Ballarat Amateur Radio Group Hamvention 2023

The BARG Hamvention  2023 is now done and dusted, a great time was had by all. If you attended, in any capacity, the  BARG Hamvention committee would love to hear your thoughts. Click here to access the survey.

BARG Report (Narrative) Hamvention 2023 Rev A

A 3 year hiatus due to COVID.

A totally new venue,

A new organising team.

The BARG Hamvention 2023 is done and dusted and is marked down as a great success.

All unsolicited feedback from traders and visitors alike has been positive and complimentary.

For the numbers people, on the 5th of Februrary 2023, BARG welcomed:

  • 36 unique trader bookings.
  • 54 Tables booked for the browsing pleasure of bargain hunters.
  • 3 major clubs represented with a total of 8 tables and who knows how many kilos of sought after equipment.
  • One representative organisation with an information table (Radio Amateur Society of Australia)
  • One organisation targetting the school aged and the younger generation (sarcnet)
  • 2 commercial traders.
  • 31 Amateur Operator traders, just like you and me.
  • 305 General Entry tickets sold.
  • 218 special sausages, and onions, expertly cooked to perfection by Chef Bob/NBV and aided by David/KQT
  • Over 160 teas and coffees
  • Innumerable soft drinks
  • The Club table had a recorded number of 64 items for sale.
  • These included items sold on consignment on behalf of Deceased Estates and Club members.
  • Proceeds from the Hamvention activities has put the club in a sound financial position.
  • The table booking process worked well.
  • The biggest problems this year related to table allocation. This was exacerbated by relatively late bookings where traders were asking to be next to trader X after trader X had booked much earlier.
  • The table allocator started to pull his hair out. But fear not we have a solution for this next year.
  • We have a plan in place to address the table spacing issue too that surfaced early.

ADVERTISING

  • We made good use of our Facebook presence to advertise as well as submitting notifications to the Wireless Institute of Australia AR magazine and news.
  • We made extensive use of our web presence to promote details and accept table bookings.
  • An invitation was emailed out to people who had participated as traders in the past.
  • A snail mailout to known non members in Ballarat postcodes, reminding them of the existence of BARG was also used to advertise the Hamvention.
  • A centralised email address (hamvention2023@barg.org.au), with forwarding to multiple people, proved indispensable.
  • Through the good work of our president Ben, we were also able to take advantage of some mainstream media coverage including the Courier, local ABC Radio and community radio Voice FM. This definitely generated significant coverage of the event and raised the club profile in the Ballarat area. In fact a very appreciated donation of some unused equipment from a family came as a result of this exposure.

Acknowledgements:

We acknowledge the contributions made by:

  • Peter, VK3HEX who offered and provided safety knowledge and paramedical resources through his company Aviation Rescue Services.
  • The Radio Amateur Society of Australia who made a very early booking and commitment to attend as well their very generous contribution to our door prizes. These were 2 QRM Kill kits consisting of a selection of ferrite rings and clip-ons to assist in reducing interference. A number of door entry raffle tickets were drawn, the town crier did his job, weaving in and around the tables. Eventually 2 lucky people went home with these very useful collections.
  • Kim VK3FMIK and Mal VK3OAK deserve a round of applause for being at the tables most of the day.
  • BARG members who made themselves available before for organising, and setup, on the day to help make it all run smoothly, and the most important post event close down and cleanup.
  • The Ballarat Polo Crosse club for helping us with the availability of the excellent venue.

Next year

What enticements will be on offer for next year?

How many table will be available next year?

Be there and find out.

Planning is already underway for Hamvention 2024