As part of our "Awards for All" application we undertook to do a free indoor exhibition as part of our recruitment campaign. Consequently an exhibition was held at the Freeport Shopping Complex in West Lothian on 4th April 1999.

The objectives of the exhibition were:

1. To raise public awareness of of sport
2. To raise money for the Scottish jet team and aerobatics team
3. To promote The Scottish Model Airshow
4. To promote our club.

The day selected was considered to be the busiesd day of the year. We sold raffle tickets to 200 people, probably about a success rate of 1 out of 10 people asked. We probably asked about 1 in 10, so an estimate of the people passing by the exhibition would therefore be about 20,000. Assuming that half of those saw the models, and of those, half stopped to look further, we probably impressed about 5000 people.

The main source of income was the raffle tickets being sold at 20p each or 5 for a pound. The lesson here is that in general, people will buy a ticket because they are interested in the subject of the event, or just because they are "Good People" and will support any good cause. The problem with a raffle is that people are unlikely to be around when it is drawn and the organisers have the problem of distributing the prizes. If a tombolla is run instead, the prizes can all disappear before a reasonable amount of money is taken.

Jim's has observed the Freeport shoppers are transititory and that a new place needs to be found for next year. It needs to be a place where people return frequently to collect raffle prizes, thereby encouraging them to buy a ticket. Too many people at Freeport were there for the day, and gave this as an excuse for not buying.

Freeport has the advantage that it is private property and the raffle could be held without a licence. This would need to be borne in mind if an alternative location was used.

The magazines were given away free for the most part but even then were not popular. The simulator ran all day and was well attended and was supposed to be 20p a shot, but in reality probably only raised a couple of pounds. However, all the kids who tried it went away happy and that is the main thing.

Scottish Gas undertook to donate £10 pounds for every person who converts to taking electricity from them, and although plenty of information packs were available, we had too high a workload to promote these.

We had 1 A0 size poster and about 500 A4 and A5 leaflets advertising the model airshow on the 5^th & 6^th June. These were given away to anyone who showed interest but were still slow to go. Eventually, 300 or so were stuck behind car windsreen wipers in the car park.

We gave away a number of club adverts but it is impossible to say at the time of writing if this will generate any new members.

We had about 3 weeks to organise participents and models for this event. The event was immediately supported by both the aerobatics and jet teams who promised models and people for the event.

We had to liase with the Freeport management, liase with Scottish Gas, pick up the raffle prizes from Kircaldy and Scoonie, pick up airshow adverts from Queensferry, generate the model data sheets, and get the raffle tickets.

10 letters were sent out to local papers and an e-mail to Radio Forth. Neither the West Lothian Courier or Herald & Post promoted the event. Since we do not get Lanarkshire papers there is no way of telling if it appeared in any of them.

In future we need to be more organised during the event. At one stage Jim was trying to supervise the simulator, sell raffle tickets and distribute the Scottish Gas packs.

For future events, all activities must be identified beforehand, and someone earmarked to do each one:

1. Sell raffle tickets (at least 2 people at any one time)
2. Promote the raffle (someone with a "brass neck" loud voice or loudhailer)
3. Supervise the simulator
4. Talk to the public about the models
5. Sell the Scottish Gas packs
6. Hand out the airshow adverts / distribute them round the car park
7. Take the photographs

Thanks are extended to Scoonie Hoobies and Paisley Models who provided raffle prizes to supplement those donated by the West Calder and District Model Flying Club.

It is hard to decide how much a success this event was because we have nothing to compare it with. Events like this would take three to four years to get established in the local area, but once established could be an event the public recognise and make an effort to attend.

As a result of the raffle, a donation of £80 was made to the Scottish aerobatics team, and £80 to the Scottish jet team.

Everyone likes airshows - witness Leuchars and East Fortune every year. It just needs advertising, and local static indoor shows in the major towns and cities could pull together to provide a stimulus for the main event; The Scottish Model Airshow.

Tom Laird

5/4/1999