Not that Voltaire was a cyclist, but I can understand why there are no cycling events in Candide. I think promoting an event would have broken even Pangloss' resolve. Would have ruined the whole book.
You see, most promoters approach events as a very non-idealized business activity. The goal is to balance the income and costs to bring you out in the black. To charge the highest reasonable fee to guarantee income. To spend a little extra to make the event fun and flashy.
I don't. I approach it as a kind of non-profit public good event, where you charge as little as possible to cover overhead and you strip down the unnecessary stuff to make it more affordable for the riders. In the second year of doing this, I'm once again learning why nobody else does it this way. It's because every single interaction I've had just pressures me to do it the business way-- all these hassles would disappear if we just paid the fee, hired people instead of scraping together volunteers, and so on. They want you to hire a litter crew, porta potties, traffic management people, to pay for barricades and trash barrels, and we say no to all of that, often having to put up a fight and muster our own volunteer resources (and my personal time) to get away with it.
Because we've minimized registration fees, the budget is tight. Razor thin. If we didn't get our deposits back, we'd be completely screwed. We show up on day one in the negative in a pretty serious way. We hope it will turn out, and if last year was any sign, it will. But had we charged more, we could have solved more problems in the easy, "professional" way and had more wiggle room for when things come up.
Just yesterday, we found out that we're being slapped with another ~$200 in fees. I don't think people understand what this means. We could have charged every rider $5 more and had the wiggle room to make it happen, but we didn't. Instead I need to fight it, negotiate it, work it out, whereas I could have just thrown the money at it. And this fee is coming from a place that should be "on our side." Or at least I'd hope...
Anyway, I guess I'm just saying that being an idealist about this is really, really difficult. It is definitely turning away from the easy road. I really don't have the time or resolve to fight this stuff much more, but I hope others do. I don't think there's any future for cycling at $35 for beginner races. But promoters can't all risk the money and do it for free. It's a tough balance.
Ridden and Reviewed Kona Libre CR
8 months ago
4 replies:
I'm sorry to hear you're getting stuck with more fees. I realize what a hassle this has to be for Half Acre to put on these crits and think it is awesome that you are giving us the opportunity to come and race five nights in a row at an insane to pass up price. Look at how huge the women's 4 field is compared to last year though! I'm super psyched to possibly get my butt kicked on Monday. = )
It's not an easy job having a hobby of event promotion as there is so much work that goes into it. I think low cost events are really important but I know how hard it can be to keep from losing money. I've put on some money losing events but they were still cool and I would (will) probably do it again. You're doing such an awesome job though so I hope in the end that the racers appreciate you and your team's work!!
hey girlie, you are doing such a good thing for female cycling. you are my hero julie.
I agree with everything posted above. In my limited experience, event promotion is always hard work and sometimes thankless. I agree that this - and perhaps especially NON-road events - is just not a "business" that will ever pay what it costs to create in terms of man-power. Almost every event I can think of is created as a labor of love (and sometimes flat-out exasperation), and volunteer efforts. I'm thinking about my experience with WORS and WEMS races and the local MTB time trials here in Wisco. Every one of them rests on a backbone of people giving time to trails and negotiating with parks and officials, not to mention working hard for sponsors. I guess what I mean to say is RIGHT ON, I hear you, and thank you so much!
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