With about a half-year to pull it off, Mark and Yvonne Cresswell from North Carolina-based Worldwide Dynamics did an outstanding job organizing the first Hollister motorcycle rally in five years.
They succeeded in putting together the right kind of rally for this city – definitively biker but family friendly with an overwhelmingly festive, mellow mood – and drew an overall attendance ranging from an estimated 40,000 to 60,000 people over the two days.
They already paid the city in full – the hitch that killed the rally twice before – for $137,000 in municipal costs for the event. Â
They involved local nonprofit organizations where they could and allowed an array of groups, including the League of United Latin American Citizens and Friends of the San Benito County Library, to reap benefits.
And most important, they kept businesses busy and prosperous and happy over the two days – with hopes for year-round branding prospects and a structured economic injection.
What do they get for their performance?
They are facing immediate uncertainty over their future management of the rally – precisely the wrong and unnecessary message to send back to the biker community – because Mayor Ignacio Velazquez cannot get by conflicts that he and Mark Cresswell developed during the event’s early planning stages.
Despite the rally’s immense success with its most recent comeback – Velazquez himself lauded Worldwide Dynamics’ performance several times at Monday’s council meeting – the mayor is openly talking about initiating a bidding war for potential managers of next year’s rally.
Publicly, Velazquez says it is a prudent business move for the city. As Velazquez certainly knows being a seasoned businessman, however, this is no way to treat a respected business partner. It is more of a slap in the face than prudent policy.
The root of the problem is that Velazquez and Cresswell have clashed because they disagree on the mayor’s level of involvement in the rally’s planning. While they will both have to compromise to some extent – Velazquez is the mayor, after all – Velazquez will have to take a more hands-off approach now that this first rally is finished.
He deserves praise for kick-starting the rally tradition after his election last November, but the event, in the long term, will benefit greatly from having as little politics as possible attached to its name and functions. That means the mayor must step away from the hands-on approach he employed – with gracious intentions in mind – this year. That means Worldwide Dynamics and the Hollister Downtown Association are on a sensible path by agreeing to a five-year agreement to partner in organizing future Hollister rallies. A long-term commitment would solidify the rally’s brand and provide a sense of stability for an event that badly needs it, but the agreement won’t amount to anything without getting the city government on board.
The city’s signature tradition is not about adding a few dollars to government coffers. It is about celebrating the motorcycle culture and selling a tradition. As long as the city itself breaks even, then it is a success from the budget perspective.
A bidding war would not just severely tarnish the city’s relationship with Worldwide Dynamics and confuse the public, but it would also signal that Hollister officials are getting too wrapped up in the idea of making a so-called profit on the rally.
The last time they crossed that ethical line, we ended up with a room full of leftover rally T-shirts and a $200,000 city loss.
