This was my third ICRBE event. Great show! Best one ever maybe. I do have one suggestion. Some of the dealers come back every year. I wonder if it might be good to rotate or phase out the older long time dealers that are always there and phase or rotate in newer dealers that have not been there yet. This would give more of the overall dealers a shot at the pie and maybe introduce some new blood to the show that the attendees are not getting to see each year. No complaints on my end, it was really really really great every year and this year was the best ever, but I would like to see some new dealers in place of those that are already there year after year. Thanks, just a comment and suggestion to consider.

This was my first ICRBE, however, I've been involved with many conventions over the years and my impression is that if there were "new" exhibitors that wanted to be at the show, Tom would accommodate them. The fact that the convention moved to a larger venue this year attests to that. I'm not sure which "dealers" you want to phase out but in my opinion the opportunity to get so many vendors to participate makes this an outstanding event. I'm not sure what your point is, do you want to make the show smaller? I think getting the most rod builders and the most vendors in the same place at the same time is the goal. It was an outstanding event.

Steve Hartzell
Lake Conroe - Willis, Texas

As far as I see it there is an open enrollment in the gestation period of the show. Those that want to be there I`m sure have the opportunity. Some of the west coast venders cannot make it profitable to carry stuff across the country and back and sell it at a discount to boot. those that do attend see the value and reup as soon as Tom starts accepting contracts.

Freddwhy (Rapt-Ryte)

I am almost sure I had read here earlier and been told by a few that the number of component and blank dealers is limited so that all can enjoy good sales instead of a horde of them that all go away losing money because of to many of them all being there at the same time. If that is true, my idea is to rotate dealers from one year to the next so that all may, "share the wealth" and give the newer guys a chance to take part. Plus it would be exciting for the builders to be able to visit different dealers each year. Just a suggestion of course.

There has never been any limit on the number of manufacturers allowed in. However, the number of retail blank and component vendors has always been limited for the very reason stated above. I have allowed new ones to come on board at about the same rate that the show has grown. It's not good business to fill the hall with so many vendors that the sales pie is cut into so many pieces that none of them find the show profitable. Sure, it'd put more money in my pocket, but for how long? The reason the companies we have keep coming back is because they make money here. When they fail to do that, they'll stop coming.

Preference has always been given to the companies that have been with us from the start and/or those who advertise in RodMaker, which is the entity that subsidizes the event. By the same token I can see some benefit to your suggestion of rotating companies so that the vendor situation remains fresh. I'm just not sure how practical it would be.

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If I was a vendor and went to a particular show year after year, and all of a sudden I was told I can't come back because one of my competitor's was taking my space.....how would you react? lol.

Nothing says "Thanks for supporting the show" like, "um, you're old, go away!"

Shaking my head here. This sounds like an "Everybody deserves a trophy" moment.

Kevin Knox
ANGLER'S ENVY CUSTOM RODS
QUEEN ANNE, MD 21657
#_#_#_#_#
www.anglersenvy.com

To be fair, there is some conversation from long time vendors aimed at stopping any new vendors from getting in, and even to push some of the more recent arrivals out. It's a two way street.

We were able to double the number of attendees each year for the first few years but it's unreasonable for any to have thought that was going to continue forever. I certainly didn't. This is a small craft with a limited number of participants. We're seeing 3% to 5% growth each year now, which remains remarkable amid a general fishing hobby that is downsizing each and every year. The continued success of the Expo has caused some to harbor unrealistic expectations as to how large such an event can actually get. Expectations which simply cannot be met no matter what anyone does. Keep in mind that prior to the Expo, no rod building event had ever drawn more than 100 to 150 people, and most drew less than 50.

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I've been both involved with and in charge of fishing shows on and off since the early 80s with the Lake Ontario Trout and Salmon Association (LOTSA) and have experienced much of what Tom describes above. On one hand, you have the loyal dealers who come back year after year and have a public following of people who come to the show mainly to see them. On the other hand, you have the customers who you have to get through your door year after year and who eventually will stop coming if they don't see something new and different. One the third hand, you have some specific draws that need to stay the same no matter what because people expect it (like a kids fishing pond) and heaven forbid if you ever miss a year of it. On the fourth hand, you have draws that need to change every year like educational seminars; these seminars need speakers and sometimes the only way you can get them to come is if they can set up a booth also. On the Fifth hand, you only have so much space. On the Sixth hand, you can't have a glut of dealers selling the same stuff because people start undercutting and no one makes any profit and your show gets the reputation of not being profitable and then you loose long time supporters. On the seventh hand, you have people who support you all year long who don't do your show but decide they would like to. On the Eighth hand, you have people who just do your show for the profit and give you no other support all year. And on and on....... point being that until you actually organize something like this, you probably don't have any idea how complicated it can be to balance something like this.

So for months and months you plan trying to factor in all these considerations and you come up with what you feel will be a well balanced show and then you open it up for people to sign up and you get too many of this and too few of that, and the trout unlimited guy with the must have fish pond is sick, and the club that meets once a month and they have to look for some volunteers and you don;t hear back from them. This is a big problem because if you don't have a pond this year you will have to reconfigure your floor plan to accommodate additional booths...And I haven't even mentioned what's involved in renting the space and getting it set up. Did you know sometimes you have to hire teamsters to unload and load dealer's displays and the dealers have to arrive at the door within a certain order or the teamster boss gets po'd and threatens a work stoppage?!

Most of us go to a show oblivious as to the months of hair pulling and utter frustration that the organizer experienced to give us a great experience. Tom's ICRBE is larger than anything I have been involved with so I can appreciate that his problems and concerns are even more numerous than I have experienced with the shows I have been involved with.

The very fact that this show continues to grow after 10 years is proof that's he's making the right decisions and shouldn't second guess himself. My recommendation to him is to remember that while this may be "our" show, it's really still "his" show and only he can make the decisions. So having rambled on here for a bit, my proverbial hat is off to Tom for a job continuing to be well done.

You bring up some excellent points and it's obvious to me that you do have some experience in this area. What I think we're down to now are expectations that may be a tad unrealistic. Of course, this sort of thing is only coming from a few and they're not upset, they just want to do better and better each year. Who doesn't?

I spent roughly $30,000 on advertising for this year’s Expo. We pulled in somewhere around 3200 attendees.

So what would have happened if I had spent $60,000 on advertising? Would that have resulted in us getting 6000 attendees? Absolutely not. Most likely it would have added another 100 at best. There are only so many rod builders and only so many willing to travel any distance to attend an event. We’re getting 90%+ of what’s possible now so the Expo "pie" is what it is.

This craft is tied to the general fishing hobby which has been on the decline for the last 20 years. In 1992, there were 30.7 million freshwater fishing licenses sold amid a population of roughly 275 million. In 2012, there were 28 million licences sold, which now includes both fresh and saltwater, amid a population of roughly 315 million. That’s a startling decline in the per captia number of fishermen and it surely affects the custom rod building numbers.

Go back 10 years and ask anybody if it would be possible to have any sort of rod building event that would draw 2000 to 3000 people and they would have laughed in your face. Now we have those numbers attending each year and the same people say it could and should be higher. These folks have short memories and their present expectations are simply unrealistic. It’s called being spoiled by one’s own success.

For what it’s worth, every single attendee that stopped by the booth to comment on the event, and there were hundreds who took a moment to do that, said they thought this was the very best Expo ever. I don’t think I’ve had more than maybe three even remotely negative comments and those came from dealers who made good money this year, but didn’t make as much as they would have liked to have made. And who among us wouldn’t like to make more each year? We’re just involved in a craft where that’s going to keep getting harder and harder to do.

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John, well said!

Very good stuff to think about John and Tom..

BTW...John, with 8 hands you must be a heck of a fisherman...

______________________________________
Super Tight Lines......Don

All the Expos have been great! This year was even better than great, if such a thing is possible. If you have dealers complaining about how much they made, they might think about bringing something different from year to year. As it is, how many dealers do we need all selling the same product? There were two there selling MHX rod blanks. So they cut their own sales by half. At least three and maybe more four were selling Batson blanks. So that sales pie was cut into four pieces. Same with some of the guides and seats there.

No way any dealer should blame Tom or the Expo for them not selling as much as they would like. The place was packed. Everybody was having fun. People were spending money. I spent over $700 this year. If a dealer isn't happy with his or her bottom line they might want to consider their product line or sales tactics. There is NOTHING at all wrong with the Expo!

Ken I totally agree with you. The NERBs have done 8 shows, and at every single show we've had new products that nobody else has (or wants, lol). I think a lot of people buy a small amount of items from us because of that, and a lot of small purchases adds up. While I have won the worst booth layout 8 years in a row, the booth has had a lot of different things going on each year to draw a big crowd. Demo's on Dec wraps, grip turning, massive amounts of custom rods, lots of laughs, Q&A's, coffee, donuts, and even hidden coolers of beer! lol.

Billy Vivona Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
the booth has had a
> lot of different things going on each year to draw
> a big crowd. Demo's on Dec wraps, grip turning,
> massive amounts of custom rods, lots of laughs,
> Q&A's, coffee, donuts, and even hidden coolers of
> beer! lol.


From what I can see, Billy is what draws the crowd....he always has a pose following him where ever he goes.

______________________________________
Super Tight Lines......Don

Each day since the Expo I've talked to more and more of the companies that were there. Reviews have been glowing. The vast majority of the retail blank and component vendors there set new sales records, even if just by a bit, and most of those say their margins were better than ever. The builders were there and they were spending money.

I remember having this same conversation with Billy the second year he displayed at the Expo. He hadn't done as well as he had the first year and was a little dismayed. After we spoke, he went back with some new ideas and has since reinvented the NERBs booth each year and now continues to do well. The others that do the same are the ones that are getting the new business each year now. You can't do the same thing year after year and think you're going to keep increasing your sales.

................

......... so I guess it's for the vendors and not the attendees ........... limiting the competition and the new ideas limits the chance to find the good deals. Why should I spend hundreds in travel expenses if the competition is limited and the nuances are limited by the promoter?

Hello Richard

If you don't like it don't go!

Bob,

New Bern, NC.