Tiki event in Monterey???? - California Events

MT Mai Tai Tiki Socialite Exotic Isle of Alameda Joined: Mar 21, 2004 Posts: 1438	MT Mai Tai Posted posted on Fri, Jul 6, 2007 6:21 PM On 2007-07-06 14:16, aquarj wrote: And, ahem, to any resident of Alameda protesting about a "long" 90 min driving distance to an event, I respectfully submit that your perspective is skewed by living walking distance from one of the best contemporary tiki grottos in America! -Randy But going to an event like that would entail leaving the Island, and what Alamedan wants to do that? Just ask Midite Tiki about the long and arduous journey to Alameda. But on a serious note, unless I missed it somewhere in the above posts, I don't hear any Alameda folks complaining about going over to the Monterey Bay area for an event like this. I know that Coco Loco and I would go (after all, we drove all the way down to Vista to attend Monkeyman's lamp making class). I'm sure it's the same for most of the folks in Alameda, as well as the East Bay and other regions in the greater San Francisco Bay Area. In fact, there's quite a pool to pull from in Northern California. We've got folks spread out from Novato down through the Peninsula to Silicon Valley and the South Bay and back up through the East Bay and all the way out to the Central Valley and Sacramento and beyond. If the event is good enough, just about all of these people will show up. Hell, if the event is just okay to lackluster, they'll probably still show up - once. And if the event looks really promising, then you'll start to pull people from the Southern California region and beyond as well. Seems to me that what I just typed is common sense, and I probably didn't need to type it, but there it is as my opinion anyways. Also as a caveat, there have been other events that had a fairly strong pull, but turned out just okay depending on what point of view you're looking from. Take the Tiki Invasion at the Mission Tiki Drive Inn down in Montclair, for example. Several of us NorCal folks made the trip down there, at least 5 of us were from Alameda, and we had a great time. There were great bands, like the Martini Kings, and the Ghastly Ones, and vending, and B movies, and a great cross pool of folks into tiki, rockabilly, vintage cars, etc. But the vending turned out to be kind of lackluster, not due to the fault of the vendors, but no one was really buying anything. The artists that were selling their wares didn't have much success, and I wonder if most of them even covered their vending expenses and gas, especially since a couple of them were from Northern CA as well. People like Monkeyman have commented that the Tiki crowd can be a frugal bunch, even at an event like Oasis. So from a vending standpoint, the event was kind of a flop. From a purely tiki standpoint, the tiki crowd had kind of a low turnout. But the tiki folks that were there pretty much knew each other and had a great time. We rolled out astroturf and put a white picket fence around our parking spot, scattered around some pink flamingos, and ended up getting squeezed out of our own party space! From a tiki event standpoint, it felt more like a smaller event, like HooptyLau. Have you checked out some of the threads here on TC about the HooptyLau events? Anyone that has ever been to a HooptyLau event can argue that it just might be one of the very best tiki events evar! We have that good of a time at the event, and people come up from Southern CA to attend. But one of the things that makes the event so good is all of the planning and legwork executed by the gratious HooptyLau hosts The Drunken Hat and TikiCleen. They do a great job of tying in visits to old tiki haunts like Minnie's and the Stockton Islander that now basically reside in the 'Hood. And we have fun partying at these places while we risk getting our asses kicked, lose various members of our crew, and have the gasoline stolen out of our van at the same time. The Drunken Hat and TikiCleen use their house as the base for the event, and most of us crash at a local motel. To me, HooptyLau is an example of an event that is a great success on the fun scale for the Ohana without bands and without vending. As a final example, Tiki Farm will be having their Big Ol' Bash pretty soon. I'm basically unemployed right now (but not complaining), yet Coco Loco and I will still find a way to make that trek down to Southern CA to attend that event. Can you create an event that will have the same kind of draw? If so, then people will come.

On 2007-07-06 14:16, aquarj wrote:
And, ahem, to any resident of Alameda protesting about a "long" 90 min driving distance to an event, I respectfully submit that your perspective is skewed by living walking distance from one of the best contemporary tiki grottos in America!
-Randy

But going to an event like that would entail leaving the Island, and what Alamedan wants to do that? Just ask Midite Tiki about the long and arduous journey to Alameda.

But on a serious note, unless I missed it somewhere in the above posts, I don't hear any Alameda folks complaining about going over to the Monterey Bay area for an event like this. I know that Coco Loco and I would go (after all, we drove all the way down to Vista to attend Monkeyman's lamp making class). I'm sure it's the same for most of the folks in Alameda, as well as the East Bay and other regions in the greater San Francisco Bay Area.

In fact, there's quite a pool to pull from in Northern California. We've got folks spread out from Novato down through the Peninsula to Silicon Valley and the South Bay and back up through the East Bay and all the way out to the Central Valley and Sacramento and beyond. If the event is good enough, just about all of these people will show up. Hell, if the event is just okay to lackluster, they'll probably still show up - once. And if the event looks really promising, then you'll start to pull people from the Southern California region and beyond as well. Seems to me that what I just typed is common sense, and I probably didn't need to type it, but there it is as my opinion anyways.

Also as a caveat, there have been other events that had a fairly strong pull, but turned out just okay depending on what point of view you're looking from. Take the Tiki Invasion at the Mission Tiki Drive Inn down in Montclair, for example. Several of us NorCal folks made the trip down there, at least 5 of us were from Alameda, and we had a great time. There were great bands, like the Martini Kings, and the Ghastly Ones, and vending, and B movies, and a great cross pool of folks into tiki, rockabilly, vintage cars, etc. But the vending turned out to be kind of lackluster, not due to the fault of the vendors, but no one was really buying anything. The artists that were selling their wares didn't have much success, and I wonder if most of them even covered their vending expenses and gas, especially since a couple of them were from Northern CA as well. People like Monkeyman have commented that the Tiki crowd can be a frugal bunch, even at an event like Oasis.

So from a vending standpoint, the event was kind of a flop. From a purely tiki standpoint, the tiki crowd had kind of a low turnout. But the tiki folks that were there pretty much knew each other and had a great time. We rolled out astroturf and put a white picket fence around our parking spot, scattered around some pink flamingos, and ended up getting squeezed out of our own party space!

From a tiki event standpoint, it felt more like a smaller event, like HooptyLau. Have you checked out some of the threads here on TC about the HooptyLau events? Anyone that has ever been to a HooptyLau event can argue that it just might be one of the very best tiki events evar! We have that good of a time at the event, and people come up from Southern CA to attend. But one of the things that makes the event so good is all of the planning and legwork executed by the gratious HooptyLau hosts The Drunken Hat and TikiCleen. They do a great job of tying in visits to old tiki haunts like Minnie's and the Stockton Islander that now basically reside in the 'Hood. And we have fun partying at these places while we risk getting our asses kicked, lose various members of our crew, and have the gasoline stolen out of our van at the same time. The Drunken Hat and TikiCleen use their house as the base for the event, and most of us crash at a local motel. To me, HooptyLau is an example of an event that is a great success on the fun scale for the Ohana without bands and without vending.

As a final example, Tiki Farm will be having their Big Ol' Bash pretty soon. I'm basically unemployed right now (but not complaining), yet Coco Loco and I will still find a way to make that trek down to Southern CA to attend that event. Can you create an event that will have the same kind of draw? If so, then people will come.

Post #317066 by Mai Tai on Fri, Jul 6, 2007 6:21 PM