A Great Article on The Cadets

[Jeff Ream]

12 hours ago, ironlips said:

Depending on alumni donations to fund a contemporary World Class drum corps to any meaningful extent is folly, and that's been the case for a very long time.

These units do not have "mom and pop" expenses. One could run a small country on what it takes to staff, feed, equip, insure, and tour such a group these days.

Alumni ties and loyalties can be strong but contributions from that sector will always be at best ancillary, at worst, insignificant.

 

i am guessing the move to Erie was viewed as a way to get more income streams going.

[Jeff Ream]

1 hour ago, Terri Schehr said:

It’s reminds me of when I used to donate to PBS.  I felt it was only fair because my kid was watching PBS everyday for Sesame Street, etc… I gave them what I could afford but instead of being grateful for that, I was subjected to a barrage of letters, phone calls requesting more money …. Drove me crazy. So the only solution I could find was to stop giving altogether. Phone calls stopped, no more letters. I was giving as much as I was willing to give and that wasn’t enough so they decided to alienate me.  Just how it was in my situation with PBS. 

i think thats what turned off a lot of drum corps fans. i'm lucky, my local PBS station only sent stuff 2 times a year

[BigW]

2 hours ago, cixelsyd said:

For full context, you must also include paper mail.  The incessant pleading started long before e-mail was invented.

Agreed. I ended up on both the snail mail and E-Mail lists a few years ago and I forgot about the flyers in the mailbox.

[BigW]

11 minutes ago, Jeff Ream said:

i think thats what turned off a lot of drum corps fans. i'm lucky, my local PBS station only sent stuff 2 times a year

My Landlord's Dad used to work for WITF (Jeff's and my local PBS affiliate) before he moved on to far greener pastures in the TV Broadcasting industry. He calls them "Begging Breaks". 😸

 

Pertinent to this thread, many of us watched aghast when WITF screwed up the Cadets show ending (1987!?) and cut it off for a Begging Break, then had to apologize on air after tons of irate calls went into the phones.

[contraguard05]

19 hours ago, HockeyDad said:

“Generous with their opinions and miserly with their checkbooks.”

Classic. So true in many many organizations. 

100% the vibe of the "playing Malaguena will fix everything" contingent of Madison alumni.

[JimF-LowBari]

43 minutes ago, Jeff Ream said:

i am guessing the move to Erie was viewed as a way to get more income streams going.

From what I was getting from the Erie flyers, Cadets got some nice deals on facilities. And reading between the lines, lot easier to deal with Erie people than Allentown.

Edited February 26 by JimF-LowBari

[lawdn]

1 hour ago, Jeff Ream said:

cool. all most of us here have access to is what has been made public. One thing very public now is the level of satisfaction groups are experiencing with USBands. 

Can you explain this further? Thanks - I always appreciate your knowledge and insight.  

Edited February 26 by lawdn

[TheOneWhoKnows]

1 hour ago, Jeff Ream said:

i am guessing the move to Erie was viewed as a way to get more income streams going.

 

22 minutes ago, JimF-LowBari said:

From what I was getting from the Erie flyers, Cadets got some nice deals on facilities. And reading between the lines, lot easier to deal with Erie people than Allentown.

And there is truth to that. They were only just beginning to tap into the money streams that were possible here. Including local corporate funding that people were working on. (I can state that for a fact as I was one of them working on corporate funding from my employer). 
 

Plus the other areas of sponsorship that would have provided great benefit from a certain school here and the Cadets organization. 
 

Plus the improvements and new instructive the sports park was putting in place to support the corps and bring in revenue. 
 

People saw one year of them here. There was big potential for them here and a lot of people working behind the scenes to put things in motion. And now? I don’t see anyone supporting the corps if they magically made it out of the lawsuit. 

[Jeff Ream]

1 hour ago, BigW said:

My Landlord's Dad used to work for WITF (Jeff's and my local PBS affiliate) before he moved on to far greener pastures in the TV Broadcasting industry. He calls them "Begging Breaks". 😸

 

Pertinent to this thread, many of us watched aghast when WITF screwed up the Cadets show ending (1987!?) and cut it off for a Begging Break, then had to apologize on air after tons of irate calls went into the phones.

first they tried to claim they weren't cutting off any of the shows. then the phones exploded. then they apologized

[Richard Lesher]

2 hours ago, jwillis35 said:

 

Nice post. I don't have any real numbers myself. The corps was founded in 1934 but how many of those who marched in the 30s and 40s are still around. I would imagine they still have a very large base of alumni out there but how many of them have real cash to spare? Many are likely retired on fixed incomes. How many of them walked away because of certain people in management? How many were put off by the constant relocation and name changes? 

When this current trial is done we have no way of knowing if there might be more. @Jeff Ream mentioned something important a few pages back that this was likely going to happen (Cadets going inactive and perhaps folding). After 2017-18 they managemed to band-aid a few things and hang around but the off-field issues with finances, lawsuits, and other legal issues were eventially going to catchup. 

Others have mentioned it, but trying to fund a corps solely on alumni dollars will not work...not unless you are lucky to have some sugar daddy with $5 mil to $10 mil who is willing to invest in the long-term health of the org. Even when Ted Swaldo invested into the Bluecoats to keep them from folding in 1984 he made sure to setup fundraisers, bingo, and other ventures that would keep Bloo alive and well for years to come.

The Cadets org needs to hope they can come out of this trial with a zero balance and not be in debt too much. Then they need to put it to bed for a while. Trying to force a comeback would likely be a mistake. If there is hope for a comeback down the road a very serious effort will need to be made toward setting up operations and funding. You need people with time to spare and personal cash on hand to begin what could be several years of operational setup. What are the chances of this happening? 

If it were me and I had just enough cash to pay down any debt they have after this trial -- and if I had the time and the say so (which I do not) -- I would take whatever was left (uniforms and trophies) and try to make amends with the city of Garfield, NJ mostly for preservation of corps history. I would try to find a place in town where the corps history could be displayed. I would change the name officially back to the Garfield Cadets, with the city owning the rights to the name, and then close shop. If a group of alumni or business people wish to take up the challenge of resurrecting the corps they will have to work with the city of Garfield. Sounds bleak but at least the history is preserved and a very small "flag" is planted back in the appopriate resting place. 

These drum corps are such a fragile thing. The foundation of the success for them hinges on giving. That giving comes from all directions and all directions are needed. There will never be enough money to "BUY" a top tier corps. SCV found that out (and they are going to find out again). The costs to replace the time and skills given to the corps freely dwarf their ability to actually pay for it in cash. 

If you look at the operational expenses, Transportation related expenses (maintenance, fuel, insurance, ect), and Food are the hard costs that essentially don't end up being given for free. Corps Staff often work for pennies on the dollar, actual operations of the organization often works for pennies on the dollar (with only a few staff on payroll) the tour logistics often works for pennies on the dollar. 

Practice facilities and housing often are a result of established relationships greatly reducing the full costs. 

A lot of the resources used by Corps is greatly done by scrounging around to get a deal out of the needed service or product/supplies. If absolutely everything has to be paid for it will not work in the end. 

****

I'm a BDC parent now, and fellow parents who are BD Alumni speak of the school location BDC uses for practice when they were marching in the mid 80's. 

WAIT....... WHAT?????????? BD has been using this facility since the 80's??????????????

Then I harken back to my time in SCV, we had the use of a local community college soccer field for practice. I even have 8 semester units from Mission College in Santa Clara for my time in SCV (which I used to literally squeak by my first Bachelor degree to meet the minimum unit requirements). 

Now........... that soccer field is a Walmart Parking Lot (literally), but that same Jr College has built FIVE different and vastly under utilized sport fields more than enough for the use as a practice field for a corps. 

WHERE DID SCV's MISSION COLLEGE RELATIONSHIP GO????? I'll tell you, we burnt our bridges with the key volunteer staff member that was managing that relationship. 

*****

When the likes of predators seeking control of the organizations' target rich environment those that have been the giving foundation to the existence of the corps start to dwindle away. What little money there was coming in starts to dwindle, and the cost savings from pre established operational relationships that were taken for granted spiral out of control. 

Elon Musk or Jeff Bezos couldn't even buy a championship tour. It cannot be bought. The whole exercise of the DCI non profit mission is a losing proposition. The vacuum of logistical needs is overwhelming. Take the Corps off the road and then the programs cost almost nothing. 

DCI Member Organizations really need to look deeply at their bottom lines and understand how much things cost if bought in the real world and the value of their volunteer base's time and skills. It's a hard calculation. I get it. We are all doing it differently depending on our volunteers. SCV at one point had the fleet manager of Del Monte Foods giving his time to take care of SCV's vehicles. 

In the end predators scatter the capable skill sets away. 

Edited February 26 by Richard Lesher