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"Billing 2007"

I altered my wording above "anger" now reads "attitude" because I'm not angry really, just frustrated.

I can see where people are coming from on the competition thing, but this is not the same as supermarkets where people can try one one week, then the other the next week if Tesco's cornflakes turned out not to be as good as the ones you'd been getting at Sainsbury's for years....

Really the LR show market is a finite one, the public will have a set amount of funds to spend in any one month or week, set holidays to take, traders can only staff one show at a time etc. Regardless of LRe originally stating they would be at Billing they took a decision that what they wanted (and what they believed the public and traders wanted) could no longer be provided at the Billing venue, hence moved location. It was always a risk that another show would take their place at Billing but also a hope that competitors would at least use some discretion and business intelligence and choose an alternative date. In that way BOTH venues/shows could have been a potential success.

Oh well. Tis done now. Will see what happens when it happens....
 
Well if I get my holidays sorted out then it'll be Billing and LRM for me in 2007...

Because I'm part of the ORRP lot LRE have deemed we are no longer welcome at any of their shows any more so ******** to them anyhow.
 
From what I read on the link to the Billing show, it is the site owners who are running the Land Rover show, and they are no doubt on the same dates as those dates were discussed with LRE at some point and a provisional date was set.

If you remember, a couple of years ago, LRO pulled the plug on it's show at Peterborough, but the site owners carried on regardless and created the Land Rover Fest Show, and that happened on the same dates as what LRO had originally intended, as far as I can see, this also seems to be the case with Billing, and the Billing owners.

They have done a deal with LRM for LRM to organise the actual event side of the show, it does not seem a case of LRM going out to set up a show at billing on the same dates as the LRE show to "have a go at LRE", but are taking up an oppotunity that was offered to them, and no doubt was also offered to LRO and LRW....
 
Well I'm going to the LRM show. As Deano says, Richard H-Thomas was one of the founders of the show back in the day when it was run by LRO and is a true enthusiast, and much more important than that, my money won't be lining the pockets of Mr Richard Green.....:D
 
I'm with Pam on this one, The guys who started the billing show having a fresh start. Remember billing used to be the dogs down bellows in about 1995 before billing started the great static caravan invasion and shutting down toilet blocks.
This year at billing to get a shower I had to go at 2am in the morning, whilst local kids driving hot hatches around the campground were being chased by the security vans……. This isn't what being an enthusiast is all about we should be able to leave our vehicles open with the keys in them, full well in the knowledge that everyone there had a common interest and that we were all friends from around the globe. - Although at billing 2006 the group of 30 youths smoking cannabis outside Vinnies Indian takeaway , wasn't the friendly atmosphere I want to share with my family any longer !.
So whilst at the show after enduring a shower under a stand pipe, (to the bemusement of the static caravan resident adjacent to the tap), went to make a complaint at the Land Rover Magazine shop Marquee and was met by a friendly lady who explained that the majority of problems, where being caused by lack of investment and from from billings license for campers being outdated by 15 odd years and didn't take into account any of the static's that had been built in that time !!!!.
So good luck to everyone going to billing next year to pay a large entrance fee to have a cold piddle shower you've queued an hour for and camping 3 ft from the caravan next to you through overcrowding and avoiding eye contact with the pikey yobs of an evening.
BUT I for one will be trying the new venue at Kelmarsh and in 2008 im sure I'll see all of you who are disillusioned with billing as well.... Because now we have an alternative.
Dave
 
Series3200tdi said:
Because now we have an alternative.
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Alternatives always existed before, The LRO show, for a while at Peterborough show ground, and now at Malven, and the LRW show at Eastnor.
For the last couple of years also had the Land Roverfest at Peterborough Show ground, and also The Spring LRO show in Yorkshire...

Have to say, it does seem like that there will be too many shows in 2006 which will most likely cause problems, companies can only go to so many trade events like this, I have a feeling that the shows generally will be a let down next year and none will live up to anyones expectations, like the agriculture shows more and more of the stand areas will be taken over by the none topical stands, diluting the experience of the show itself.

How do you know that Kelmarsh is any different, with regards to facilities, as it doesn't say on the Kelmarsh website it caters for camping and caravans, also from what has been stated so far todate that facilities are having to be "brought in" Think you may end up just as disappointed with Kelmarsh as Billing, maybe more so in some ways... maybe from the point of view of the security chasing after the undesirables, you may find they may also visit Kelmarsh, after all it is only 12 miles or so away.... not very far is it...

Some had a good time at Billing last year, while others like yourself had a bad time. What I do find strange though is how people only compare the Billing & Kelmarsh venues, after all, we are still in 2006 and we could just as easily decide that the one show we should go to next year could be just as easily the LRO or LRW shows... or do those that are been negative towards either the LRM Billing show or the LRE Kelmarsh shows have something to say about either of these two alternative magazine shows?
 
Lighting90 said:
... next year could be just as easily the LRO or LRW shows... or do those that are been negative towards either the LRM Billing show or the LRE Kelmarsh shows have something to say about either of these two alternative magazine shows?
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Fell out with LRO's 'Frank Skinner lookalike Censorship Police' a long while ago and that, plus the fact it's the wrong side of the country dictates that Billing and Peterborough are the two venues I would attend.
Gaydon was a fair way away for us (we have to drive the best part of an hour just to get to a decent bit of twin track) but we enjoyed it the year LRM sponsored it.

Oh yes I see we have another new member joining just to post here, well, well!
 
As one who has no connection whatsoever with the people who side-tracked the LRO Billing Show a few years back, formed a magazine on the back of the show to promote the next one, which they then renamed after their low circulation publication, and then pulled out of the show in 2006, I'd just like to clear up a couple of misconceptions.

The Billing Show was first dreamed up by the two major shareholders of Land Rover Owner magazine, John Cornwall (Publisher) and Richard Thomas (Editor) plus Richard Green (Accounts & Subscriptions), as a way of meeting their public at a 'family off-road weekend show'. Prior to this, other than ARC and AWDC events, there had not been much in the way of Land Rovers shows, in the way we now recognise them. LRO was the only Land Rover magazine in existence at that time.

In the early nineties, as LRO had been so successfull, the publishers of OR&4WD started Land Rover World (LRW)to try to cash in on the new market. Once this mag was established, their competitors EMAP decided to buy the then independent LRO magazine from its publishing team in the mid-nineties. However, as part of the deal they asked the Mail Order side of the old company to handle subscriptions and LRO Billing Show organisation on their behalf. John Cornwall and Richard Green administered this side, while Richard Thomas looked after International Off-Roader (IOR), which the old LRO team had also set up in the early nineties.

In the latter half of the nineties, once an embargo date caused by the sale of LRO magazine was reached, Richard Thomas (now Howell-Thomas after he married publisher Cathie Howell) founded Land Rover Monthly (LRM) with his wife, and invited as many of the original LRO contributors that were free to join them. I was still on an exclusive freelance retainer with LRO, and under its terms was not allowed to write for LRM; though by late 1998 EMAP released me and I took my Military Scene column straight across to LRM.

At the end of the nineties, the deal with EMAP to handle distribution and LRO Billing Show organistation ran out and the title LRO Show (which had not been part of the magazine sale) was sold to EMAP. However, bookings for the next two traditional Land Rover shows at Billing were made in the name of an individual and not in the name of the LRO Show.

That individual tried to persuade the publishers of LRM, and also I believe the LRW management, to take over the LRO Show under their magazine's name. I sat in for part of the LRM meeting, so know that to be fact. After short consideration, LRM said: "Thanks, but no thanks." The show was, in their views, morally LRO's.

When no other magazine stepped in to take on the Billing LRO Show under its name, LRE was formed. The following year Billing was advertised as the LRE Show.

LRO now have their own show, at Eastnor. They also tried running Northern shows for a couple of years, but these were nowhere near as successful as the Midlands area shows. Presumably, as they already have their 2007 LRO Show booked, they felt unable to take on the Billing 2007 Show when the previous organisers withdrew. The LRM crew - from the very first issue LRM carried the cover headline "the monthly magazine for all Land Rover enthusiasts" and from issue 10 the strapline "written and published by enthusiasts for enthusiasts" - were only too happy to step in and keep this little bit of Land Rover community history alive, rather than see it vanish.

Billing Aquadrome has been the annual venue for a Land Rover magazine weekend show since 1991. The tradition continues. Hopefully I'll see you all there.

Bob:)
 
Pam said:
Just to make it clear, in the above post by Dave there a quote from my post where I was defending the LRe team against Dean's accusations in an earlier post.

MY worry about offending people was that I was a newbie and seemed to have got off on the wrong foot with some people here.... So I'll shut up again now
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Everyone on here is entitled to an opinion...You can voice yours just the same as everybody else does.."You can please some of the people some of the time, but not all of the people all of the time":D
Thats what a forum is all about as far as i,m concerned..If nobody voiced there opinion the forum would die i feel...Voice on ...;)
 
Pam said:
OK. So have a good go. I can take it.

To set things straight. I am currently unemployed and decided to surf google to find some new forums to fill a bit of spare time here and there. I found this one, had a look through some of the posts, thought it looked like a friendly sort of place, with people into Land Rovers and stuff, just like me.

I saw the posts about Billing and having some insider info on Kelmarsh I decided to provide a bit of extra info. It was absolute coincidence that the very same day as I joined this forum all the stuff about LRM at Billing started kicking, both on this forum and on Difflock.

Of course if being new here means I have not earned the right yet to put forward my point of view, opinion or facts that I am aware of that others aren't then maybe it isn't the place I thought it was.....

For information I have also posted on the Poll about Rover V8s, on the Introduce Yourself thread, on the Events thread and just before I saw this attack on me, on the thread about Land Rover Experience.

However, I should not have to and will not justify myself to thread/forum nannies who are just as likely as me to have their own agendas.
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Well said..As with any forum your opinions are welcome otherwise why have a forum?? Stick with it Pam...We are not all out of the same bucket of mud you know..:tothetop: Donk
 
Sir Bob! Good to see you on here.
You related that story to me a long while ago - possibly around the BBB times of the old LRe forum. Nice to see the real story, rather than the presumed, out in the open.
 
Bernie Hayden said:
Have to say, I'm amazed to see all these people springing up out of nowhere to 'defend' a show. So two mags decide to have shows at the same time, big deal, isnt this "yer actual Missiz Fatcher's maaaaarket fooooorces" at work? :D I've never been to any of these shows myself but reading all this stuff just makes me even less inclined to go! :p
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I was in the UK this summer and went to Billing, have to honestly say can't see what all the hoo haa is about, been to one, seen it , finished.......bit like my LR mags buy two a year just for the ads and prices........keith
 
I went this year and thought it was a load of pish, i missed it last year first time for 5 years and was really looking forward to it, but when i got there i was really dissapointed i went armed with a list as long as yer arm and managed to get one part that i needed, were was all the autojumble stands from previous years?
I had thought it had been slowly going down hill a bit but after this years effort i dont know if i can be bothered to go to either billing or kelmarsh.
I agree that it would have been nice to get a show a bit further up north, but i suppose thats down to percieved market forces, i do often wonder though how some of these companys sustain a 2,3 or 4 page advert every month in four magazines, they must have to shift some stuff just to pay there advertising bills not alone there staff and then having to justify paying for a pitch at four shows, probally thats why there were so many traders missing from billing, they just can't afford to commit to all four shows.
Bigredone
 
Pam said:
Info I have suggests that the majority of last years Billing tradestands have already booked for Kelmarsh so there may not be much on show at the Billing show if LRM go ahead with it.
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DLS and Simmonites weren't at Billing this year, so perhaps they'll be at the LRM Show in 2007.
Seems an idea to stay at billing with the known facilities and visit Kelmarsh as a day visitor. I for one like the home comforts of a hook-up.
That way you get to judge which you prefer for 2008.:)

geoff
 
Dave-H said:
Oi....... That's Mr Morrison to you Deano :p
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:D :D :D

Cannonball Bob, you said it right.
BTW it wasn't you over my house a fortnight back nr Sizewell was it?
I thought the bloody thing was crashing when I saw both rotors in the vertical plane! I didn't think they could do that.
Sorry back to the subject.
 
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