An Idea To Improve The National; An Open Letter To The Board

[calvindog]

Originally Posted by bcornell

I've been to 12 Nationals and they are in a steep decline in quality. It's practically all Tristar (autographs) and 'corporate' booths now along with $25 admission fees, which is just obscene.

I would agree that the quality of the material from National to National is in pretty steep decline -- but isn't that the dealers' faults as well? As for walking a lot, well, a) this is the nature of the beast considering the size of the floor and the number of booths in existence; and b) having taken a look at the size of most of the hobbyists it might not be the worst thing in the world to get these people moving to some place other than a feed bag.

[wonkaticket]

I would add in the little train from the show Silver Spoons.

[7nohitter]

Originally Posted by wonkaticket

I would add in the little train from the show Silver Spoons.

HA! And Dexter Stuffins!

[slidekellyslide]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wzDaNEJudAs

[drmondobueno]

Originally Posted by calvindog

I would agree that the quality of the material from National to National is in pretty steep decline -- but isn't that the dealers' faults as well? As for walking a lot, well, a) this is the nature of the beast considering the size of the floor and the number of booths in existence; and b) having taken a look at the size of most of the hobbyists it might not be the worst thing in the world to get these people moving to some place other than a feed bag.

Hey! I resemble that remark😎

[Exhibitman]

Oh, I agree we are a bunch of lardasses (mostly) who benefit from walking and I'm not complaining about having to cover the mileage per se. It just frustrates me to have to cut around the corporate crap. Here's another idea: aisles between the corporate displays. There were some parts of the floor where they had multiple booths with no passage between them.

[ullmandds]

being young(46) and relatively fit...I do not mind the walking...what I didn't love is the difficulty in figuring out booth #'s...and I would prefer similar material grouped together.

But...part of these complaints are what make the national what it is. You have to hunt for things...if everything were organized there would be no hunting. There would also be issues with dealers providing customer attention...whereas with us having to walk...and "find" certain dealers...this creates more even time for them to help customers.

Additionally if all material were grouped together...a lot of people would come and go quickly figuring they have seen all they came to see.

So I don't think like material will ever be grouped together...it really doesn't make sense.

For those who want material grouped together...there's...oops...there used to be ebay!

[calvindog]

Originally Posted by Exhibitman

Oh, I agree we are a bunch of lardasses (mostly) who benefit from walking and I'm not complaining about having to cover the mileage per se. It just frustrates me to have to cut around the corporate crap. Here's another idea: aisles between the corporate displays. There were some parts of the floor where they had multiple booths with no passage between them.

LOLOL they WANT you to have to run into the corporate sponsors, etc. at every turn. That's the point! And yeah it was kind of Twiilight Zonish after a while. Wherever you turned or whichever path you took you ended up back in front of one of those massive corporate signs and areas.

[Rickyy]

I haven't been to a National or a large show in years....but it still sounds the same in terms of not being customer friendly. I can understand the logic of wanting the attendees to comb and look over every dealer, but a specific print out listing of dealers and their specialties would be helpful. I went to a antique show many years ago where they had a booth that you can stop at and they could print you out a list of dealers based on what you were looking for... (ex: post cards) and they would sort and print out the location map of all post card dealers in the bourse.

Ricky Y

[BeanTown]

Onething I would say is never select a city which requires union labor to help dealers move in and move out. It doubles their cost which gets passed down to customers I imagine. Las Vegas does this for The SEMA convention and its a joke how much the bill is afterwards.

[rdwyer]

How about coming back to Southern California?

[Exhibitman]

Originally Posted by calvindog

LOLOL they WANT you to have to run into the corporate sponsors, etc. at every turn. That's the point! And yeah it was kind of Twiilight Zonish after a while. Wherever you turned or whichever path you took you ended up back in front of one of those massive corporate signs and areas.

What was weird about the set-up from that perspective was that quite a few of the corporate booths had sides that were enclosed so you literally would dead end into the back of a booth panel. Big waste of potential visibility That was mostly the graders, but there were also significant dead ends at the unopened card seller booths and one of the card mfgs had a set-up that was closed off on at least one of the sides.

To echo others, displaying booth #s should be mandatory, like addresses on curbs.

[bostonmarathonman]

Originally Posted by calvindog

b) having taken a look at the size of most of the hobbyists it might not be the worst thing in the world to get these people moving to some place other than a feed bag.

:d :d :d