which is why i keep bringing it up. i’m an outsider too, and deeply conflicted about these things. competitions are endless fun for nerds like myself who are easily wowed by the craft some people practice every day, for work. on the other hand, the opportunities for outreach that the current system misses are just … staggering.

your bush-beating exhortation is a good one. i doubt the scaa has the staff to do it well. and the lack of outreach to consumers and ‘real people’ is a long-running and well-known beef. i increasingly suspect that it will take some seriously motivated outsiders to alter the system (organizing independently the farm system, say, and forcing the competition circuit to deal with it). i’ve seriously considered some attempts for some time. i also have a different day job, which hampers things.

in any case, kudos to you for wading through that debate.

i can vivdly recall the day when, while i was at work, it erupted. like a flaming corpuscle.

re: serious outreach– As I see it, there are two ways to go about promoting something like the SERBC: you either have a set group of people who are going to attend no matter where it is, so the location doesn’t really matter (my Bahamas analogy) or else you work your ass off to bring people through the door who wouldn’t attend otherwise. The first is easy. you send word out through the relevant professional associations and you have enough people who attend out of habit that you know you’ll meet your goals to be successful as long as the venue is solid. (for example, I helped to organize an annual long distance mountain bike ride/fund raiser. we had to promote the crap out of it for the first two years, but since then it has reached capacity within a week of sending out announcements to the previous year’s attendees.) The second is difficult. You have to go outside of existing professional mailing lists to directly appeal to people (in the industry but outside of the active lists and boards) that there is a compelling reason to attend. Not rocket science, but it tends to take organization, cash, time, and strategy– and isn’t something you can easily pull off in a month’s time.

Check flights for TPA (Tampa, about 45 minutes away); one advantage of a tourist destination is that there are almost always cheap flights, rentals, and rooms (although the event location is directly adjacent to Scientology world headquarters and almost all of the adjacent budget hotels in downtown Clearwater have long been bought up by the church to house OTs-in-training).

note: there was a massive debate on this issue here after last year’s serbc.

also, what kind of “serious outreach” would you like to see in advance of the bash?

as far as plane tickets go, i was initially excited by the direct budget flight. turns out the tix are $49 going and $79 coming. for us, it would be $577, not counting lodging or car rental. and the flights go only thursday, saturday and tuesday, which means that to catch the whole thing i’d need to burn three work vacation days.

gulp.

I’m in north Florida, so I’m excited to see anything happen that might kick-start the scene down here. My concern is that without serious outreach before the event you might as well hold the event in the Bahamas– those attending would fly in to have a nice tropical vacation in addition to the competition, but the event itself will not have any impact locally.

There’s so much potential here, but where do you start? Personally, I think you are dead on with the idea of a grassroots/farm system. (full disclosure– I’m overthinking all of this because I’m hoping that I’ll be able to help out in the near future. I’m about to sign a lease to start my own shop, and supporting/encouraging staff participation in competition is part of the business plan.)

which reminds me of this concept, where a grassroots farm system of smaller sanctioned jams/competitions might feed larger regional competitions, lowering the barriers of entry and widening the scope of competitions’ impact. it’s an excellent idea.

without such a system in place, though, what’s the next best thing? to me, it’s a central location that draws on as many of those pockets of interest as possible. atlanta might not be perfect either, but it definitely allows low-budget participants to easily enter from birmingham, s.c., north florida, tennessee, etc.

i’m glad for what this year’s serbc will (hopefully) do for the florida nexus. i’m frustrated that it has to come at the expense of the rest of the region.

from greenville, driving to clearwater is the same as driving to st. louis and almost as far as chicago. and we’re fairly central to the region.

obviously, you’re the exception that proves the rule. and yet, surely it would be much more of a slam dunk for you AND alex to leave for a weekend if the thing was in atlanta, right? the travel, the logistics, the details involved with leaving a small shop … suddenly you’re better able to “manage it.”

no?

If I can manage it I’ll be down there with my barista, Alex. Hell, I’m even toying with competing myself.

And here’s the website, so this can stop being a rumor: http://serbc.net/

you gotta believe that the (admittedly small) handful of enthusiasts and potential competitors in alabama, mississippi, tennessee, n.c. and other adjacent states could also be swayed by proximity. isn’t that a logical way to build a movement in the wasteland?

The South East region is a poor unfortunate soul itself.

agreed. wouldn’t that place somewhat of a premium on locating events in optimal locations for drawing fans? generating excitement?

i’m not knocking ambex. but why not atlanta?

As far as geography and (specialty coffee) population goes, it’s pretty much the largest region of the ten. That said, with the competition having been held all four times in North Carolina, the Floridians have felt a little geographically disenfranchised themselves.

No matter. murky coffee’s competition team, with all fresh-faces, will be in Clearwater, as will representatives from Counter Culture, Octane, etc.

Ambex will do a GREAT job with the SERBC, and we’re looking forward to the sand betwixt our toes come mid-October!!!

What purpose does having it there serve and who is benefiting?

I guess you won’t be riding the scooter down to that event.