Re: charlene again, and next year's convention (fwd)

[Neil Frank <nfrank@mindspring.com>]

An immediate discussion with Charlene would be helpful... she may have some
reasons (e.g. large room rental fees, speaker expenses if any, or other
large fixed costs). She may be thinking from a money management point of
view.  Of course, her late decision is not going to sit well with
registrants who already bought nonrefundable tics. These factors would have
to be weighed in any recommendations on this precarious situation. Because
AGA is responsible for any potential negative income, it should have been
involved in the financial management of the convention.. including timing
of registration, contingencies,etc. Of course hindsight is always better.
Regarding the offer from Niagra Falls club or Sacramento, I cant decide if
those sound more like regional events than "national" ones. And the amount
of "plant focus" is extremely important. I have always felt that the ease
and cost of getting to a convention location is an important but not only
factor. I would hope we eventually move to the approach that ACA and maybe
other national clubs use. They have at least one proposal to consider ,
then they pick the best one. There are many factors as you all know.
Neil. 

 At 10:37 AM 9/20/2002 -0700, you wrote:
>I'm a little disturbed by this message below.  Charlene is saying that if
>we don't have a certain response (she doesn't say how many) by October 8,
>she may c*ncel the convention.  Kathy and I were about to make our
>non-refundable reservations for the conference.  The idea that Charlene
>could just up & canc*l it one month before the event is quite annoying.  
>[Sorry, can't use the word ca*cel because it bounces the mail back to me!]
>
>I would like a decision by the board on whether it is OK to let this 
>happen. 
>
>I haven't written back to Charlene on the matter yet.  I sort of doubt an 
>APD posting is going to cause massive signups, but I also have no idea how 
>many we need to have sign up.  It's that whole "secretive" thing again.
>
>I should also add that there is no incentive to sign up early.  There is
>no discount for pre-October 8th.  Most of the people I've talked to are
>really annoyed about the high price, late timing, etc, which you've all
>heard from me already.
>
>Kathy keeps saying we need to confront Charlene on all this.  I'm on the
>fence for doing it now, because I'm not sure what good it will do at this
>phase, but strongly in favor of doing so right after the conference.
>
>
>
>On a related subject, I noticed the big response to my post of the CAOAC
>note last week (sarcasm).  I had a similar offer made to us last weekend
>by Kevin Plazak of the Sacramento Aquarium Society.  They are hosting an
>annual convention called "FINDIG".  It was 2 weekends ago.  It was kind of
>like 3 conventions in one; they had circuits for Cichlids, Livebearers,
>and Rainbowfish.  The venue was shared, so the overhead was lower.  He has
>offered to have the annual AGA convention as part of FINDIG next year, and
>I offered to present it to the board.
>
>Kevin also mentioned a few things that I don't think we are really 
>utilizing in our current convention, i.e. Marineland speaker program.
>
>What I'm looking for with THIS issue is some input: does it make sense to 
>partner with one of these "meta-conventions"?  Do we lose anything by not 
>going on our own?  Do we gain anything?
>
>Thanks,
>
>  - Erik
>
>-- 
>Erik Olson
>erik at thekrib dot com
>
>---------- Forwarded message ----------
>Date: Thu, 19 Sep 2002 08:03:13 -0400
>From: Charlene Nash <ecn@tennis.org>
>To: "'erik@thekrib.com'" <erik@thekrib.com>
>
>Hi Erik, be thinking of the equipment list needed for the conference. I have
>no carryover in my head from last year so tell me what I need to bring and I
>can make sure the Aquarium will let me take it to Texas. If not, we may have
>to rent at the hotel's exhorbitant prices! Also if you could put a note on
>the website and maybe send one to the APD encouraging people who want to
>attend to go ahead and register. If everyone waits til the last few weeks as
>usual, we may have to cancel. If we don't have a substantial number by Oct
>8, we can cancel without penalty but after that it is very expensive (unlike
>the lax Clarion hotel here). We would encourage folks who want to come to go
>ahead and register soon to help us know the numbers we can expect. Thanks
>Charlene
>
>
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