Come Back Greenlight

[pongo]

If motorbike racing, in general, ever got good viewing figures it would be regularly on TV. If it was a popular TV event then the broadcasters would be fighting to screen it. And you are not going to be able to market the TT to people who are already not interested in motorbike racing.

 

Albert: I know you always make thought out arguments - but I believe that the potential benefits of € vs £ will be largely negated by the general economic depression and bad news which is international. € vs £ is not some great opportunity unfortunately. Since I believe that it will only make our neighbors feel slightly less skint.

 

Has it ever been established that the TT is a net earner for the IOM? Are the numbers out there somewhere?

[Albert Tatlock]

TT Marketing 101. Map of motorcycle ownership around the world (country sizes change in proportion to percent of population - the largest number of motorcycles per person is in Malaysia and Greece - where there are more than one for every five people - closely followed by Thailand, Cambodia and Italy.).

 

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[%age]

An interesting map but I'm not sure just how useful it would be without so many other factors considered too.

 

I am absolutely sure that no one employed by the Isle of Man Government would have a fucken clue how to read and use such information anyway.

 

I had communication with my first wife over the holiday period, after 27 yrs!! Basically asking where her bar of chocolate was. Anyway, she didn't know where the IOM was,, she only lives in Leicester!!!!!!!!!!!! We really need to do something about our profile chaps.

 

We seem to think everyone, certainly in UK, has heard of us and naturally loves us because we are nice people and have our own laws and all that, and we have the TT and those cats and stuff.

 

The vast majority of people in the UK but most certainly Europe, haven't got a fucken clue or even give a damn who and where we are.

 

And those who do know where we are, also know the truth. They know why and how the Isle of Man has such a lavish existence - by sidling money away from the UK tax system. And other places too.

 

Perhaps we should just come clean - we are a grubby little tax haven, yet we expect the UK to have some sort of paternal responsibility to look after our interests in the world.

[Max Power]

Hardly rocket science, but this year is going to be a very tough year for the TT re: money available, number of visitors etc. Losing any publicity/channels is going to make it only tougher too.

 

If the people responsible don't get it in their heads now and understand just how bad next year is going to be, and get out there heavily marketing like never before, then they'll realise it all too late. People involved sat in cushy jobs that they're unlikely to lose, need to get their heads around the gravity and impact of this financial crisis and where things are heading and will be by June 2009.

 

But as usual: no sense of urgency, heads up ar**s, no sense of a financial crisis, and 'business as usual'.

 

This is so true! Perhaps we will now see how good Signature marketing really are.

 

So far they've managed to alienate most of the loyal TT brigade in the search for reinvention.

 

I heard that both Audi and Yamaha are both reconsidering their contractual position, where now if that happens? The original 'suppliers would have honoured their unwritten obligations as they always have!

[jonnyrotten]

But as usual: no sense of urgency, heads up ar**s, no sense of a financial crisis, and 'business as usual'.

 

This is so true! Perhaps we will now see how good Signature marketing really are.

 

So far they've managed to alienate most of the loyal TT brigade in the search for reinvention.

 

I heard that both Audi and Yamaha are both reconsidering their contractual position, where now if that happens? The original 'suppliers would have honoured their unwritten obligations as they always have!

 

Nail on head, Max.

 

All of the island-based companies who have supported the TT through the years, lean and fat, thick and thin, have invested time effort and money in its growth and are part of the culture that has surrounded the event for the past 100 years. And because of that they have always felt that unwritten obligation. Things like that made the TT what it has become.

 

How will it fare in this brave new world of marketing, led by the company that manages Shell hospitality in F1, televised by the company that used to do talking heads in F1 and is now clinging to the wreckage of the World Rally Championship and only turned up on OUR doorstep because someone promised them a pot of government gold (ie taxpayer money). Do any of them care about anything except emptying your pockets? I think not. So when the time comes to invest, to give, and to support - where will they be then? Back home in London counting your cash would be my guess.