Organising a Jaguar National Rally by Doug Tilley Rally Director 2007
Peter Holland has asked me, as Rally Director for the 2007 National Jaguar Rally, to give a brief overview of the responsibilities and requirements to run a successful Jaguar National rally. Let me start by saying that it was challenging in the ensuing two years, exciting during the rally duration and enormously satisfying at the conclusion. In the end I was very glad I had done it. The two main ingredients for the Rally are - People and Location, in that order. I was very fortunate to have a team of club members who supported me fully and did a fantastic job to ensure the Rally’s success. We spent a very busy two and a half years planning the Rally. My wife Judy and I visited a number of rallies prior to ours to get a handle on how they are run. We then spent the Easter prior, in Adelaide, visiting as many venues as possible, to see how each area looked over the planned rally period and what locations would be most suitable for our rally. Here then, are the major items and challenges that must be attended to and managed, in setting up a Jaguar national rally. 1. Location: One must consider secure car parking, car cleaning facilities, location to sporting venue, location to other functions, capacity of venue to hold cocktail party (150 guests), dinner (100 guests), location to other points of interest and for the ladies, shopping. We are fortunate that Adelaide is a relatively compact city. All events, with the exception of the sporting event, were held within a 5km radius of rally headquarters. The Stamford Grand Ballroom was used for the Friday welcome cocktail party and the Sunday presentation dinner. Morphettville Race Course with its Easter Craft Fair was a perfect location for Concours Day. The tram took delegates direct from door to door. Taking the car was a simple 5 minute journey. Glenelg Aussie Rules Football Club had just recently opened a new $1 million dollar function centre just 1km from rally headquarters. This was our venue for Saturday night. Mallala Race Circuit is 70km North of Adelaide which finally allowed the cars to stretch their legs for the Sunday sporting event and alternate Sunday run. The Monday Brunch was held at Adelaide Sailing Club, just 3km North of Rally Headquarters, from here the post rally tour commenced. 2. People: Great people make a great rally. We decided to make each of our club Register’s responsible for an event. Eg The Multivalve register was responsible for the Saturday night function , the XK register was responsible for the alternative Sunday run and so on. This was possibly the single most significant decision we made, because the registers then had ownership of their responsibility and to their credit, all saw their given task through to the end. Also in addition, specific people were delegated certain duties such as treasury, bookings, sponsorship, rally handbook, publicity etc 3. Booking Method: It is very important to make the booking system simple. We pioneered the use of booking over the Internet. This did give us a few headaches due to the number of parties involved and our inexperience. However it worked to our satisfaction and with the current excellent webmaster in the club and peoples expanded knowledge of the internet, this method should work better in the future. Also rally participants are now much more Web savvy. 4. Regalia: A very important part of every rally. An excellent income stream also. Use the KISS method here. Keep it simple. 5. Rally Theme and Logo: All Jaguar rallies have a theme. This must be settled early so that a rally logo can be developed. The regalia can then also then be produced. This can also be a big publicity item. For us, getting the only two original D Types at X Million dollars each to Adelaide created great publicity for our rally. 6. Finances: A critical part of the rally is the setting of a budget and regularly reviewing costs against budget. Plan for a modest surplus. It is also critical to set up a system where duties and responsibilities are measured against a time line. We reviewed our project plan at every meeting, which was held monthly for the two years prior. As the time frame drew closer we met even more regularly. 14