On Friday, February 7, 2014 11:37:06 AM UTC-8, Charlie Papa wrote:
Well, there is a BIG LESSON in this for us. Yes, he was condescending.
But remember, Anthony's role is to be a surrogate for the 'everyman' pilot, and for the many more pilot wannabe's.
If they don't have experience with gliders, they think they are just simple machines, - IF forced to think about gliders, - because they otherwise seldom or never do.
And if jogged to think about gliders, they think about something analogous to a toboggan: - you tow it up the hill, and it slides down.
So he was perfect. Note that 10,000,000 USA viewers watch this show. There are fewer than 1,000,00 USA pilots. So folks who wish they were pilots, or had learned to fly, make up almost all of th34e audience.
This is great, - but only a first step. There is a reason we see those same commercials again and again and again; they are building 'Share of Mind', and gliding has close to zero.
We all need to sell our sport. And we need assistance from our national gliding organizations on how to do that.
In my view, each and everyone of us should carry a few business cards with the URL of our national organization or our club, or something like www.letsgogliding.ca or www.letsgogliding.com.
Time to wake up!
On Wednesday, February 5, 2014 2:59:15 PM UTC-5, Charlie Papa wrote:
Here, from Season 4, Episode 11, is the segment on our sport, shot at York Soaring Association near Toronto last summer:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h5a0tUPxzl0#t=41
We believe they will return to York next summer for another segment. We have suggested to them:
-WSPE (Women's Soaring Pilot's Association) annual seminar, this year July 21 - 25 (http://www.womensoaring.org/?p=seminar)
-FREEDOM'S WINGS CANADA York is home to the first and largest Chapter in Canada
- TOW PILOTS the essential volunteers who drag us into the sky
-AIRLINE PILOT either trains in a glider or UNUSUAL ATTITUDE training
Neilson estimates audience size a 10,000,000 in the USA.
Great video. Have to comment though on the trend (caution: this is from perspective of western pilot, can only relate what I've seen out west) -
Note that our club flies at Lake Elsinore, sharing the skies with a skydiving operation. Our glider facilities include a small club house with an outhouse, along with a dirt runway and members ranging from teens to 70's. On any given glider ops day, there might be 5 to 10 members there for flying.
The skydive ops, when one chooses to walk over to their facilities, includes food for purchase, meeting rooms, real toilet and shower facilities, overnight guest accommodations, paved runways. They are also regularly crowded with 50 - 100+ skydivers, most in the under 50 range, and maybe 1/4 female, 3/4 male. They go up to 10kft for $8 a ride (with 10 - 20 on board per jump). And, they are an international skydiving destination facility. Plus there is more to do at there facility than skydive.
I will also note that glider club members go over the the skydive facilities to see what's going on and get some food, use the facilities. We also sometimes use their meeting rooms for club meetings. The skydivers, on the other hand, don't tend to come our way to see what's going on with gliders or use our facilities.
It's more than advertising, I think. There is more coverage of skydiving in the media, perhaps due to higher perceived risk. But - how many glider ports are there in the USA that have overnight accommodations? In SoCal, for high desert soaring, we are mostly constrained to motels or camping out (which isn't all bad, but does eliminate many people from being interested). Our Krey Field overnight accommodations are a sleeping bag - period (and rattlers). And a bumpy gravel/dirt runway. And nearest food/shopping about 12 miles away, motel lodging even farther. No electricity or water, other than when the FBO generator is running during flight ops time. Makes for good adventure (and great soaring), but not the type of conditions to convince friends and family to make a habit of going along - and certainly makes an impression on first time visitors along the lines of "What are we doing here?"
I contrast that with staying at Seminole in Florida where the food isn't on field, but is nearby, and there are overnight accommodations with running water and the like for a reasonable fee.
There are others, I know, but I don't think it's as simple as saying more advertising or getting out the word. The skydiving community seems to recognize that the beauty/freedom/thrill of skydiving alone does not generate/attract/retain customers. Perhaps some of the glider FBO's need to think beyond providing a runway and tows as a viable business. That works fine for the die-hard soaring pilots who just want to soar, but for newbies - friends, family, those responding to advertising - maybe more would be beneficial.
Eric Bick