come in. Lets face it, kids love trains, as well as Dads, so it should be a win win situation and a no brainer for them to do. The organizsers get the door receipts and the dealers have an even larger crowd to sell thier wares to.
Maybe getting the dealers to also talk to the organizers about having a public day might help as well.
Dan S.
This is EXACTLY my point. With regards to LS railroading in general, the public thinks (incorrectly I believe) that our hobby is ONLY for the well-heeled. We need new blood to get into model railroading to increase the foundation of the hobby. A single day open to the general public, if only for part of that day, at a fee of $25-$30 per adult, children under 12 free, teens maybe #10
, would “help” to tweak some interest. For folks like me, with a few bucks to spend with vendors, might purchase an engine in O3 as a way to break into the smaller size NG segment of the hobby. Just a thought.
I have talked to “other” NG fans in the last few weeks and one of the reasons for the higher cost of these conventions is that the local unions involved in unloading vendors products into the halls have to be compensated. The vendors are not making that much from these conventions as it is. I’m sure that the vendors would appreciate the added crowd from “outside” the hobby.
Off my soapbox now.
I live near Pasadena and would readily attend the “for sale” room if there was a fee closer to the BIG TRAIN show in Ontario, Calif. I’m puzzled on this one. What is the motive in excluding potential enthusiasts and those who wish to purchase products and yet not pay for the workshops?
Do the vendors agree with an attendance price so high it restricts those who might purchase their products?
Who are the organizers of this convention?
Walt
Keeps the riff-raff out, I guess.
They probably figure anybody who can afford the new Bachmann locos should have no problem paying the entrance fee.
Just think…you might even get to meet the Great Howard himself.
Never know.
Anything can happen…
TOC
Gary: you will be happy to know that when the Convention makes it to Houston in 2015, the vendors won’t have the Unions to deal with for loading and unloading, so there in no cost that has to be passed on to the attendies to pay the union. We do our own loading and unloading and nobody tells us when and how we move things.
I know all to well how the union thing rares its ugly head out in CA. AT the Last Large Star Wars convention out there, we had dealing with them and it was very dis-tasteful. The members of the Robot group I belong to were not allowed to bring thier own robots into the convention center and had to be moved by union members and only could be moved in between the hours of 7am and 9am, plus it cost each member that brought a robot $10.00 per pound for the robot to be moved in. Considering some of the robots weighed in at 150 pounds or more, it was highway robbery for us to be able just to display something that the fans wanted to see.
I made up my mind then that I would never display anything at a convention where I was not allowed to carry the items in myself and where I was forced to pay a union laborer to move something I was capabale of doing
Thank God that Texas does not let Unions rule convention activites here.
Sorry to be on a soap box about it, but I have never liked unions from back when I was 18 and was forced to join one when I lived in Conneticut just to be able to work and then having to pay 1/4 of my salary to the union in dues.
Stepping off the Box.
Who’s next to climb up.
Dan S.
Gary: On a different note. I will talk to the organizers of the 2015 convention here and get them to have a one day membership for people that just want to visit the dealers room. I hopefully will make the realize that it is beneficial to all concerned. They will make more money to help cover the cost of the convention and it will bring in new people to the hobby. Train shows are big down here, to bad we only get two of them a year.
Dan S.
Interesting, so far as I know us layout guys are responsible for bringing in, setting up and take down ourselves. I have not seen anything other than that but then I am not selling anything.
Vic Smith said:
Interesting, so far as I know us layout guys are responsible for bringing in, setting up and take down ourselves. I have not seen anything other than that but then I am not selling anything.
Vic,
This union information came from a mutual friend of ours regarding a NG convention many years ago in N. California. At that time, the union workers were seen as the reason for the higher cost for an entry fee.I never mentioned or insinuated there is a problem with THIS convention. Just sayin’.