Hi Bill,
I didn't mean to badmouth RTMC which is very good. Just that I
noticed that it's got a lot of other things going for it besides
vendors. I see it as geared more towards ATM'ers with some observing
and some vendors thrown in. NEAF appears to be more of a big
equipment expo. It just seems to me that California has a very large
amateur astronomy crowd and when you include some of the contiguous
states you're talking a real potential market. Looking at the NEAF
write-up on Cloudy Nights it seems to me that a lot of the vendors
are home-grown Californians. If you could attract 2-5000 people to
a weekend event (include some interesting lectures) that's a lot more
potential customers than attends any of the large star parties. Make
it a big event and people will come. Most of us wont ever travel to
NY for NEAF. If we held it in early December , after the major star
parties are over and Christmas is just around the corner, we might
even convince Al Nagler and other eastern vendors to attend just to
leave the dreary eastern weather behind. Anyway it's just a dream
right now but who knows what could develop with a little hard work.
Dennis Beckley
At 08:25 PM 10/12/2005, you wrote:
>I don't necessarily agree with the supposition that RTMC doesn't cover the
>"star party" aspect. NEAF is pretty much an indoor event unless you do solar
>(and if you do the Solar Star Party put on by Rockland and Barlow Bob
>Godfrey is tops) and one could make the argument that the talks at RTMC are
>right up there. RTMC may not be on many short lists for observing sites but
>it sure beats the pants off Suffern!
>
>Not that the idea for another astronomy expo is a bad idea in any way but
>the folks who put on the two shows do an absolutely fantastic job. Money is
>tight for vendors and when you look at the schedule with WSP, NEAF, TSP,
>RTMC, and maybe Astrofest for domestic shows the travel budget is getting
>pretty well spent. Then throw in the rest of the larger regional star
>partays and the dealer events. Maybe the way to approach this is to get the
>dealers interested and see if that trips any triggers- might be an even
>tougher sell than to manufacturers though. The lost revenue of sending out
>sales folks to hit the road is real, covering expenses for a trip just
>doesn't cut it these days.
>
>We have it plenty good out West believe you me. Pretty hard to beat SSP and
>CalStar and if the folks over there even had an inkling of what we have here
>we'd be looking at even more traffic.
>
>Clear skies,
>Bill
>
>-----Original Message-----
>From: sf-bay-tac-bounces@No-Spam [mailto:sf-bay-tac-bounces@No-Spam] On
>Behalf Of Dennis Beckley
>Sent: Wednesday, October 12, 2005 1:05 PM
>To: sf-bay-tac@No-Spam
>Subject: [TAC] Bay Area NEAF
>
>Spent my idle lunch hour looking at the Cloudy Night's recent review of the
>Northeast Astronomy Forum (NEAF). I thought to myself "I probably don't
>spend enough money on astronomical products. Wouldn't it be neat to have a
>huge Vendor's get-together here in the Bay Area!". It could be done on any
>weekend (clear skies not a necessity, exept for the solar scopes). Moreover,
>the states of California, Oregon, Washinton, Nevada and Arizona could
>certainly generate the crowds. I dont' think RTMC really adequately covers
>this missing astronomical "star party" link. Wonder if there's any interest
>in TAC on organizing an event like this and what it would take to get it off
>the ground (maybe with the help of several local vendors). We could call it
>"SWAF" for Southwestern Astronomy Forum, or something like that. Why should
>astronomers in the Northeast have all the fun?!
>
>
>Dennis Beckley
>
>
>---------------------------------
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Received on Wed Oct 12 20:57:09 2005