Ok, a few things.
Much thanks to Carnac for creating this thread and for formatting it and then most everyone else following the format.
I want to discuss a few things.
A. I had planned on putting up some signage directing rally attendees to the field, but I was sick with bronchitis right before the rally and I lost 4 days of prep work-honestly, I am lucky I was able to attend. Next year I will make some signs.
B. We had planned and anticipated having a Public Address (PA) system this year like what we had last year, but the person who was going to let us use his screwed us over at the last minute, leaving us unable to acquire a replacement. I will look for something next year. I would love to have some kind of programmable sign with a digital readout that could be put up in a central location (near the campfire) that could be programmed to read whatever we wanted (i.e. "Next trailride departs 1330 hours", "Lunch will be ready at 1130 hours", etc.). That may be technologically and financially out of reach.
C. Spots/Parking - I am not sure what to do about this but Carnac is definitely correct about potentially running out of room. The problem is that it would be an epic amount of work to mark out spaces-we'd have to agree on what size to make them, then mark them off and make sure we are leaving enough room for people with long trailers to get in. Just the sheer amount of either paint or engineer's tape (this is what Carnac used to mark off the MKT and campfire areas) is overwhelming. I think we would be better served (for now) by expanding into the bottom portion of the field that we didn't use this year. If you came in through the open gate and turned to the right and headed down the field, towards the area Zout and Drew (I think that's his name) took with their M109 and M35's, you'd see more open field to their right. I think next year we will direct people into that area in order to make sure we don't run out of room.
D. Head count - I've always wanted an accurate head count but the difficulty in obtaining it kept us from doing so. In all honesty, the only purpose having a head count serves is to try and plan for how much food to buy and for record keeping purposes (growth rate, etc.). The only practical way would be a manned gate and wristbands. I'll get to the manned gate issue in a minute.
E. 73M819 said: "name tags that can be put in tag holders so tags are not lost, this we could use ONE tag per person". The problem with this is that the rally would have to foot the bill and the rally uses what little profit it makes from the MKT for the next year's food. I thought Kenny's name tags worked well this year and if we had a manned gate, we could give each rally attendee a few nametag stickers.
F. 73M819 said "every MV is given a numbered tag to id that truck, a master log is kept with the id numbers, this will tell who owns it, what it is, anything special, so if someone or a VISTOR wents to know about the truck , the owner can be found" A good idea but a LOT of work for a potentially unlikely situation. Probably not enough payoff for a lot of work.
G. 73M819 said "mandatory gathering at a set time each day to cover rally info" - impossible-you'll never get even 25% of the people to show up. How do I make it mandatory? Threaten to throw them out if they don't show up? I've run a lot of events and believe me, things like this never work.
H. BlythewoodJoe said: "One thing I would suggest would be a central command post of some kind with a bulletin board or some other devise where the days quasi plans would be posted. I understand most of the events where plan as you go, but a more announced trail rides would be nice. I didn't plan to ride much but it seems I would notice people leaving before I had a chance to prepare my truck and get in line." This was definitely a problem. Without either a set schedule or a functioning PA system, the trailride notification system was lacking. I am not sure what I want to do about this. Setting a schedule is easy-sticking to it is near impossible. We tried running them on a schedule in the past and it was just a nightmare trying to stick to it (and we ultimately failed).
Now, the bulletin board is a great idea and since we are going to have a command tent and a manned checkpoint this year, we can easily have a dry erase board. We can put whatever announcements on the dry erase board we need to (lunch will be hamburgers and will be served at 1230 hours, trailrides at 1330 hours). As people come through the gate, they can be told "If you have questions, come to the dry erase board!".
I. Command tent/manned gate/etc. One of the reasons I have never tried to do this, even though it would solve a lot of problems is that it's a thankless task. It would eat up a person's entire day and keep them from being able to go on trailrides, it would greatly limit them being able to socialize and would hurt them if they were trying to sell stuff. I absolutely hate the idea of asking someone to do this. If there are volunteers that is great but I really hate the idea of having to have someone do this as it will turn the rally into more work than relaxation for them. I know that for me, I was not able to do nearly as many trailrides as I wanted and there were tons of people I never even got to meet in between rally responsibilities and trying to help clintogf with her vendor space. If a person is going to man the gate and be the primary POC for fresh arrivals I recommend we schedule it so that they only have to do it one day, leaving there other days free for socializing/trailrides/swap meeting, etc.
In closing, a lot of good ideas have been posted in this thread and some of them are definitely going to put into play (Joe's bulletin board, a command tent, a manned gate check, etc.). Some of them would require too much work to be feasible.
This year, we concentrated on really growing the rally-getting vendors to show up and pushing up the attendance #'s. I think now with 75 trucks, at least a dozen vendors and at least 200 people, we can concentrate this year on improving the organization of the rally.
The primary things I want to work on are (in order of importance to me):
1. A fixed menu for the MKT that doesn't change.
2. Some kind of better organization for the trailrides: Either a set schedule or announcements 1 hour ahead of departure time.
3. Refine the vendor area (get everyone on the left side of the lane)
4. Properly use the camping area to it's maximum potential
The fixed menu should be easier this year; with last year's and this year's profits, we are already a large amount in the black, which will allow Mike and Wreckerman to set a menu ahead of time and follow it, regardless of price fluctuations in the marketplace for raw materials.
The trailride organization will be solved with either one or a combination of several things. A bulletin board at the manned checkpoint or the command tent and a PA system. It's either that or a rigid schedule that is not allowed to change. I don't see another way around it.
Refining the vendor area is pretty easy-as people come in the gate, the gatekeeper directs them to the right area and if they don't comply, they get asked to comply. Same goes for the camping area.
