Promotion of meetings. - Page 2

Peter Scillitoe · 24 Jun 2002, 21:30 (Ref:320750)

A couple of friends of mine attended yesterday's excellent HSCC meeting at Brands. They both thoroughly enjoyed themselves, but could not understand why the crowd was so small. Answer, Octagon did not - to the best of my knowledge - promote the meeting. Why not? This is now the closest major historic meeting to London, but nobody outside of the sport new it was taking place. Criminal IMHO.

**Stephen Green** · 25 Jun 2002, 07:02 (Ref:320983)

The club owners pay to hire the circuit for the day but keep all the entry fees. The circuit gets the money from the clubs plus any gate money and extra cash from any 'sales pitches' they sell.

JR Ewing · 25 Jun 2002, 08:05 (Ref:321008)

Also, for example, look at your finals for any meeting on an Octagon track. ANY hospitality is only allowed with the permission of Octogan - and guess what, you've got it a permit at £££..........

**Peter Mallett** · 25 Jun 2002, 08:43 (Ref:321054)

Quote:

Originally posted by Peter Scillitoe
A couple of friends of mine attended yesterday's excellent HSCC meeting at Brands. They both thoroughly enjoyed themselves, but could not understand why the crowd was so small. Answer, Octagon did not - to the best of my knowledge - promote the meeting. Why not? This is now the closest major historic meeting to London, but nobody outside of the sport new it was taking place. Criminal IMHO.

The BARC Classic Package in May was bigger and it drew a seriously large crowd. I believe it was promoted by the sponsor (CSMA).

Stacy · 25 Jun 2002, 08:58 (Ref:321070)

Quote:

Originally posted by Peter Mallett

The BARC Classic Package in May was bigger and it drew a seriously large crowd. I believe it was promoted by the sponsor (CSMA).

I understand 40,000 came through the gates over the weekend.

**Stephen Green** · 25 Jun 2002, 09:46 (Ref:321104)

Possibly more. I heard above 12,000 on Saturday and 35,000 on the Sunday. In terms of racing the BARC and HSCC packages offer similarly good racing. In many ways it's a shame they couldn't be combined and given a fantastic weekend.

As Peter knows (Mallett and Sillytoes) I was there for both days of both meetings. The racing on each occasion was good, but the atmosphere at the CSMA meeting was calculably better given the size of the crowd and the family atmosphere.

This take me back to my previous question, what happened to the free race days hosted by The Sun, Evening Standard and the likes of Radio 1? Surely local radio stations such as Virgin, Invicta and Capital are large enought to be able to do something? One wonders how much willingness there is on the part of Octagon to spend the money to promote smaller meetings.

flagwaver · 25 Jun 2002, 20:06 (Ref:321507)

The only reason some race tracks hold race meetings is so when the corporate punters come along they can say that they have raced on a race track that someone has herd of.
Most circuits make far more money on "drivedays" than on most meetings. The other advantage for the circuits is they have complete control.
A lot of club events might as well be run as closed events for the ammount of spectators they get. It would cut down on costs.
Several rallies are already run like this.

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