I had the same sort of idea several years ago. I had traveled to Baltimore, Sissipahaw, A.T.A.R. And decided we needed a similar shoot in Va. I will tell you up front... it is a LOT of work!!!
I approached my local archery club, Sherwood Archers here in Roanoke Va. And pitched the idea. This is mostly a compound club and they weren't too keen on the idea. They did agree to allow me to use the facility and 3-D targets if I could put it together and pull it off. Obviously, all of the profits went back to the club. I then went to the traditional archery club, The Roanoke Valley Traditional Bowmen, and pitched the idea. It seemed we had enough support so we decided to go forth with it. We were going to put on the Sherwood Traditional Archery Rendezvous or S.T.A.R. Shoot.
The first year we started working on the shoot in August or so in order to have it running the next June. It is tough to find a weekend between April and August to host a shoot where you aren't in a conflict with another shoot, as so many of them have popped up over the last several years. I started trying to get the word out early and often on this site as well as other media.
The first year I had about 30 volunteers help me out and we had a couple of hundred shooters show up from seven states. We put on a 30 target 3-d course for competition, a fun course, a 28 target field course for competition, tomahawk throwing, novelty shoots, raffles, etc. One of the things we have going for us is our club site. We have almost 100 acres set in some of the most beautiful, and steep, terrain in the Blue Ridge mountains.
This year will be our seventh year I believe and I have to say our shoot still draws a nice crowd, everyone has a ball and looks forward to it each year, and it has turned out to be one of the biggest money makers for our club. One of the down sides is that I have watched the number of volunteers steadily decline each year, which just puts more on the rest of us.
Some points to consider...
Have some kind of draw to attract people. We have a nice bow built by a custom bowyer to the winners specifications each year and raffle it off. This generates a lot of interest. Last year we raffled off one of the new Bear Take downs.
T-shirts- We have had different colored t-shirts for sale each year, except one. That year we still had a good supply of blue, gray and green shirts from years past and decided to just sell what we had. I could not believe how many complaints I received. I lot of guys go to a shoot with the intention of buying a t-shirt and are disappointed if one isn't available. Besides, t-shirts are a very good money maker. The first year I messed up. I bought a couple hundred t-shirts in S, M, L and XL and a few in XXL. Now I make sure I have a couple dozen each in XXL and XXXL. A lot of the trad guys love those three X shirts.
Food- It is a monumental task to feed a couple hundred shooters, plus their families, visitors, and your workers. Just making sure you get enough food stuffs in and don't over buy and getting the kitchen staffed is a huge task. We are lucky as our indoor range has a full kitchen.
Camping- If you don't at least have primitive camping, a lot of guys aren't going to come.
Several local hotels near by- We work out a deal with some of our local hotels for a rate for our shooters. Have that information handy for when the guys contact you.
Venders- It is tough to get venders to commit to your shoot, and then show up after they do commit. Most of them have a limited traveling budget and are booked a year or so out with shoots they have been to in the past and have a relationship with.
It helps us that we have a lot to do within 20 miles of our shoot. A lot of families come in the area and drop dad off to the shoot while they visit the Peaks of Otter, some of the local caverns, Appalachian Trail, Claytor or Smith Mountain lake or one of our big shopping malls.
If you put your name and information out as the contact person, be prepared for literally hundreds of phones calls and e-mails.
A point to consider is that there is a very large financial outlay up front. Most years you will recoop this and make a tidy profit that can be utilized the following year. It only takes one year of torrential down pours or other bad weather to break you.
It is fun, as well as satisfying, but I would be stone cold lying to you is I said it wasn't one of the hardest and most time consuming activities you can embark on. Myself, as well as 3 or 4 of the core guys in our shoot each probably put in over 100 hours each year to pull this shoot off.
Topic: How do I get a Traditional Rendezvous started?..........PLEASE HELP (Read 310 times)
