[JONAT] Why the low turnout in many areas?
Jerry Mouton
jonat@autox.team.net
Thu Jun 24 18:23:01 2004
Mark et al,
Boy, your ideas really resonate with our sector, too.
Our sector started Friday, and so made a great
3-day weekend. We had a route from SF to San Luis
Obispo, then back, and lots of folks came along.
A rest day in SF in between, then Tues-Wed up to Eureka.
A completely different crew on that section, and fewer.
People on that sector mainly came out for a one-day drive.
We do have some die-hard club members out here, to be
sure! The weekend worked the best, by far. Hard to figure
how to make all sectors weekends without shutting out
long-distance drivers, who will have to plan for that
much more vacation time and money.
Having people from other areas along seems to me to be
a real draw -- Craig and Fazal made it seem like a really
international event, and they were new nice people that
club members enjoyed meeting. This aspect of the tour
brought out quite a few more club members than might
have otherwise have been expected, and this year's
participants will make them enthusiastic to do it again.
So, we need to continue to inspire the few to go
longer distance.
And JCNA affiliation would definitely go a long way to
increasing participation. Our club would very likely set up
a JCNA event or two in coordination with a big National
event like that. And having an event would bring out lots
more, some of whom would drive along, too.
All in all, our turnout was as large as I had hoped for.
Remember that huge groups will make it into quite a different
event. Our trip was like a group of friends taking a nice
long ride -- actually, two groups of friends taking two long
rides.
One issue I have is variety. Next time, it seems pretty unlikely
that we would choose a very different route in our sector,
unless we decided to drive along the Sierra. However, it seems
that people may not be as interested locally
in doing the same route again. But another route
would mean much more time, much farther away from the
home base. Does anyone see an alternate route on their
sector that will work as well as this year's?
Jerry
Jerry Mouton '64 E Type FHC "Laissez les bons temps rouler!"
----- Original Message -----
From: "Mark Stephenson" <marks@jaguarot.com>
To: <jonat@autox.team.net>
Sent: Thursday, June 24, 2004 4:15 PM
Subject: [JONAT] Why the low turnout in many areas?
> There are a number of reasons, many of which are interrelated. Here are
> the ones that come to my mind. I'll rank them in terms of impact as I
> see it.
>
> Critical
>
> Planning time: Bob and Craig, you are exactly right. We were asking
> people to plan a vacation of a week or more, have their car prepped and
> roadworthy, but we didn't have the route finalized until a month or so
> before the start. We are a tour for and by the common-man Jaguar owner
> (if there is such a thing). That means that we have family, work,
> financial, and car repair commitments that we have to fit into the
> available hours of each day. Very few folks with normal jobs can take a
> week off on that short of notice. Generally it's something they set
> aside at the end of the previous year or the very beginning of the
> current one. If we want people to plan this as a holiday, we need to
> have the starting and ending points and holiday destinations of each
> sector for the entire route unalterably set well before the end of the
> year prior to the tour. It means that we have to have the full
> compliment of SCs in place a year in advance. With exciting stops to
> entice them and ample time to ready their Jaguar, owners will consider
> us for their holiday. To be honest, I think we should start recruiting
> SCs and begin the general discussion the 2006 route as soon as the 2004
> is wrapped up. We can keep it light, brainstorm ideas for six months,
> and scrounge up SCs to replace the departed.
>
> Big picture: Based on our experience with JONAT 1, focusing on people
> spending weeks on the road is a mistake. You could probably count the
> number of people who participated for more than a week on one hand (OK,
> maybe with a couple extra fingers). I think we should market the tour as
> participation in a continental relay, encouraging participants can cover
> as many sectors as their schedule allows. In that regard, the current
> fee structure is ideal. A flat JONAT rate for one sector or all keeps
> things simple. With the shift to a local focus, this becomes much more
> of a local event with local flavor planned for local Jaguar owners. Even
> if I wasn't in my local area, I'd prefer the little-known out of the way
> places to the tourist traps anyway. What this means in terms of route
> planning is that each sector should be a loop. SCs should map link from
> their major metropolitan center to the start and end of each sector. You
> might do what we did in Arizona and map out a shorter link or two for
> people who don't have the time to do the whole sector. If you want to
> make it interesting, these should be on different roads than the sector
> route.
>
> An event of note: Second only to sufficient advance planning, it is
> imperative that there be something that a lot of people is going to want
> to do on every sector. I placed this after the big picture only because
> "noteworthy" means to the local folks who are your prime audience. I was
> drooling over some of the stuff the California sectors were doing.
>
> Getting the word out: You really have to expend a lot of time and effort
> to raise the level of interest. You are going to have your core of
> driver-owners who will take any excuse to hit the road. In our club
> there are about five. There are another ten who will make it if you give
> them a good reason. After car problems and scheduling conflicts, that
> left the ten stalwarts on my sector. If I had had the time to call every
> club member, I could have probably talked another five to ten members
> into bringing their cars. It really boils down to months of contact,
> mentioning it at every club meeting, keeping the active local members
> apprised of how the route is developing, getting their input for places
> to go so they feel a part of the process. You have to have a route to
> get them excited, which gets back to early planning. I know that in two
> years, if the route comes through here again, I'll have a larger
> contingent, just based on the feedback the ones who joined this year are
> passing along to other club members.
>
> Important
>
> Sector organization: One thing that worked well with our sector was that
> we started mid-week and ended on a weekend. This makes the sector a long
> weekend for the participants. That'll create more interest than a
> Tuesday through Friday sector. Participation is going to be at an ebb on
> Wednesdays unless you have something amazing planned, which is not
> highly likely. In keeping with the proposed new big picture (above), the
> handoff time on the weekend should be set so that participants can make
> it to the sector's home base that weekend. In other words, sectors would
> run for a half-week or, if someone is willing, about a week. Whenever
> possible, the handoffs would take place Wednesday and Saturday or
> Sunday. In our case, our handoff was five hours from Phoenix and about
> the same from San Diego. A Saturday night or Sunday morning handoff
> would have been perfect. The joining San Diegans could have driven
> Saturday to get there and the departing Arizonans could have left Sunday
> for a leisurely drive to Phoenix or Tucson. We had the mitigating
> factors of heat and the Fun Run, so Sunday evening worked well, but we
> lost half of our remaining eight vehicles after lunch because they
> wanted to head back. Real life will impinge on the schedule, but we
> should do everything possible to avoid a mid-week sector.
>
> JCNA Affiliation: I really think the biggest single thing we could do to
> play up "JONAT, the Sequel" is to form an affiliation with JCNA. It
> would be a win-win for both groups. This goes back to critical advance
> planning. Having been involved with the Challenge Championship, I know
> that a continental tour would be outlined in the Jaguar Journal at least
> a year in advance. In our case, CC artwork and major details had to be
> there three months before that. Imagine if we had the basic itinerary
> including all the stops published on a two page spread in the Jaguar
> Journal a year before the event. Imagine updates and an entry form in
> every issue until the tour ends. Imagine insurance coverage by JCNA's
> blanket policy for members. Suppose JCNA encouraged all the clubs along
> the route to hold their concours the weekend JONAT passed through. JCNA
> would be ecstatic because the tour would boost concours participation.
> Imagine someone traveling just a short distance on a two week vacation,
> accompanied by a bunch of Jaguar enthusiasts, hitting a concours each
> weekend and making the minimum requirement for JCNA ranking. What if
> there was a JCNA-sanctioned rally Sunday that was part of the JONAT
> route? Or a slalom, as part of a Wednesday evening handoff? We'd have
> immediate credibility with JCNA's longtime sponsors. The possibilities
> are endless. This is something else we should begin to do as soon as the
> 2004 tour is over.
>
> Not so important
>
> Advertising: None of the big Arizona driving events, from the lavish to
> the most economical, make a concerted effort to attract participants.
> People already know about them. They've developed a following via
> word-of-mouth. The high-dollar ($1000+/day) tours garner attention
> simply by being there. They get free newspaper coverage. TV camera crews
> broadcast from the starting line. The quality of the cars and the
> notoriety of the people make them noteworthy. The tours for normal
> people ($100/day or less) don't get the coverage, but spread the word
> through the Internet and the local clubs. I say clubs because they are
> all multi-marque. They also have a higher level of organization,
> services and amenities than JONAT provided. All have tow vehicles and
> all provide some or all food and lodging, with the amount and quality
> being reflected in the price. Neither model matches ours, as these are
> all self-contained loops.
>
> Tour fee: Our current one-price-for-all is ideal. Trying to set prices
> for each sector would create a nightmare of accounting. I don't think
> bumping the cost up $5-10 next time around is out of the question, but
> using that for advertising is going to be relatively ineffective, with
> one, maybe two, exceptions. If we don't affiliate with JCNA, Jaguar
> Journal ads for the year before the tour would be the best targeted.
> Another option is a mailing to past participants, but, since we are
> primarily Internet-based, do we need a mailing?
>
> Valid reasons for low turnout?
>
> The biggest difference I see, between JONAT and the other events is that
> we have a much smaller base of cars to draw from. I'm not disagreeing
> with the concept that it be Jaguar-only. It's just that when you have,
> for example, 20-30 active Jaguar Club members in my area you don't have
> the pool to draw from that you do when you add 50 active Triumph Club
> members, 40 active MG club members, ten active Lotus club members, five
> active Rolls-Royce club members, etc., etc., etc.
>
> Another factor is where you are and when. I think the Arizona Sector was
> a great success given that at the closest point, we were 150 miles from
> our core constituency (Phoenix) and it was the first year. Some of you
> may not realize, however, that at the handoff with Denver, on a Tuesday,
> in the middle of nowhere about 400 miles from Phoenix, Albuquerque, and
> Denver, there were only three cars -- Robert, Denver SC; Dick, AZ ASC;
> and me. We picked up a straggler the next morning, another one the next
> evening, and a bunch at the Grand Canyon the following day. It will pick
> up as the legend grows, but we aren't ever going to have a big showing
> in the middle of the week in the middle of nowhere.
>
> Those are my thoughts.
>
> Mark Stephenson, Sector Coordinator - Arizona
> Jaguar Owners North American Tour (www.jonat.org)
> April 15 - July 4, 2004
> AZ Sector Home Page - http://jonat.org/sector/info.cfm?sequence=7.0
> Arizona Sector Report - http://jonat.org/mark/JONAT07AZReport
> Route details - http://jonat.org/mark/secdetail/secdetail.htm
> Printable maps - http://www.jonat.org/mark/routemaps.pdf
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: jonat-admin@autox.team.net [mailto:jonat-admin@autox.team.net] On
> Behalf Of Bob
> Sent: Thursday, June 24, 2004 11:45 AM
> To: jonat@autox.team.net
> Subject: [JONAT] RE: Disappointing turnout in NE
>
> Craig
>
> You are right. We have to create a demand for the Tour to be a holiday
> - in essence we have to try to get people to consider this as a holiday.
>
> Bob
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: jonat-chat-admin@autox.team.net
> [mailto:jonat-chat-admin@autox.team.net] On Behalf Of talbotc@telus.net
> Sent: June 24, 2004 9:50 AM
> To: jonat-chat@autox.team.net
> Subject: RE: [JONAT-chat] Disappointing turnout in NE
>
> Hi Bob,
>
> Somehow I think that its just the nature of the beast. Most people have
> families, and for a lot of them it isn't a holiday to go on a driving
> tour through their local area. They seem to want to go somehwere, see
> what's there and head home. When I first mentioned the idea of joining
> the tour, I knew I'd be doing it alone, as there was no way my partner
> could spend that much time
>
> in the car without being a total grouch.
>
> For me it just happened to come at the right time when I had the time
> off to
>
> be able to head down to SF and join the tour, but it was a substancial
> financial obligation considering fuel and accomidation costs. My week on
> the
>
> road for just me cost about as much as my partner and I spent two years
> ago to go to the UK for 2 weeks. I think for most people its a no
> brainer - a week in the car or 2 weeks in Europe for the same cost?
>
> Just my take on things. All that being said, I'm glad I went to
> California as I had a great time, the weather was perfect, the scenery
> was amazing, and the people warm and friendly, but it was an expensive
> holiday.
>
> Craig
> Calgary SC
>
>
> Quoting engl@jonat.org:
> I think this is the thing
> > that surprised myself the most that more people were not considering
> > this
> a
> > holiday and taking a week for the Tour - most seemed to take a weekend
>
> > or
> a
> > day or two.
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