On Ham Talk Live! Thursday night at 9 pm Eastern time, Michael Kalter, W8CI, the official spokesperson of the Dayton Hamvention, will return to give us a Rapp Up.... I mean wrap-up... of this year's Hamvention and some ideas for improvements. If you have a question or comment about ways to make Hamvention better next year, here is your chance to call in! Tune into Ham Talk Live! Thursday night at 9 pm Eastern time by going to hamtalklive.com. When the audio player indicates LIVE, just hit the play button! If you miss the show live, you can listen on demand 24/7/365.25 also at hamtalklive.com; or a podcast version is on nearly all podcast sites a few minutes after the live show is over. Some sites include Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, Google Play, SoundCloud, and iHeart Podcasts; and it's also available on YouTube. Be sure to CALL in with your questions and comments by calling 812-NET-HAM-1 live during the show, or by Skype. Our username is hamtalklive. You can also tweet your questions before or during the show to @HamTalkLive.
2013: 24,542 2014: 24,873 2015: 25,621 2016: 25,364 As a reminder, that is by Tickets Sold. I had bought a ticket, for a Friend who was unable to go. I did turn the ticket in to try and win a door prize. No prize for me, but I had a nice time. 73 K2HAT
So Xenia topped The Hara by roughly 4,000 . All those naysayers when Xenia was announced were wrong. I recall reading many with "wait and see" attitudes. I guess they couldn't wait and just had to see. Congratulations to DARA for a successful 1st year at Xenia.
What you must keep in mind is that many fewer bone yard vendors were accommodated and based on the mud situation many will not be back next year. Many many people in the bone yard had to be extracted using recovery vehicles. I dare say many will not want to go thru that again. While DARA will try some fix for this many will have a wait and see attitude. As far as they numbers from my observations I would say ticket sales may have been higher, but attendances and size would only dictate a 2 day hamfest. They have just shrunk the flea market by 20%. Next year will be the test how many come back after this years hams in the mud flea market. I will say that they inside spaces were nicer, but hot, and the food was a 100% improvement over HARA. My concern is what will attendance look like next year and the next how many return the next year after the decline. IMHO the Jury is out until 2019. If the numbers stay steady or grow, we shall see. Many I spoke to say they are going to attend HAMCOM in TX in 2018 or HAMCATION instead. DARA seemed to have no idea which fee market spaces were paid and which were not paid. Many appeared to go unsold. Flea Market spaces need to be Cash on the Barrel Head ie PAY online period.
The DARA Hamvention people should, in an organized manner, get feedback from the Vendors. I believe they will get some very meaningful feedback.