Car Show & Bazaar Planning Update
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July 19 2009
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Greetings!
Thank you all for volunteering to help run this year's Car Show & Bazaar on August 30th. I feel great about the new ideas we're putting into action at this event!
The big decision we need to make as soon as possible is whether or not to farm out our Food Booth to another organization in exchange for a percentage of their profits. Perhaps we could get the local Boys & Girls Club, a Volunteer Fire Dept. or another community group to take on this area of the event.
On the Plus side:
1) We'll be able to use our volunteers more effectively on other tasks like collecting donations at the gate, working multiple membership booths, parking show vehicles, counting car owner's choice & people's choice ballots, coordinating completed judging sheets and organizing a 2:30pm sharp trophy presentation. 2) We'll build a positive relationship with whomever is running the food booth. 3) We won't need to shell out the advance money for Grill Rental, Health Dept. Permit, and about $400 worth of food. 4) We'll save time on set up.
On the Negative side:
1) We won't make as much money on the food booth area.
You can vote on this decision HERE Or...
A few of us are getting together tonight, Sunday July 19 at Panera Bread to discuss this at 5pm.
After everyone has a chance to arrive and pick up a cold drink and a snack, we may take a field trip down to Riverwalk Park just to visualize things and discuss some other event operations issues.
Once again I want to thank everyone. This project requires a lot of advance work. While everything may not have gone exactly to our original plans, I'm still very proud of what we're pulling together. Details below!
Jim
(203) 521-2498
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FLYER DETAILS
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Our flyers are AUDACIOUS! Our flyers scream at you LOOK AT MY PAINT JOB! Special thanks go to Mike Rizzuto and Peter Bartush who redesigned our flyers and to Sam Josovits who got us the deal on the printing costs! Our car show has always had the sharpest looking flyers out there. Way back in the 90's we printed our flyers on heavy multi-color card stock. In the 2000's we started printing with a splash color. Our flyers have always stood out compared to all the other shows.
This year our flyers look like magazine covers! NO OTHER EVENT EVEN COMES CLOSE!
Distribution is key. Even though we've already given out over 700 flyers at Cruise Nights in Monroe, Derby, Danbury, Wallingford, Milford & Hamden, now is when we really need to hit the gas.
Today, July 19th, we'll be at the Shelton Historical Society show on 70 Ripton Rd. We'll also try to make a show at WCSU in Danbury, and two additional shows in Manchester & Enfield.
Sunday July 26th is a BIG ONE. The Time Machine's Show at Guilford Fairgrounds 111 Lovers Lane. This is the second largest car show in CT. (The largest being The Roaring 20's Car Club Southbury Training School Show three weeks after ours.) We'll need at least 5 volunteers to cover the Time Machine's show. Sign Up Here. Also on the 26th, there's a large Thanksgiving in July Car Show sponsored by CT Cruise News in New Milford. There are 2-3 Cruise nights around the state 7 days a week. All of them need to be visited. Sign up here for an assignment! |
Trades & Sponsorships
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 Kate thought of an idea to get golf carts to shuttle committee members around from one end of the twelve acre site to the other. - Ask Car dealers to allow us to borrow a spare cart in exchange for X number of category sponsorships! - Most dealers have more than one cart used for shuttling customers around their lots.
The big question about this is what's it worth in "lost" sponsorship dollars to us? What "sponsorship value" would the car dealers expect in return for a cart? We don't want to give away the store but having a cart or two on hand would be pretty helpful.
Other items we could trade for: We will need signs printed for the Bazaar Area to generate vendors & customers. Would newspapers take sponsorship trades in exchange for advertising?
Something to think about.
Thanks go to Michelle Laubin for re-writing our sponsorship letter this year! So far we still don't have any businesses signed up for sponsorship. We recently sent out letters to 100 top businesses in Shelton. Sign up here if you can help with the follow up calls!
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Judging Recruitment & Training
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Bob D'Amico, President Roaring 20's Antique &
Classic Car Club visited our membership meeting this past week. He's in charge of the Southbury Training School Car Show (the largest Car Show in CT).
Bob gave an outstanding presentation on many of the lessons learned from their giant Southbury shows. We'll likely be stealing some of their quicker AACA judging forms as well as some of their registration & parking methods. They also gave us a copy of their judges disclaimer letter that we will be quoting almost word for word. (basically says thank you for supporting our community fundraiser. If you did not win a trophy we hope you continue to support our community efforts and try again next year).
Bob is willing to loan us at least 4 experienced judges to help at our event. All he is asking in return is that we provide at least 4 volunteers for his event on Sept. 20th (three weeks after our event). New judges for his show do need to attend a 1 hour training. It actually only takes about 30 minutes. All guest judges are partnered with experienced judges on the day of the event.
The next judging training is Monday August 10th 7:30 PM at Thomaston Savings Bank 985 Watertown Ave. Waterbury. Click here to sign up!
With the additional categories we've added we may get well over 300 cars. We'll need as much help as possible.
If you know anyone, regardless of age, who is an auto enthusiast, please recruit them to help us judge. Just like the giant Southbury Show, we are not a "sanctioned concourse caliber" event. Our judges are not expected to be experts! You just need to know the basics (like where the engine is). After that you just compare condition and cleanliness between each car in the class, fill out an easy form and choose the winners!
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Parking, Gate & Show Car Registration Team
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 This year we have the materials needed to actually have a gate!
Over three thousand feet of rope is being donated by Bronson Country Club. We've also received enough posts to fully enclose the show vehicle area. While our event is FREE and open to the public, we will have signs that say "Admission FREE, Donations Welcome!" All we need are enough volunteers to put a couple of people at each entrance to collect money! Sign up here!We still need to modify last years parking plan to include all the new categories. This year we'll need more people first thing in the morning guiding cars to their parking areas. Our registration line will change a little bit to incorporate what we have learned from the Southbury folks. Sign up here! |
Vendors
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 We've already received money from 20 vendors. The latest vendor to contact us was GIECO. We may actually have a salesperson dressed as a Gecko handing out free gifts this year.
We've sent press releases to all the major newspapers, community cable listings and radio station listings but we can still use more vendors.
Pass the word to friends family and coworkers. Tag sale opportunity here. $20 buys a 30'x30' space. $15 buys a 12'x12' space.
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I'm convinced that with all the new people, new ideas and new energy going into this years event, this will be a year to remember.
Jim
(203) 521-2498
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