Cutting it too fine?

[Oldman]

For the 3rd weekend running, I have had to surrender my map at download as the organisers had run out of maps for a "larger entry on the day than expected".

Why is this happening? Do organisers not realise that comparing runs with others in the car park and later (but not five days later when the postman arrives) is one of the key enjoyments of an orienteering event?

I know it's environmentally friendly to keep map runs low, but this is going beyond what is acceptable, I think.

How can this be rectified? Perhaps Organisers should have to "buy back" maps (eg for £2) from competitors?

[Gross]

Tough cookies.... it's harder on those who have got to use a 2nd hand map.... they are the one's who should get a discount!!! Lets say... £2 off if you enter on the day coz you get a used map:) Sounds fair to me..... Viva the triumph of the Cuban Revolution:)

[Snail]

On the two occasions this has happened when I have been on the organising team we offered to buy maps back at the finish / download. Once in the past couple of years for £1; the other almost 10 years ago for 50p. (Both level 3 or higher)

I think this keeps more people happy. There was no question of people "having to" give their map back. We offered to buy - competitors could (and some did) decline the offer - but more than enough were happy to sell.

Don't disagree in principle with competitors getting a discount for running on a second-hand map - but it can be more difficult to organise unless you have a system worked out in advance. For pre-entry events you often have to work on the basis that the EOD level means you will run out, but since you don't know the no-show rate you often can't tell who will actually get a second-hand map until people start. And it may be those starting last that get the second-hand maps, which isn't necessarily those who EOD.

[EddieH]

Well it sounds great to me - 3 weeks running with more than expected.

We recently ran a district event in Darnaway and got nearly 200 starts, almost double what we might expect and a larger number at any district event around here for over 20 years.

I am fairly clear that GRAMP and MAROC have been seeing a massive increase for the last year and a half.

Are we turning the corner on participation country wide?

The one real problem with pre-printed entry on the day is when the weather is bad. I controlled a BASOC event last Autumn where the weather was in fact okay, but it did not appear so where potential competitors lived. Result was few punters and the event made a loss. Had it been a new map it could have been a disaster.

[Rookie]

For the UWOC district event in January we tried to get people to give us an intention to turn up in advance on our website - no payment just an entry form - so we knew how many maps we'd need. We only had 6 people register in advance and plenty more than that turn up!

If people had actually used this (only takes filling in a few details, maybe we should have asked for less, we didn't need half the stuff on there in advance but some of it would be helpful for results) then map printing would of been easier. Costs the clubs nothing and costs the competitors about 60 seconds to fill in while looking for the event details.
The "closing date" was set a week in advance but even if people had done it the day before it would have helped.
http://www.uwoc.co.uk/events/uwoc.php

[Simple Soul]

If I travel 60 miles or more (with the approx £20.00 + petrol cost for a Return trip) to an Event that charges me for parking and a significant sum for Entry I expect some customer service. I do not expect to have to hand my map in at the Finish, or run with a second hand map. Any Event where this has happened has without question, failed in its organisation. Other themes that occur in the discussion topics involve increased participation (how-with no maps?) Entry fees too high, (but saving costs by not printing enough maps), and so on. Perhaps there should be some discussion on how to focus on customer satisfaction before the customer decides, with the high fuel costs, not to travel to Events.

[RJ]

There is a cost involved in preparing maps for EOD, in the hope they will all be used on the day. Perhaps as much as 25/30p per map unit. With an entry fee of £3/£4 (less the levy and other fixed costs) it doesn't take too much computation to work out how many spare maps you can afford to have. With 100 spare maps you might need 15 extra people to turn up on the day to pay for them. After that is is surplus.

If you can.... print on the day. It solves so many problems with good weather (or whatever) and therefore a large EOD. Solve the perceived problems and sort it!

[Knee Deep Mud!]

I'm actually surprised that this doesn't happen more often, particularly on EOD only district events.

Over the last ten years, my club's district event turnouts have varied from ~300 competitors to over 650. Not easy to cope with this scale of variation, particularly when you don't know how big the turnout is going to be until the punters turn up at registration. However, I think the only time we ever had to recycle maps was when there was a significantly larger than normal turn out on one of the courses that normally has a fairly small entry (yellow or red i think).

[SJC]

If you can.... print on the day. It solves so many problems with good weather (or whatever) and therefore a large EOD. Solve the perceived problems and sort it!

In theory this sounds ok, but I have twice fallen foul of this practice. At two events in the last year the majority of competitors have received good quality maps that had been printed before the event, whereas the late starters got poor quality maps that had been printed on the day. At local events this is probably acceptable in order to keep the costs down. But at any serious event it isn't. Clubs must provide a level playing field for everyone.

[andy]

Just get more than enough printed, look at previous events at the same level/time of year and get 150% of that.

If you have extra maps, plan some training exercises for your club on the same area

[Kitch]

OK thats enough carping

any organisers able to advise what % of maps to allow for EOD.

I have no experiance but perhaps there is an organiser out there who has never had a problem - what's their formula ?

EOD is always more expensive - its expected - but why ?
well one good reason could be - in order to pay for the excess maps (i.e. won't get used) that have to be printed to ensure all EOD runners get a new map.
I can't think of any other good reason these days.

Or is higher EOD fee simply punitive / profiteering ?

[andy]

kitch - it depends a lot on the type of event.

I think most of the comments here are geared towards an event with only EOD, a colour coded event or similar. All estimates of numbers have to go on previous events in the series (if there is one), the 'same' event the previous year and such like.

I planned the esoc sprint-O a few weeks ago, it was only pre-entry but historically has accepted entries up to the very last minute. I had taken entries for the same event last year and over 50% of the competitors entered after the deadline for ordering maps by, so I was probably over-cautious this year when ordering maps. The deciding factor for me was that maps got cheaper per item if you ordered over 200 so I made the numbers up slightly.
The result is that I have a small pile of East Craiglockhart hill maps in my flat!

On the subject of cost, a single map (A4 anyway) is a very small portion of the entry fee, certainly well under £1. Unless you're ordering a massive excess of maps then there's probably no need to worry too much about cost.

Costs I was quoted:

100 to 199 A4 maps are charged at £0.38 each
200 A4 maps are charged at £0.33 each
50 to 99 A3 maps are charged at £0.76 each
100 A3 maps are charged at £0.66 each

[Snail]

EOD rates vary considerably, so are difficult to forecast. As someone who often EODs, factors that influence whether we go to a particular event can include weather, location of adjacent events, convenience of the event (eg bussing, long walks to starts), and colour coded courses offered.

Clubs must provide a level playing field for everyone.

I disagree. In exchange for EOD flexibility I accept that I may get something different from those who pre-enter. If I've driven 70 miles to an event I would much rather have a second-hand map / map printed on the day / map for a course other than my first choice / master map than to be told: 'sorry - we haven't any maps - please go away' - which has happened in the past.

As an organiser I have used the "150%" rule and think it reasonable, but for events with a smaller number of courses have modified it to ensure a minimum addition of at least x maps per course (say 10 for the South, perhaps only 5 for Scotland).

Totally agree it would be helpful to collect some statistics. As well as the EOD number this perhaps needs to include numbers pre-entering before and after the closing date, and number of no-shows on the day. If the on-line entries systems maintained and published the event pre-entry stats for say the past two years - which would seem easy to do - then we could all compare these with the results to get an idea of the net effect of "EOD less no-shows" - which is probably what we really want to know.

The main reason for EOD surcharges is that we (ie almost all of us ) are rubbish at entering in advance unless there is a financial incentive to do so!

[Simple Soul]

If historically an Event has had about 200 competitors, the budget for the current Event would be presumably be such that 200 people would make a profit. (I would expect the organiser to assume the break even point to be around 150 entrants to allow for bad weather etc.) At £4.50 / person, a £675 Income recovers all overheads. If the average of 200 turn up a profit, allowing for levy, of £150 is already achieved. What is the problem in printing an extra 100 maps at £0.35 ea. (£35.00) total? 12 more entrants would more than defray the costs. Is the £35 so critical that it is worth the risk of upsetting competitors and causing on the day organisation being disrupted with having to collect and hand out maps at a possible remote start. In any case spare maps can often be recycled for informal Events or as training aids. A simple answer may be to increase the Entry fee to offset the extra map print costs, but I would hate to suggest anything like that.

[PKJ]

Looking at the pre-entry count on Fabian4, and the actual number of competitors on Winsplits or on the event results, I get the following for 4 recent Regional Events (maths not guaranteed! - and actual nos include colour-coded) -
HALO 03/02 - pre-entry 122, actual 173
WCH 17/02 - pre-entry 460, actual 545
CLOK 17/02 - pre-entry 268, actual 384
LOK 24/02 - pre-entry 523, actual 575

And I'd be interested to know how many of the 500 at the CLARO Brimham Rocks event last Sunday had pre-entered; I suspect CLARO weren't expecting so many customers.