Feedback Wanted - Did you attend the Conference & Frag Swap in Highlands Ranch?

[rmougey]

Greetings,

Thanks to everyone that attended the event on Saturday, particularly those that donated to the raffles. Your efforts helped fund the event and raise money for the High School. A big thanks to our vendors who also donated frags to the raffle and money to help fund the speakers.

Most raffle items came from our vendors, manufacturers or LFS. Please let them know how much you appreciated their donation.

Looking for feedback about the event. What did you like? What programs did you enjoy? What could have been improved upon? What just flat out didn't work for you? Apologies to those that didn't get their tickets pulled.

If you are an SCMAS or DARC member, please answer these question in your club forums (reefcentral for DARC, thescmas.com for SCMAS).

Thanks!

-Rob

 

[the_fish_man]

Everything was perfectly fine for me!

 

[Zooid]

I think you and Juan did a great job setting this all up, Rob.
I wish I would have had time to see Joe speak.
Aaron did a good job with the frag workshop....now that he's trained some people,
next time they can help instruct with Aaron answering questions that they can't
I'll have to bring a bandsaw for the next one to let them try cutting with that.
The LED workshop looked like it had a bunch of attendees so it must have been good
Plenty of room for everyone too.
I'm impressed.

 

[dv3]

workshops didn't really interest me but it seemed like alot of people enjoyed them ...i would have like to seen the speakers but i think the last one i seen was so boring it kind of turned me off so i never made it up to see one ...personally i would have liked it if the speakers were in the same room and people were free to come and go as they pleased without insulting the speaker and the vendors could have still sold stuff quietly

 

[xsocali]

I think that the event went real smooth and the speakers and work shop were good,all the vendors had some nice coals and dry goods there.Great raffle and a big thanks to Elite and all the other vendors and members that donated to the raffle for Brent.Glad to volunteer for next year.

 

[hurrafreak]

I helped organize the whole event so I'm kind of partial to it but I voted for everything. I guess I just LOVE to hear what the speakers have to say, and learn from them. Some people don't like that but passing knowledge onto people is key in this hobby! I also love the workshops because it gives people the opportunity to have hands on experience on these things that they would like to do at home. And the swaps and raffle give you the opportunity to take home sweet stuff!! The one thing I might have changed is the layout. I think we should have had the vendors more in the back/middle and had the workshops and such in the front. Some people just came to the front and then immediately walked out, while that's cool and you're choice, we do these things to hopefully involve everyone and the next generation of hobbyists.

I love the fact that some students went home with new knowledge on how to frag, new knowledge on building lights, they went home with some cool raffle prizes, and in general some new knowledge!! The coolest thing of the day IMO was this. After the first presentation that Scott gave a teacher at the high school asked Scott and his girlfriend if they could take a look at the tank and give her some tips on what she could do different. Not only did they give her tips (the tank was in "rough" shape) but they dove in head first to TOTALLY re-aquascape EVERYTHING!! We secured the teacher a brand new light thanks to Mike from MTS AND they got every vendor at the show to donate frags and I believe a Koralia from D&G pets. It's that kind of passion in this hobby that drives the MASC board, and DARC to do what we did. I'm sorry for the people that didn't come, it was a beautiful Saturday and there were definitely other things to do lol, and I hope people delved into a little bit more than the swap or they missed out on some cool experiences.

In the end whatever you came for wether it was just for the raffle or just to hear Scott and Joe speak we hope you enjoyed your stay and hopefully appreciate all the hours that were spent ( I mean tons of HOURS) trying to secure everything so that you can come to the show and enjoy a day full of cool stuff! We helped the school with the raffle donations, and we helped a fellow reefer in Brent, and in the end if that's what we have to show for it then I'm definitely proud of the event we put on.

 

[hurrafreak]

I also wanted to say that probably not being on the next BOD I would LOVE to help Rob do next years (if there is one, hopefully) event. Big thanks to Rob, Tony, Aaron, Adam, Gale, Kris, Roy, Derek, and Joe. A lot of great people helped with putting this show on before and during!

workshops didn't really interest me but it seemed like alot of people enjoyed them ...i would have like to seen the speakers but i think the last one i seen was so boring it kind of turned me off so i never made it up to see one ...personally i would have liked it if the speakers were in the same room and people were free to come and go as they pleased without insulting the speaker and the vendors could have still sold stuff quietly

I agree with you that some people were turned off by a past speaker, but Scott was TOTALLY different lol. Hope you can enjoy his presentations later in the future as he is definitely a dynamic guy.

 

[chrislorentz]

Rough estimate on turn out of people?

 

[thejrc]

workshops didn't really interest me but it seemed like alot of people enjoyed them ...i would have like to seen the speakers but i think the last one i seen was so boring it kind of turned me off so i never made it up to see one ...personally i would have liked it if the speakers were in the same room and people were free to come and go as they pleased without insulting the speaker and the vendors could have still sold stuff quietly

Interestingly enough I can speak to this one from both sides of the fence now... Having seen a ton of speakers I know what you mean, and with that in mind I spent a lot of time stressing and freaking out hoping that my own first talk would not bore anyone. It's always hit or miss **ESPECIALLY** when you consider the wonderfully diverse audience that reefing brings. I personally would enjoy an extremely in depth lecture on amino acid trails and yadda yadda yadda, but then again I'm a bit of a geek. Having to present to such a diverse audience made me really second guess what I was presenting and how it would reach each person out there... sadly, I think I could have done better but in all honesty it was a lot of fun and I hope people enjoyed my random BS.

As far as speaking in the same room, I have seen events done both ways and honestly can say that moving the speaker away was a good choice. It's very hard to listen, and interact with a speaker when there is a lot of background noise. Having everything in the same area disrupts the talks as well as the vendors as people get more concerned with noise levels. It's impolite to be loud during a talk, and it's also bad practice to expect a vendor to stop doing business at such an event. The vendors spend an extreme amount of time and effort as well as initial financial investment into their booths at each show, for their sake it makes no sense to expect them to tone down or stop business for a speakers talk.

All told, this was one of the better events I had attended! I wish more students would have come and participated but really it was a very nice day out and I dont blame them for not going to school on saturday. I am glad we could all pitch in for both the students tanks and a reefer in need!

If I were to make any suggestions I would say to cut the talks down to 2 from 3 (to help with that sliding time scale) and find a way to "televise" the talks on the floor so that the vendors and those manning booths could at least see (we do this with many of the nearspace conferences we run, it works out well).

The workshops IMHO were a great idea, while timing had a big play in the grand scheme of things. I saw a lot of people enjoying themselves and learning a lot of nifty tricks during the workshops which was very cool.

 

[dv3]

actually wanted to be there for yours joe but i didnt get there til just after 1pm and didn't want to interrupt ...wanted to go to scotts second one i just kinda felt i would miss something in the main area if i left i guess ...lol ...it sounds like what i missed was a good speaker

 

[thejrc]

he he nah I understand

you shoulda interrupted it woulda slowed me down (I think I rattled on too fast...)

 

[Yaten13]

"I attended just for the frag swap."

Voted this way because I didn't have all that much time and the wife was getting impatient, so all I did was give the vendors a bunch of my money. But generally I like to see speakers, and workshops sound good too.

As far as good speakers go, try to keep it informative, but remember that most of us have ADD of one form or another, so a lot of pretty pics/videos with fun examples go a long way.

 

[little_fish]

I enjoyed the whole thing very well. My suggestion would be to move all the vendors in to the larger area (where they did the workshop), and then set aside the smaller area for the speakers and raffle stuff.