Volunteers for Conference committee

Ok. Dave has given his permission and blessing on the idea of a conflab of some description. We need a leader and many,many others to make this happen.
Fully understand that this is not immediate. Who, what, where, how much, when,etc. is all hanging out there. Primarily as a gathering of friends with common passions. The multiple forums (and growing every day) would all have equal weight. Having said that, guess the top billing would necessarily be Gardening as it will represent Dave's Garden and the membership. Now is when your ideas are desperately needed. Your experience and those who are just plain willing. The cross-section of our membership is daunting and there is someone out there with the capabilities to handle every single detail. What a great thing if we could actually do this. Dave's motto is "By gardeners...For gardeners...".
This can be transmutated into "By friends...For friends.."

God bless and have a wonderful time of Thanksgiving.

Christi

MEMEMEEMEMEMe

I will help anyway you all want me too!!

Almost ditto of Mitch. I can't promise to do whatever you want, but I will participate and do what I'm able.

Note to Mitch: Careful what you promise.... ;-)

McGlory - I know but I am very willing to help with a great wife. I have never ever worked on anything like this before but I have some great ideas and cannot wait to get started.

I always admire those with unbridled enthusiasm. :-) And they're fun to tease...

Oh My Gosh!!! Yayay,
I am Judy and would love helping in this main event!...
hahah, so excited i've got tears...and Happy Thanks Giving...
...Will start helping by spreading the word!

I would love to help out on this as well. I have been to many scientific meetings, held in much the same way that some of you have echoed in the previous thread. They usually entail a series of sessions during the day hours, with different talks going concurrently so that people may choose which ones they want to attend. Also they would have a section for vendors. I've never participated in the organization of one but am familiar with the setup, so I figure I may be helpful in that regard. Just let me know what you want me to do! I also did some fundraising, but that was years ago.

:) Kim

WE NEED A LEADER!

Are we talking about a face-to-face gathering in the U.S? If so, some of our members who live a long way off, in Europe and Asia for example, will find it difficult to attend unless assisted monetarily. Should a fund be set up on-line for collecting donations to help defray the cost of air fares for those living overseas?

All of these things will be taken into consideration. I would think the bottom line would be of utmost importance to most of the members.

The leader/coordinator has to be someone who can encourage and motivate, but isn't afraid to tell a team in charge of whatever that they need replaced. There's an unpleasant part to the job too.

I would be happy to get us organized, but I'm not the kind of person who can encourage and motivate.

We need some information first. Then we need people second. We need to know how many people may or may not attend. We already know Dave will attend if within 500 miles of his home. We need to know approximate time of year. Any ideas on how to get this information?

The size of the convention (no. of attendees) will determine what year we can do this. If we found out only 300-400 people can attend, we can do this pretty quickly. If we're talking 2500 gardeners, we're probably looking at 2011 at the earliest, and probably later. See what I mean?

I've been involved in lots of convention planning and organization. There is a definite order to things or else it becomes a situation where the left hand doesn't know what the right hand doeth, etc.

Edited to clarify I was not volunteering to be leader! I could help leader with organization and methods to achieve goals maybe, but no leader here. :-)

This message was edited Nov 20, 2007 2:25 PM

I'd like to volunteer.

While my time is extremely limited at this point in time, I can assist when needed.

I have an IT background and have extensive experience in project management and development. So please contact whenever a project leader is selected.

BB

McGlory - I would see our first one being about 500 or so people I can see it Fri to Sun, and in 2 to 3 years from now if we get on the ball. I can also see that the big cities might not work with us the way something like OKC would. Still a great airport but small on the sacle of doing these things. I think we need leaders before we talk to Dallas and try to see what we can do here and before we can save space.

I would IMHO - sell tickets to the event, only print what we can handle and let it slowly, and controlled, get a little bigger each year.

Mitch - I agree totally, except I don't know about the number of people part. Whatever city we're looking at needs to have a host committee of locals. If the local DG members aren't really into it, it's not the city for us. Dallas is excellent, but don't overlook SanAntonio or Austin. You'd know more about their airports.

We need to have a number before contacting facilities, especially this first time. We don't have a history to fall back on, so a facility will not take us seriously without semi-solid figures. "We have 300 committed and anticipate 200 more," carries more credibility with a facility than "We don't know," or "We think there will be hundreds." Know what I mean? It will necessarily be a best guess, but we need to be able to state how our best guess was determined.

Yes, I agree on selling tickets. Some organizations used a tiered process for ticket sales to generate funds earlier. Three tiers: Early bird special is lowest price for limited time early on, standard rate is higher priced up until the event, highest price is to register at the door. Two tiers: Eliminate Early bird special and cut pre-registration off two weeks before the event.

With what 300,000 or so people here we can get 500 tickets sold easy...Dallas, well we already have people here a go - LouC and me both live very close to Dallas and ahve ties here. There are some smaller towns here too that might be willing that have the area (small by Dallas not in really small...you know?) I like the Early Bird, that is how one of the big things I go to is run, 20% off before hand - must be paid at once. We need to not take paypal IMHO too - their fees could kill something like this.

We need a few people to get started, then in a few weeks bring on some more.

1. Head - a name? Maybe Frostweed, she is local too and very good with getting things started. Will Dmail her to see.
2. Help, foot people if you will McGlory and me
3. Local - my name in the hat would be LouC
4. Someone with money experience to handle all that and keep the book, open to the whole group - I think of Pirl, back ground in banking and I think she would do a great job. I will dmail her for it.

With the 5 of us we could start getting hard numbers going and getting this off the ground.

Good thinking! The money person needs to be someone DGer's know. Pirl is a good idea, as her name is familiar, but if we can get dave's staff involved, Terry or Trish might be good too. Doesn't Trish handle the money for the angel fund or something?

You do d-mailing....

What do you anticipate will happen at this conference, and what results later on?

Maybe an invitation Flyer type needs to be sent...
This way people will know whats in the plan can rsvp by a certain date and then we would have numbers.

Terry would be great to add, and Dave Trish and Terry are all welcome. I just know their time is valuble right now if they want to jump in here and get this going thats great, but I think Dave is saying for us to get it started.

D - 3 days and nights of meetings, talks, and vendors... good food and friends.

We need a few people in charge first - then we can get all the rest going. We need vision and people to work the numbers after we get them.

I would like to attend. It would be an awesome event.

I have a lot to say, but I'll back off until a proposed agenda gets published. No matter what we do, there will be some who do not like it, it's the wrong time, it costs too much, etc. We just need to know it will be this way.

Okay, I said I'm not talking, so I'll shut up now. I'm marking this thread so I can keep up.

Sorry to disappoint, Mitch, but with health issues and family situations as they are I simply can't participate. My good wishes to everyone for a successful event.

I agree, there are going to be upset folks no matter how we work this. So FlowrLady - are you signing on to help?

Just an idea, if you want to get n estimation of how many are interested. Remember when Dave announced the Name Media thing? He put it up right on our home pages where it was visible. Since there aren't very many that watch this forum--some stick to their own forums, etc, if you could get Dave to put an interest generating announcement up on our home page it would give you an idea. I don't mean a voting booth thing, cause I think we can disable that in preferences, the same with the news one too.

That is a great idea. Maybe Dave will be willing here soon to do ssomething like that.

And it would probably only take him about 30 seconds to do it too LOL

threegardeners are you getting on board to help?

Mitch,
I'm enthusiastic, but a realist.

What percent of that 300,000 signed in once to get some free info?

I would caution that the whole number, should center on subscribership, plus some. then multiply by a 1-5% ratio, to get a more realistic figure.Lots will be interested, and excited-but the fact that it will be an expensive trip for almost all of us not living in or near the targeted City, that percentage of possibilities just went way down.

Honestly not being a 'Gloomy Gus' here, but this is a serious consideration.

I look forward to more comments, I'd love to see this event happen!

Sasha

What about workshops? That's usually what conferences are about anyway. We could send out feelers for those who would be willing to do workshops, then those who would like to attend ea. to get a feel for scheduling of same.

Woo hoo! 3gardeners with good ideas is helping! Right?

It might also be good to come up with ideas for committees, and then people could volunteer based on what they are able to help with best, ie. fundraising, advertising, etc. Just an idea.

Kim

Also, if you know that you can get enough people, a lot of hotels will discount rooms and airlines will discount fares as well. Our professional org. (Tx Span. teachers) holds state conventions and that's what the hosting hotel does and one of the airlines does. Though a national one would be fun, I'm going to be a wet blanket and suggest that we do state conventions first and meet afterwards to swap experiences with an eye to a national/international one. But that's me, I'll still do what I can to help whatever the group consensus is.

Anne

This is what I said on the other thread.

But as far as that goes, each state could have a committee to raise contributions, handle advertising, vendor solicitations, workshop leading etc. for a national convention.

Yup McG

Aunt - you would not want each state talking and promising thing to vendors and speakers that when all added together might not happen. My wife puts one of these together for where she works - well she helps - and it is a alot fo work. We need hard numbers and some people that will stay the same for these places to work with. One thing she learned fast is if John Doe talked to them first they really dont like talking to Jane Doe - they want it to be the same people if possible.

McGlory - would you take the leader role here - at least to get us started? It sounds like you have done a lot of these before and we could use all the help we can get right now.

McGlory I know what I would love to do - will help else were if needed but I would love to set up the speakers both for the break out times and the whole group times.

That is what I know I can do - I can get all that together easy.

EEWWWW! I don't know. I'd have to talk to Handsome Man. Where's Jill?

Since it's predominately an American thing for now----and it is, honestly, most members are-----for anybody else it will be a holiday destination---maybe divide the the US into 4 sections with a representative from each. Each rep to be responsible for contacting vendors in their section. That way every, well most, areas of interest are covered.
Wherever you have it, someone needs to contact local members to see about maybe billeting travelers--the camper idea was a god one, depending where and time of year. Find reasonably cheap lodgings, most people don't care if they stay in a 4 star hotel/motel. Available bed and breakfast places, etc.

Just think about it.. you got the know how from the ground up.