First off I very much enjoyed the rod show there in NC last month. I was wondering about the numbers of rod buiders who attended. Since this was a multiple day show were the builders who attended each day counted more than once? I attended both days so I wonder if I was counted as "two rod builders"?

I got some conflicting information from someone else and just wonder if the figures you gave earlier were accurate or did they reflect the counting of some of us more than once. If that is the case, then the number of rod builders there would be somewhat less than reported.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/15/2007 09:23PM by Bill Napier.

I'll bet that I can guess where you got the "conflicting" reports!! All you had to do was look around to see the crowds and number of vendors there compared to other venues. If there had been 20,000 builders in attendance, they would have said that nobody showed and it was a flop!!!

Mike (Southgate, MI)
If I don't want to, I don't have to and nobody can make me (except my wife) cuz I'm RETIRED!!

I hope I'm not speaking out of turn for Tom, but on several occasions I remember him saying that during counting they set out the "duplicate" tickets or registers. I'm sure he will give a better answer shortly.

That's a fair question. No, you were not counted twice. Over 1500 individual rod builders attended the event. Any less and we'd have had some pretty upset vendors. It takes a minimum of 150 rod builders to support each retail sales exhibitor. Any less and somebody loses money, which vendors typically don't like very much.

Here's how we count them - we relied on the main door prize registrations to get our rod builder numbers (we count ticket sales but that alone won't tell us how many rod builders there were because some of the attendees were just fishermen). Out of roughly 2200 attendees, there were almost 3000 door prize registration tickets filled out (many disregarded the notice about entering only once - one builder from this very forum entered no less than 25 times). Removing the duplicates, we were left with 1879 individual registrations.

On the registration tickets, a box was there to indicate if you were or weren't a rod builder. About 60 people didn't bother to check either so they were not counted as rod builders. The rest were considerate enough to provide us with that information. That left us with 1580 individual people who indicated that they were rod builders.

The issue of how many rod builders actually attend this event comes up each year. I guess those who are less succesful just can't stand the fact that this event is the major success that it is. But each year the numbers add up all the way around. I talked to dealers who sold over $20,000 worth of blanks and components this year. Several of them in fact. Several others did between $10,000 and $20,000 each. In all, over $100,000 in blanks and components were sold off the exhibit hall floor in just two days. A couple or three hundred rod builders cannot possibly account for those kinds of sales figures.

We had seminars running concurrently and each room would have anywhere from 60 to 80 attendees in them which accounts for 120 to 160 people nearly every hour of the day and yet the main exhibit hall floor was still packed. The reception was open only to RodMaker subscribers and not all of those could stay over Saturday evening. And yet, right at 350 were there for the reception. It was easy to tell that even with that large number in the reception room, the size of that crowd paled in comparison to the size of the crowd that we saw on the exhibit hall floor during the say Saturday.

No, you were not counted twice. And no, I do not have to fudge on the numbers or exaggerate anything about this event. This is one heck of an event. Believe it. I'm not the one who has to use mis-information or word play in order to get people to attend. When you have something this good, it stands on its own merits. You can only fool people for so long before they see through any guise. If I was fooling or misleading them, they'd have stopped coming long ago and I'd be hard pressed to persuade any vendors to buy booth space. But each year more and more builders attend and this year... I even had to turn a few vendors away.

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Not realizing that the main door prize registration was also being used for gathering information as to who was or who was not a rodbuilder I for one was not counted as a rodbuilder in attendance.Didn't need a kayak.Surely I wasn't the only one,maybe so.In any case let the record show there were at least 1581 rodbuilders in attendance at this exceptional event.

The gentleman that I traveled with to the show did not fill out a door prize ticket for the same reason. So make it at least 1582!

That's why I said there were 1500+ rod builders in attendance. If anything, my figures are on the low side.

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The ICRBE is something I do for the rod building craft and industry because no one else is willing to do it. I'm not out to make money on it. I want the builders to have a great time and I want the vendors to make money - everything is set up so that it represents the best value and best educational opportunity in all of custom rod building. No, I don't make any money on it personally and I never intended to (just don't want to go deep in the hole). It's just something I thought our craft should have. Now we do.

I don't think I should have to keep explaining this sort of thing every year. If you add up what the ICRBE event offers and at what price, versus what any other rod building event offers and at the price they charge, well... I think the world's custom rod builders have proven that they're smart enough to see who is doing what and why.


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While overall the partons of this site are said to be the weakest contributing link to Toms and sponcers empire of events and publications...were known for being cheap, but the Expo drew nearly 20% from this site alone. It not a huge amount only 1/5 of the ppl who attended, its approximatly half the profit margin on most sales, factor in the cost of a booth and it might have been all the profit margin one cleared. Saying nothing about getting your name out there and what you offer. All the little bits add up to make a whole, and that whole successful (not to call the expo a Hole) and I think the cheap guys like me on this site did well for once when it came to a regonizable contribution worth noting, instead of a lack of, too bad it always seems to be somehow always cash related.

It wasn't my intent to cast doubt on the numbers, Tom. I only wanted to confirm the way you counted the builders. I was at the event and if you had told me that there were 2000 rod builders there I would have certainly believed it. The place was really packed with rod builders! It was a great event and much larger and educational than I had been led to believe it would be by some others.

This came about because I had inquired about the small size of a competing show and the high admission price and related participation fees they are charging. I just wanted to point out that it was hurting their attendance by working class rod builders like myself. What I got in response was how you had counted each rod builder three times, once for each day, and then used that figure as a total. This sounded odd to me right off the bat because you only had a two day show, not the three day event that they claimed. It was apparent to me that they were either getting their information from people who hadn't even been there or were just plain making it up. Your explanation above on how you accounted for the numbers you gave satisfies me completely.

Sorry if I sounded like I doubted you. That wasn't it at all. Just wanted to confirm some things in my own mind. Now I know who's being honest and who isn't.

Chris,

I have no idea what you're talking about above. Sorry, I just can't make head nor tails of it. I'm guess I'm missing something. This site does extremely well for the sponsors - many of them tell me it is far and away the best bang for the advertising buck going in the rod building world. I'm glad it's productive for them. On the other side of the coin, RodMaker Magazine has to subsidize this website. We've had a broken banner ad system for almost a year now and no money to fix it. Again, this site is meant as a service to the custom rod building craft, not a money maker for me. I wish it was but I don't charge membership fees to use this site. It's open to the rod buildling public at no charge.

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Bill,

I may have misinterprested your intentions and hope I wasn't harsh in my reply. It's just that this kind of thing gets old after awhile. My endeavors can withstand scrutiny and they certainly stand on their own merits. They serve the craft in a way that no one else ever has and when I have to listen to the usual misinformation campaigns run by those who spend more time on carping on the hard work of others versus spending time making their own endeavors better it just starts to get under my skin after awhile.

No hard feelings on my end. I'm glad you enjoyed the show. You were there, you experienced it firsthand and should be able to draw your own conclusions.


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This seems to be an ongoing situation. If all the "organizations" spent half as much effort on promoting the craft of rodbuilding as this site, RM magazine and the ICRBE, instead of "protecting their turf", making money and putting down the efforts of everyone else, the craft would be a LOT better off!!

Mike (Southgate, MI)
If I don't want to, I don't have to and nobody can make me (except my wife) cuz I'm RETIRED!!

Chris,

I've reread your post a number of times but am not sure I get the gist of it. If you're trying to say that I should spend more money on this site, I can only say that I don't have it to spend. I do what I can and offer free services and resources that no one else does. Of course, if it's still not enough all I can do is offer you a refund, but I'm in a bind there as well, because you don't subscribe to the magazine, you didn't buy a ticket and attend the Rod Expo and you don't pay anything to use this site. Not trying to be smart at your expense, but please understand that I do what I can within the confines of the monetary resources that I have to work with.

If I have misinterpreted your post then I sincerely apologize.


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I have a hard time understanding most of Chris's posts.

Rolly Beenen
Rovic Custom Rods

I honestly don't know what pouring more money into this web site would accomplish.

.org is the absolute best run site I visit. You come here for one reason, rodbuilding. You don't come here to talk about anything else. People use their real names and don't hide behind internet identities. This causes us to be honest. The wealth of information on .org is expansive...and to think the contributors are willing to share that knowlege with everyone!

This is surely a great resource Tom has provided us with and it is my opinion that there isn't much that can be done to improve it.

Jay

Well I've just heard it put here (and not by me until now and its more of a reiteration on my part) that most of the partons of this site are sort of a frugle bunch with our money, not buying alot, or subscriptions, or lots of how-to books or thats the take I got from others who posted and said things to that effect. Or that we look for things on the cheap, That fits me well enough so I can't argure, (Tom put it well enough when he was trying to figure out my refund in one of his preceeding posts) and I am sure there will always be those that buy everything in sight as soon as it is available. From what was said as to the frugality of site watchers, these other people who spend alot, were not in the majority. So to then to hear that the site produced 1/5 of the attendees to the Expo seems like an accomplishment for those who are hard to seperate lots of cash from, in that 1/5 can make or break some shows. Just glad we did so well considering the sterotypecasting I have heard on this site before. This is not to say that all the 1/5 who attended where site regulars, but to hear that 1/5 claimed they heard about it here makes even the frugalest amoungst us feel like we can still accomplish something, even if it was indirectly, sort of success by assoicaition, instead of the guilt of being just cheap by association.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/16/2007 07:50PM by Chris Karp.

HUH?????????????

Mike (Southgate, MI)
If I don't want to, I don't have to and nobody can make me (except my wife) cuz I'm RETIRED!!

When I sit on my swing in the back yard relaxing sometimes I end up watch a long string of ants hurredly moving through the dirt. The individuals ants typically are climbing over each headed in opposite directions. I wonder which direction will prove to be the ultimate goal. Most would end up calling it chaos. The ants behavoir is quite similar to a few posts that appear on this site. I am quite sure that I do not have the mentality to fully understand what I am observing in either case.

We have a lot of customers from this site and I don't think "cheap" or "frugal" describes many of them at all. I think "smart shoppers" would be more accurate, which is typical of almost anyone buying online. When you can sit in the comfort of your own home and "shop", why wouldn't you look for the best value? I know I do. I saw several earlier posts get removed from this thread where readers took offence at being called “cheap”. A blanket statement like that covers a LOT of people who aren’t under that blanket. In fact, I’d say with confidence that it covers a vast minority.

If Rod Builders as a whole were "cheap", we wouldn't stock every Super Seeker blank made, or bother with things like Titanium Guides or Alps Reel Seats. In looking for new products, I don't look for items for items based on price point. The trend I'm seeing is definitely towards a "step-up" market, which is anything BUT price driven. If our customers were "cheap", I'd have a big selection of Aluminum Oxide guides in stock. Fact of the matter is, we've been with Fuji for several years now and I can honestly say I’ve never even been asked for a set of A.O. guides. We have Books starting at under $5. Our best seller is the most expensive one on the shelf @ $40 (yes Billy, you have a best seller). All of these are strong indicators that builders as a whole are NOT cheap.

I do see a lot of posts here where a Builder may be looking for a way around spending $300+ dollars on a Power Wrapper or $60+ for a dryer. I think that's just Human nature when you get into something new and are faced with start-up costs, whether it's a hobby or a new business. Face it, there's a lot to buy when you're starting with nothing. I also see these Guys/Gals "evolve" after they've got those start-up costs behind them. When their microwave turntable powered dryer finally gives up, I don't picture a lot of then dumpster diving for a new one.

Many readers/posters here are retired and on fixed incomes. That tends to allow them time to look for alternative methods. I think most readers/builders would too if time allowed.

Back to the original point of this thread, I was at the show and saw lots of new faces on day two. My guess on a head count would have been higher than Tom’s actual numbers.


Mark Griffin
[]
C&M Custom Tackle
San Dimas, California

All rod builders, if they are going to build rods, will have to purchase blanks and components. From that standpoint, the sponors on this site are gong to reap benefits, and most likely more so than on any other rod building website With 7,000 registered users, it's only natural that this place offers a tremendous bang for the buck. Percentage wise, however, you end up with a greater number of, shall we say, "thrifty" rod builders here than say those who buy RodMaker or attend a rod building event, etc.

I'm tnot aking issue with Chris' post, just trying to understand his point. If it's that I need to put more money into this site, I can only say that I don't have it to spend. And if I did, most of what was available would probably go into the show itself or the magazine.

I should also mention that all the registrations that said "internet" were assigned to this website, but it may well be that the official show website (www.rodexpo.com) was what some or even many of them were referring to. Next year I'll be more specific on the list of choices.

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