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Welcome to todays diary entry! I am literally using every day as some sort of a counter for something so today is my penultimate Saturday before we go. I am going to have a day off talking about the trip now for fear of it being boring in here reading me talking about how i count down to big trips. Well this coming week will be a busy one for us hopefully in the shop as it is the start of the NEC week and in this industry pretty much everything stops and comes to a standstill and everyone who is anyone will be at the NEC for the Caravan and Motorhome show.
Anyone who is anyone apart from me as we struggled to get me on a stand so i will be back at base doing what i can to support the Dodge in Birmingham. Sometimes it can be a lonely place when you are there. There is a lot of pressure on retailers for one last cash injection to help see you through the winter months. The stand i was on last year it cost £2500 for me to even go on the stand so before you have sold a thing you are £2500 in the hole. Then there would normally be accommodation costs on top of that and foods etc but as we were in the motorhome we didn’t have a hotel we stayed on a Campsite near by.
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So there is that on top so call it £3k they then put you on a stand with 5 or 6 other people from other retailers and then all of a sudden it can get quite tribal. Although all the people i was on the stand with last year were sound actually to be fair. So there wasn’t any funny business and everyone got on well. The show then starts on Tuesday which is Club day and the opening day so that tends to be a little bit busy. Then Wednesday and Thursday aren’t very good so if you have a slow Tuesday and a slow Wednesday then you are really up against it. You have to hope that the sales gods are with you on Friday, Saturday and Sunday.
Then if others a re doing well and having a bit of luck then it makes you even worse so i wasn’t prepared for that last year i suppose as well in hindsight as well in October last year were doing our talks as well so i was spending an hour or so off the stand and i am not sure that went down too well but it was one of those things. So you have to try and keep yourself going and ploughing on when sometimes you just want to have a melt down and have 5 minutes off the stand you cant because you cannot afford to miss any sales opportunities.
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- Check out our Pre-Departure Motorhome Checklist to make sure things are plain sailing from the off!
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