A recent email discussion has suggested capping the attendance at the annual National Rally. This is a new initiative and is worthy of discussion.

In previous years, 2016 was the first that we actually started a formal registration process, previously you registered with the campground and Redwood accepted whoever arrived.

What are your thoughts, both pros & cons of capping registrations and what should the number be.

I believe that the rally attendees could receive more BANG for their Buck with limiting the number..

The big question is, should it be held to 100 ?? With never attending a rally, its hard for me to imagine keeping more than that number of attendees pleased.. I would think that anything larger would need outside assistance for certain things..

I agree, more people becomes harder to manage. I would rather keep 100 people happy with good stories than 150 people frustrated because we weren't able to manage. The reality is there are a limited number of us. If we have too many rigs for Redwood to handle tech repairs, we have lost a major benefit.

We might set a limit of 100, but be willing to stretch to 125 if the registrations come in before a certain date.

Some other thoughts we need to consider:
- Limiting numbers to at or below the Shipshewana South Park capacity will ensure we can remain at this campground, which in my opinion is the best location for our needs
- The size of the 2016 rally, from a management perspective, definitely stretched our resources
- If we cap at less than campground capacity, other RW owners that didn't make the cut will still be able to make a reservation at the campground. They may also try to attend rally events. We experienced this issue at 2016, when a SOB registered, then cancelled, but still attended.
- If we set a cap and stick to it, it will set a precedence and encourage owners to register early for future rallies. This helps greatly in meeting the campgrounds registration metrics to maintain sites for rally attendees.
- The current metric for reserving 140 sites is we must have 50% (70 rigs) registered with the campground or all sites are released to the public.
- If we set a cap and then accept additional registrations we may find challenges in future years getting owners to sign up early.

Capping the number at 100 leaves out the potential for the rally to grow. I suggest we cap it at a slightly higher number, with an early (June 30) registration date. This will make things simpler and accomplish all you want to. Also, if someone cancels after paying, we should charge a cancellation fee of $10.00 for the effort of repayment. This is not unusual for events like this, and some will not grant a refund at all within the last month before the event.

Elliott,

When considering dates for cut-offs, early bird, etc we need to be cognisant of the terms in the campground contract.

Andy

I was just throwing out an idea. Wasn't sure of the dates,so I put one in as an example.

Elliott
On the road again, soon, after the Redwood is repaired.

I was (I think) the one that suggested a 100 rig cap. My intention with this is to list it as "There is a limit of 100 Participating Coaches, to ensure your spot, you must register by April 30" We could make the date later, but I believe the campground contract has a March cutoff for a certain percentage. The other thing is from my perspective, I need to know for certain that I have funding long before June,

Also ~ FWIW, in checking with other SOB owners, it is not uncommon at all for Rally registration to be $65-100.00 Not saying we should go that high, but $50.00 / coach is in no way unreasonable.

And in my personal opinion ~ I don't see a need to offer "Earlybird Discounts" You either want to come and participate and partake of all that there is to do - or you don't.

And in my personal opinion ~ I don't see a need to offer "Earlybird Discounts" You either want to come and participate and partake of all that there is to do - or you don't.

Vaughan,

The discussion on early bird discounts was in response to the fairly slow uptake in registrations last year. Fortunately last year we had no formal contract, only that they would hold about 100 sites until about end of June.

In mid-May 2016 we had only about 57 owners registered, so when you consider cancellations, almost 50% waited to register, until less than 3 months before the rally. Even after the cut-off, I believe we got at least 5 additional coaches.

It makes sense to limit the number of attendees to the resources that we have, it sounds like 100 is a good number for a successful rally.

Just a little over a month ago, we were speaking of a goal of having 140 in attendance. Now, it seems it’s dwindled down to 100. It looks as if we’re capping our growth potential by limiting the number of attendees (which is already capped because the campground can only support so many units).

With Marketing in mind… we want to expand the number of members, just so long as you don’t attend the National Rally? – which is every members’ right to do. We have an obligation to make the Annual General Meeting open to all members. Limiting how many can attend could conflict with our By-laws.

The Early Bird discount I think would promote members to not wait until the last minute, an incentive which if acted upon, would save people some money. (I think the Early Bird discount should be a figure that still covers all expenses), and those that wait will have to pay more. What I think could happen, is to limit the number of Early Bird registrations to the first 100 units, after that, the price would be more.

Right now, it looks as though we are talking about 2 catered meals, a RW catered meal, and continental breakfast. There is usually a pot luck dinner, for the last meal. If three of the meals are catered, would we not expect that to be set up by the caterer, and cut down on the workload significantly?

At the end of last years’ Rally, we had a good turnout of volunteers for the 2017 Rally – 22 people if I remember correctly. Even if half were still interested, that would help defray what workload is left; if as Terry pointed out, each volunteer had specific assigned responsibilities throughout the Rally.

When people arrived at last years’ event, they were to meet at the big tent to sign in and collect their bag of goodies. I’d like to suggest having a ‘welcoming committee’ deliver goods to each site, which can be metered out accordingly. A group of two could accomplish this over the course of a few days.

Make it 99 more rigs. I'm going :).

Make it 99 more rigs. I'm going :).

At least we'll get the hot tub at the Rally like we talked about in 2015!

Sorry, I left the hot tub at my parents in AZ. We are on our way to TX now and aren't taking it with us. Will pick it back up next winter and use it again while we are in AZ then.