Triples, Sheffield

[Womble67]

What a terrific photographic report, Andy. Thanks for posting. Particularly like the Anglo Dutch ships (Langton?).

Yes Langton that game was put on by a Andy H & Steve M both from the Grimsby Wargames Society

Great piccies, Andy.

Did you take them really early on, or was it that quiet ? Hardly seems to be anyone there. 

Cheers - Phil

No it was like a ghost town, a number of traders are saying they won't be coming back. Which would be a great shame.

Take care

Andy

[Techno]

Stroll on.....If it was that quiet, you can't blame the traders.

Cheers - Phil

[Ithoriel]

I considered going even though it meant getting up around 5am to get on a train at 6am and not getting back home until after 11pm. In the end Real Life (tm) got in the way and I didn't go.

From what I'm reading on-line and the report back from two friends who went I'm glad I didn't go tbh.

One of those who went said words to the effect that Claymore (my local show) was busier before the doors opened than this show was when it was "busy." Which is probably an exaggeration but doesn't inspire me to try to go next year!

[Techno]

Are there too many shows, too close together at this time of year ?

Cheers - Phil

[Leon]

I've posted on our Facebook page today with a lot of responses (https://www.facebook.com/pendraken/), so I'll pop it here as well:

There's been a lot of comment and discussion online since Triples, so here's our viewpoint on it.

The show was extremely quiet, to the point where I can't remember the last time a show felt that quiet. The numbers through the door were significantly down on previous years, despite claims to the contrary. Our takings are down over 50% over the past two years at Triples. Around 90% of the traders I spoke with during the weekend were in a similar situation, and even the ones who did well were still generally unhappy with the event in it's current form.

There were 21 traders missing from last year, the majority of them being well-known faces you'd expect to see at a large event like this. By Sunday afternoon, there were at least another 10 who said they won't be returning next year.

Unfortunately, I don't think we'll be back either in it's current form. If they move it back to May and reduce it to a one-day show then we'd consider it, but as the last of 3 shows in 3 weekends, all within 80 miles of each other, it just doesn't work for us. After 3 weekends on the road, we're well behind on our mail orders and we'll all be working overtime this current week to catch up.

The other major concern this year was that there was no advertising to inform people of the change of date. The first time I saw it online was Tuesday night on TMP, 4 days before the event. Various customers on the day told me they'd only found out about it in the week prior. If you move your date and don't tell anyone about it, then it can't be a surprise when the numbers fall dramatically, as we all saw this weekend.

I'll pass feedback on to the organisers, as well as offering to help out if there's anything we can do, but the trouble is that it rarely seems to have any effect and they carry on regardless. That might be OK in the very short-term, but once the more well-known traders start dropping out of any show then there's less and less reason for the majority of gamers to come along. With venue hire costs as high as they've got, you can't afford to ignore the kind of comments/feedback we've seen online so far.

This was looking down at the hall from the gallery, at 11:30am on Saturday, which should be peak visitor time:


I did a rough headcount while I was up there and got around 400 in both halls at that point.

[Leman]

In most of the shows the same menu is on offer. As a consequence I limit myself to York (start of the season and free entry owing to age), St.Helens (I usually run a game and it's local), and Reading (again involved in running a game and travel with other club members). I have also heard that Triples is expensive to get in and expensive to park, so it does need to be something special under those circumstances, which apparently it wasn't.

[Techno]

That seems very poor, Leon.

Your headcount of 400...Did that include the people running/playing the games ?
In the photo...There seem to be as many people 'playing' around the tables as customers around the edge of the hall. 

Three shows in three weekends, all relatively close distance wise......It doesn't seem ideal, at all.

Cheers - Mr Disappointed for you.

[Steve J]

Blimey, that's even quieter than I thought

[Leon]

Your headcount of 400...Did that include the people running/playing the games ?
In the photo...There seem to be as many people 'playing' around the tables as customers around the edge of the hall. 

I tried to include only the ones playing the game, rather than the guys running them.  It was only a rough count, just blocking people into approximate groups of 10.

[Orcs]

That does seem very poor.

I am disappointed for you and all the other traders.

We used to go as a group, stay over somewhere cheap and enjoy good cheap real ale over the weekend.  That stopped when we started doing  4 day holidays to Normandy, Arnhem Etc.

Why diid they move the date, especially if there are two other shows nearby in a month.

I am afraid that Ebay has killed the bring and buy, and the internet has killed the need to attend shows.  You might find a new trader that has stuff you want or check out a range before buying, but that's about all. 

Two day shows were really for the competition games. and competition gamers are not usually big spenders.   

For a trader they are a huge expense in Time, money and the loss of production. 

[Leon]

Why diid they move the date, especially if there are two other shows nearby in a month.

There was a rumour that the venue was booked for May so they had to move back to March, but I'm not sure on that.  I think they thought that it was the date change into May that was causing the decline of the show, so by bringing it back to March everything would be fine again.  Obviously that wasn't the case and it's deteriorated further.  I believe they've already booked the venue for March 2017 and 2018 as well, so I don't know how that's going to work out for them.

[Womble67]

Very sad really used to be my favourite show but it's steadily declined over the years

Take care

Andy

[Steve J]

I am afraid that Ebay has killed the bring and buy, and the internet has killed the need to attend shows.

At our local show most people are checking their 'phones to compare show prices to ebay ones. I attend a show to see what's going on in the hobby and not really to shop. It is nice to see stuff in the flesh as websites vary in your ability to see how nice or otherwise stuff is.

[Ithoriel]

For me shows are for

Bumping into old friends
Bumping into friends you hadn't met until then
Seeing what the figures from the websites with no pictures actually look like
Bending the ears of traders about figures/ ranges you hope you can persuade them they should make
Despairing of ever achieving the the standards of figure painting and terrain building shown in the best demo/ participation games
Saving on postage by picking up stuff in person
Buying random stuff I didn't realise I needed (and possibly didn't!)

Pretty much in that order. A sufficiency of attendees is therefore quite important to me.

[Leman]

Bit like going into a new (or old) coffee shop and finding you're the only customer.