<VV> Sturbridge Car Display

[sarahvair at cfl.rr.com]

This is really an issue that is near and dear to my heart.  When I ran for the 
Board one of the items on my agenda was The Car Display.  Years ago my late 
husband and I attended the Dallas Convention.  When we got there the Car Display 
was treated like the "red headed step child".  We both looked around and thought 
why?  Clearly there are double the amount of cars in the display versus 
Concours. 
 
We approached Harry Jensen and Harry said, well, we don't have clear cut rules 
for the display.  Tell you what, host a convention and you can do what you want.  
LOL.  2000 we did and Harry's words bit him in the butt.  Yes, Harry and I still 
laugh about it to this day. 
 
So, as President, I formed a committee and we worked long and hard at developing 
some guidelines for the Car Display.  Nowhere in there did we want to take 
anything away from Concours.  In fact, if you read it our intentions were to use 
it as a mentoring program for Concours.  It clearly states in there the award 
process.  As you will notice the name of the classes are different then that of 
Concours.  
 
In Sturbridge the Car Display had more cars in it then Concours.  Whether you 
like it or not, the Car Display is a revenue generating part of a convention.  
I'm not sure what happens elsewhere in the country, but a typical Corvair outing 
does do a people choice ballot.  I know when we were in Texas, Curt and I wanted 
to see how our Corvair stacked up to other cars from all over the country.  We 
knew where we stood in Florida.  What did people like, were we to extreme, what 
other ideas did we like or not like for the others in the display. 
 
Corsa members spend there hard earned money and vacation time to attend a 
convention.  The memnbers take part in many moving events during the convention.  
However, not all of them want to compete in Concours and that's fine.  The next 
best thing is the Car Display.  To some people it does mean the world to them to 
see how they rank amongst their peers, as Curt and I felt in Dallas. 
 
So, the cost of an award sitting in the car with them on the way home is a small 
price to pay for the goodwill it generated. 
 
I did see a picture of the Model Car Award.  What a nice award!!!  So exactly 
how many entries did the model car have?  Not many, I'm sure.  So NECC gave 
"killer" awards for a very small group.  Typically in the past, the Model Car 
Entry is a losing money situation for a convention.  So you have a really nice 
award for a small fraction of entries and sub-par (trying to be nice here)award 
for one of the largest events in a convention.  Seems a little lopsided to me. 

For what it's worth, the guidelines are not listed on the Corsa website (they are n the process of being added now).  However, I did send them to the NECC about 6 months prior to the convention when they were discussing the awards on their email list.  They were very aware of the situation and how it was to be handled.

Sarah Bruce
Eastern Board Member