Garlic Fest organizers offer Hollister some organizational tips
for success
There are many that speculated that this year’s
”
unofficial
”
Independence Day biker rally was not a huge success. Others used
more colorful adjectives.
Despite the fact that some bikers still came, the numbers were
significantly lower than past years. Some cited the overwhelming
police presence as a factor for less enthusiasm while others said
that they just didn’t seem
”
into it.
”
Garlic Fest organizers offer Hollister some organizational tips for success
There are many that speculated that this year’s “unofficial” Independence Day biker rally was not a huge success. Others used more colorful adjectives.
Despite the fact that some bikers still came, the numbers were significantly lower than past years. Some cited the overwhelming police presence as a factor for less enthusiasm while others said that they just didn’t seem “into it.”
Whatever the reason, the unofficial event was disappointing to local merchants that stayed open.
“It wasn’t a very good weekend. Overall, sales were down,” said Deborah Wood, owner of Drapoel and Teezerz apparel. She’d been open during the past six rallies and watched sales increase each year. She sold to vendors and had returning customers. She thinks that the city did the best they could this year, with steady police force and the bikers did come back, but she felt that the event needs to get back on track next year and accept support from one of the promotional organizations.
“HIRC [the Hollister Independence Rally Commission – the nonprofit organization that until last year organized the annual event] gave a lot to charity. Rotary used to put on the beer gardens and make all that money that they used to grant scholarships. It’s sad that they don’t have that money this year,” Wood said.
A.J. McCall came from Fresno to help his brother-in-law sell T-shirts. He said the weekend was a little slow. They didn’t expect it to be great because there wasn’t any support and he said he thought most everyone knew it.
“Business was terrible,” said Ruben Chavez, owner of Mi Casa restaurant and Fairview Country Market. “Sunday I was open by 8 a.m. thinking people might come earlier, but I was closed by 1 p.m.”
Chavez said there had been lots of speculation about the feeling behind the event. As far as the city’s goal of discouraging people from coming, Chavez said they were successful.
“Friday there were more police than bikers,” Chavez said.
The added security helped accomplish the city’s goal of making the bikers feel unwanted, Chavez said, a goal he doesn’t share with the city.
“As a businessman I think that was very stupid. I don’t want to be in a place where people discourage business,” Chavez said.
Contrast the lack of organization at the Independence Day Rally with an event such as Gilroy’s Garlic Festival and it is pretty easy to see how, when handled correctly, a large event can be beneficial to everyone.
Each year more than 100,000 people flock to the garlic festival to eat, drink and be merry, but the festival could not be successful without the throngs of volunteers that work year-round to make the event a success, said Brian Bowe, executive director of the Gilroy Garlic Festival.
“What makes the Garlic Festival work is the balance of local volunteers that put in thousands of hours of work and the money goes back to local charities,” Bowe said.
One of the reasons that the Garlic Fest is able to succeed is that every element has a committee and a chairperson. So, for example, parking, tickets and entertainment are all handled separately and each has a committee and a chair that makes that particular element of the event succeed.
The challenge, Bowe said, is getting everyone on the same page. The other thing that helps is that the chairpersons only serve on two-year terms, so a person can be an assistant chairperson two years and a chairperson for two years before they have to find something new to do. Through this method there is always new blood in each division.
The biggest difference between an event like the Garlic Festival and the rally is that the Garlic Festival is a gated event. Each year a fence is put up around Christmas Hill Park and admission is charged at the gate.
“The No. 1 advantage to having a gated event is that it is a huge revenue source,” Bowe said. “I don’t want to say it’s a make-or-break deal, but without admission it would definitely be harder to be able to make things work.”
Looking at Hollister, Bowe said that it would be difficult for Hollister to be able to do the same thing.
“How would you put a fence around downtown,” Bowe questioned. “And if you moved the venue, you can’t stop people from wanting to stop downtown.”
Not all business owners downtown like the rally, Wood said, but her take was that more business is better. As long as sales increased, great – whatever gets people into the shop, she said. But since Hollister is not a tourist destination, the city needs to actively recruit more foot traffic downtown.
So what’s the bottom line?
“Money,” Bowe said. “You need to figure out a way to earn revenue; either through charging more vender fees or … I don’t know, but you have to find a way to get a consistent revenue stream. Our success is due to the volunteer force and I don’t know if Hollister can do that, but it works well for us.”
