Fred Windish Posted October 23, 2014 Share Posted October 23, 2014 (edited) I haven't read through most of the posts in this topic, so my observations could have been expressed earlier. I think we all can agree, corps performances have changed yearly in some manner. Duh! But, so have the consumers. It has become less necessary to attend events in order to support DCI. Through the web, Fan Network, etc. there is a vast undercurrent of interest, I think. Our options to hear and view the performances continue to improve, making actual attendance less compelling for some, especially for fans like me. After a very long period of live attendance at events all across the country, I have attended 'in person' probably less than a dozen times the past decade. Yet, I still spend money in support of DCI and its corps. Expense is not the issue causing me to stay home, nor is the difficulty of travel. I live about 5 miles from Allentown! I just find more satisfaction now through Fan Network. The multi-camera views present the corps in ways not possible sitting in a single seat, in person, at the stadium. Obviously, the sound is different, but depending on equipment, quite good. At my age (63) and degree of laziness, I'm still a willing, and paying, fan. My 'tenure,' as described, has been unbroken since DCI was formed. THIS data isn't included in the recent stadium survey. More importantly, I'm surely not alone in my form of consumerism. My behavior pattern won't be changing any time soon, either. The corps look better than ever on my new 65" Samsung 4K tv! Everything gets upscaled. Add-in a good audio receiver and the presentations are simply amazing. I do not expect to attend a stadium event, in person, next year. But, I'd like to be counted as 'still here.' These are curious and changing times. My type of consumer will only grow, I think. Edited October 23, 2014 by Fred Windish Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
xandandl Posted October 23, 2014 Author Share Posted October 23, 2014 (edited) Garfield, You said you couldn't understand my English in the last question, so I will re-phrase. What percentage of those who purchase tickets for shows are present for multiple occasions and for multiple seasons? For those present for multiple seasons, what is the usual number of seasons for which they purchase tickets or participate as members/staff of the competing corps? i.e. (id est, that is) what percentage of those who bought tickets are one and done buyers, occasional purchasers, or people who come back year after year and buy tickets to see shows as opposed to getting in with free passes from DCI or others? For that last group, how many years (1-43) are they there as ticket buyers or have a role in the touring corps (member, staff, tour volunteer - all who get in with free passes from DCI.) Interesting, in neither the responses to me or others do you answer my first two questions. What is the source for the "data" you cite? Why do you see it and not the public? Being a show coordinator/sponsor is not the only "office" in the activity who should be able to see such data, IMO. Edited October 23, 2014 by xandandl Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MikeD Posted October 23, 2014 Share Posted October 23, 2014 Yes, civility has been great in this thread and allows us to spend the greater energy on depth, not distractions. Mike D's link to the 1971 performance of a "contraversial" show is great. But few seeing it for the first time might not be aware of the great visual staff which helped produced the corps of his era. Bobby Hoffmann called Garfield his home before he headed to celebrity status with the Bridgemen. Pete Emmons was also there but is better noted for his marching with Troopers and his drill time with Santa Clara, Long Island Kingsmen, and a few before finding his niche at Blue Devils, even today. And of course, Hugh Mahon the master of exactness and order was the Garfield alum known for continuing the tradition. Which one predominated this season, the year before DCI began, is a bit beyond my memory but they all cast their contributions IIRC, I think the concept was Frank Dorittie's (our great brass arranger/instructor...and college History major)and Bobby's. They had to convince Hugh (our director) that it was a good idea. The first thing written in the fall was the jazzy "Yankee Doodle" spot at the end of the eventual opener and the reprise. That convinced him. George Tuthill wrote a masterful percussion score that got eviscerated during the season as it was over many of the drum judges' heads. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
garfield Posted October 23, 2014 Share Posted October 23, 2014 Garfield, You said you couldn't understand my English in the last question, so I will re-phrase. What percentage of those who purchase tickets for shows are present for multiple occasions and for multiple seasons? For those present for multiple seasons, what is the usual number of seasons for which they purchase tickets or participate as members/staff of the competing corps? i.e. (id est, that is) what percentage of those who bought tickets are one and done buyers, occasional purchasers, or people who come back year after year and buy tickets to see shows as opposed to getting in with free passes from DCI or others? For that last group, how many years (1-43) are they there as ticket buyers or have a role in the touring corps (member, staff, tour volunteer - all who get in with free passes from DCI.) Interesting, in neither the responses to me or others do you answer my first two questions. What is the source for the "data" you cite? Why do you see it and not the public? Being a show coordinator/sponsor is not the only "office" in the activity who should be able to see such data, IMO. I don't have all the answers you're looking for because I've not seen any data to delineate attendees based on number of years tickets were purchased. Though being a show producer does have its privileges (long hours, lots of weather risk, and a constant battle to get more and more buses in the parking lot) preferential exposure to non-public data is not one of them; I'm highly confident that the data is not non-public, and I'm equally confident that the other important "offices" of DCI and/or participant corps saw the data long before I did. The instructions given me were specific. The presumption of from whom I got those instructions is completely open to speculation but, really, it doesn't matter. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
garfield Posted October 24, 2014 Share Posted October 24, 2014 This, from your "Think about it" post: Attendance has not been flat over the past 15 years. I'm curious, what do you think attendance has done over the last 15 years? And I admit that I'm wrong, it's not flat. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cixelsyd Posted October 24, 2014 Share Posted October 24, 2014 I'm curious, what do you think attendance has done over the last 15 years? And I admit that I'm wrong, it's not flat. From what I know, attendance has had its ups and downs over the past 15 years. More downs than ups over that time, but improving most recently. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
perc2100 Posted October 24, 2014 Share Posted October 24, 2014 I haven't read through most of the posts in this topic, so my observations could have been expressed earlier. I think we all can agree, corps performances have changed yearly in some manner. Duh! But, so have the consumers. It has become less necessary to attend events in order to support DCI. Through the web, Fan Network, etc. there is a vast undercurrent of interest, I think. Our options to hear and view the performances continue to improve, making actual attendance less compelling for some, especially for fans like me. After a very long period of live attendance at events all across the country, I have attended 'in person' probably less than a dozen times the past decade. Yet, I still spend money in support of DCI and its corps. Expense is not the issue causing me to stay home, nor is the difficulty of travel. I live about 5 miles from Allentown! I just find more satisfaction now through Fan Network. The multi-camera views present the corps in ways not possible sitting in a single seat, in person, at the stadium. Obviously, the sound is different, but depending on equipment, quite good. At my age (63) and degree of laziness, I'm still a willing, and paying, fan. My 'tenure,' as described, has been unbroken since DCI was formed. THIS data isn't included in the recent stadium survey. More importantly, I'm surely not alone in my form of consumerism. My behavior pattern won't be changing any time soon, either. The corps look better than ever on my new 65" Samsung 4K tv! Everything gets upscaled. Add-in a good audio receiver and the presentations are simply amazing. I do not expect to attend a stadium event, in person, next year. But, I'd like to be counted as 'still here.' These are curious and changing times. My type of consumer will only grow, I think. This is a great point. I used to attend half a dozen or more shows a year when I lived in the mid-west. Since moving to SoCA I've maybe attended a little more than half a dozen shows total (in 15 years). But I think I spend more money now on DCI than I ever did, am a FN subscriber, have bought more DVDs or Blu-ray than I ever bought video cassettes, etc. I haven't attended a DCI show since 2008 (IIRC), but I've certainly spent hundreds of dollars (a year) on DCI stuff since then! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fred Windish Posted October 24, 2014 Share Posted October 24, 2014 (edited) perc2100, You are a good example of my point. DCI should not be judged only by its in-person attendance count. Unlike individual tour event sponsors, it has more ways to produce income. I do understand, the in-person attendance count at local shows is very important. Also, it's much more exciting in Indy with 20+ thousand in attendance at Finals, but there is another live (not in person) audience that's buying-in. It will be sad if Finals attendance drops back down to 15 thousand, for example, but such a drop can actually occur in a year when DCI has its greatest overall revenue. So long as you, and I, continue to purchase other things 'DCI,' it can remain healthy. Besides, in-person crowd size is self-limiting. There are only so many great seats between the goal lines. It's easy to feel we are hurting DCI by no longer traveling to Championships as we were once able and willing to do. In reality, maybe 90% of our spending to make that trip wasn't going to the corps anyway. It was going to airlines, hotels, restaurants, etc. When you purchase products from DCI, and its individual corps, you can remain a strong source of support. I hold nothing against someone who, for whatever reason, now seldom attends in-person. Folks like you, and I. But, our 'type' needs to be embraced for DCI to be strong. We remain a source of revenue. As our nation and economy changes, as our legacy fans age, as international groups participate, I see big things for Fan Network. In coming years, 'fandom,' can be much different, yet still be exciting and rewarding for DCI and its corps. Edited October 24, 2014 by Fred Windish Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
IllianaLancerContra Posted October 24, 2014 Share Posted October 24, 2014 Was there a lot of gettting out of the way for anything they might have left behind on the parade route? Following horses on parade is bad enough... Let's just say 'they cleaned it (the pachyderm) out' with a hose before the parade started. But it was right in front of us when they did it. IIRC is was 4th of July weekend - we always did a bunch of parades in the Chicago suburbs. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GUARDLING Posted October 24, 2014 Share Posted October 24, 2014 Like I said earlier, I cannot think of one good reason why drum corps should no longer exist. 1. Bad management? Get good management instead. Apparently, dozens of corps obtained good enough management, since they are still here. 2. Where one source of support wanes, others grow. As just one example of each - war veterans are not as common as they were in 1946, but there are more grant opportunities available today. 3. If it was as simple as "more choices", then every youth activity would have experienced steady decline. But some have grown instead. How can that be? 4. We made drum corps more expensive with bigger corps, longer tours, more equipment. If we believed cost was an existential threat to the activity, we could have made different choices. The success of other youth activities flies in the face of all this generic excuse making. Sports like soccer, football, lacrosse, whatever, all face the same changing communities, expanding choices and facility challenges - and thrive. No reason I can think of for why drum corps could not have done the same things that worked for successful, growing activities. I agree with alot of what you say. The ease of producing is far from the days of local involvement. Yes many youth activity have suffered and some flourished BUT I believe choice, the times and the youth of today will dictate this. Ive seen it over and over just in this activity. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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