2024 coming home rally

3 people have volunteered to be on the committee to plan next years rally. They need at least 3 more so they can start planning for next year. Once the committee is formed they will then start planning and come up with dates for the Coming Home Rally next year.Dave
 
Any volunteers for a leader? We certainly don't want this rally to go away. I will be doing/helping with food again next year.
 
hopefully someone will agree to be the leader. we agreed to help but we have not heard anything .i hope someone reserved campground
 
can someone answer why with all the people who have joined the forum. why dont more people come to the rally what do we need to do differently.
 
A lot of people that are new to the group and even the Facebook groups don’t know about the rallies, nor understand what they are. I know I was hesitant before i went to my first one. I think if there was a nice clear description and explanation of each of the facets it may get some more interest. Plus, a lot of the new people are younger with families. Not much for kids to do at the rallies, and time off is a consideration. Just my own opinion based on my own experiences running the rallies and from what I’ve seen in the memberships online.
 
Our first time at the CHR, in 2017, there were 140 rigs there, then in 2018 , there were about 80, almost half and subsequent years haven't been any better (don't know about this year since we skipped it). I asked why, and the answer was that Highland Ridge discontinued doing out of warranty repairs for free. Apparently the incentive was that people would come to get something for nothing.
I have heard that all of the other brand rallys are run by the company, and maybe they actively promote it, where ours is run by the forum members, although Highland Ridge normally gives a nice donation.
JK
 
The campground has been reserved, dates are not yet determined. The Elkhart location is more family friendly but not truly the home of Highland Ridge. There is still out of warranty repairs being done but as stated this rally is entirely run by volunteers who are owners.
We did have a new website for this year but most people rely on this forum.
As far as promotion we need anything we can get, any ideas are welcome.
 
i guess we need to talk about it more.morryde was great 15% off free install on most stuff some of the things we payed to have installed.always nice to have mfg install it.for what ever reason micro air didnt give us a discount not sure why we will have to work on that next year .carefree awning show up replace our awning lights no charge for lights or installation.s&s ski was there installing ss ski.highland ridge /jayco was there randy showed up to fix my slide problem the guys fixed broken screws in nose no charge so we had lippert there working i didnt have anything done by them.rv air flow gave us 15% off there system.the morryde and highland ridge tours were awsome.the free lunch at morryde was really good.so anyone saying our vendors didnt support us are dead wrong. almost forgot about the solar guy he was great too. hope i didnt forget anyone if i did someone speakup all crap almost forgot about skymed good breakfest :woohoo :woohoo
 
Well let me start by saying I started the original COMING HOME RALLY over 10 years ago with my husbands help I ran it at first by myself with lots of volunteers. Eventually I determined we needed people to be in charge of different things I couldn’t do it all myself. When we hit our peak we had 144 rigs. I hauled down an Rv of door prizes plus several volunteers did the same. As soon as one rally was over I started to plan the next. I was on the forum everyday inviting newbies and explaining how the rally worked. At one point we had 17 techs working on repairs at the rally. Today not as many but they did a lot of work for free. You only paid if the part was really expensive. They did not advertise this. I thought I was going to get a bill but in the end I didn’t.

The vendors help make the rally, the more attendees the more the vendors will participate. They tend to pull out if you don’t have enough attendees. Also the week they have chosen to have the rally is also the Elkhart county fair in Goshen, that is also a problem for vendors. A lot of them are vendors at the fair or plan their own vacations at that time.

Location makes a difference too. I’ll be truthful here. I don’t like the rally in Elkhart because it’s just another city. Going to Shipshewana where they are built and experiencing their way of life was my reason for starting it there. I took it to Goshen a few years because Shipshewana south got greedy about charging for everything. Including space to put a large dinning tent up. The last year there the company paid for it but said it was too much. It would have cost us $700 a site to hold it there. Then back to Shippy at the auction campground on Docs recommendation. He talked with the owner and got us a building to use for a reasonable amount. It was across the road but was nice and cool in the heat for the vendors, seminars etc… they also got greedy and upped the building charge by about 5k. The Auction grounds will come down again if they talk to the campground owner. In fact they contacted last years group shortly after they committed to Elkhart. The week it’s scheduled for 2024 is not good for several folks because a bunch are traveling to Alaska and Nova Scotia and myself to Branson with a group.

My experience after 10 years is that kids don’t really like rally’s. We held them in mid, July, June and August. We switched it around because if you couldn’t make it one year you might the next. When we had 144 rigs we planned lots of kids activities but it just didn’t help. We had scavenger hunts, games, kite building, Chuck wagon round up tours, Dutch farm zoo and more…it didn’t help, so I decided to go back to planning for adults mostly.

I do think the rally needs to go back to the registration forum registration. It was good to get more info than was required on this years registration. Also a list of who’s coming. We always did that and some folks just came back to see old friends.

I will miss the rally in 2024 but will also hate to see it end. Hopefully someone will step up and take the bull by the horn, surround themselves with great worker bees and make it happen.
 
Regarding rally’s, we had work the Texas rally’s for 5 years. If I recall, it went on for 7 years. Had lots of fun, being rally hall director.

Had rallying meets in Fredericksburg, San Antonio, Halletsville, it came to an end, as no one step up to be the Wagon Master. Hence, the rally for Texas fizzle out.

Maybe one day, someone will get bold, step up, gather a few owners, and do it again.

After the rally fold, a group of 5-7 of us would organize a mini get together at various cg’s, just to have fun.
 
Hi all. I am one of the 3 who volunteered to help with the 2024 rally. We do need others to step up. This year there were at least 7 on the committee. We will start planning on 9/18. Let me know if you want to help make it happen.

________
Marcia & Ed Fisher
2018 272rls
2017 Ford F250
 
I'll be in Elkhart on the 17th for major repairs on my trailer. Since I live in Idaho it's hard to be on the committee but I will be ready and willing to do whatever I can at the rally.Dave
 
lois and i are willing to help just let us know what we need to do. we will be in fla. jan. through april
 
Maybe I missed it but are there dates for the rally for 2024 yet? It will be our first one and want to get it on the calendar.
 
3 people have volunteered to be on the committee to organize the rally but they need more help so a date can be decided.Dave
 
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