Oregon State USBC

With tournament attendance shrinking, I have noticed entry fees rising. I feel that doing this is the last thing tornaments should do. Bowling centers should slightly lower the linage fees tournaments have to pay. Most tournaments are held during the day and most bowling is done during cosmic bowling hours.

For example, a few years ago state Queens was 60 some-odd dollars, then last year the entry was $75 I believe. Now it is $90. With the way the economy is at the moment the last thing that should be done is raising the entry fee that much.

Another thing I have noticed is that there is not much advertising being done in centers for tournaments. Last year my home house received 1 entry form for queens and was expected to copy it. Another house in the area also recieved one and I had to print out the entry form online or forward the website to potential recruits. If no one knows about the tournament, who would show up?

Also, I have found that tournaments have been in past scheduled at obscene times. This year Queens(thankfully scheduled earlier in the season this year) is scheduled around the same time as OBA's and possibly the Four Seasons Open. Two years ago Queens was in April but over in Bend and many western bowlers had to traverse the icy roads of Mt. Hood.  If tournament directors could plan out the best time to hold a challenging tournament in between other local and state wide challenging tournaments there maybe hope.

Thats just my opinion, I may be wrong.

Camille,

Some really good thoughts there and I really appreciate you taking the time to express them!  As for the Queens, the committee debated, and even though attendence was down, thought that by raising the price and offering some incentives (winner gets a paid trip to National Queens), we could entice a few more bowlers.  We also have made the split have prize fund and half expenses/lineage.  Another reason for the increase is the number of games the bowlers bowl.  We've pretty much doubled the amount of qualifying games and made the elimination round two game sets.  To try and boost attendance, I personally sent out 380 entries to high average lady bowlers in the state.

I do apologize for our lack of advertising, I'm doing my best to get that all straightened out.  Hopefully by the end of October you'll see our Championship Tournament posters and clings displayed in every center, along with ample entries for all three tournaments.  I'll be personally driving to nearly every center in the state to make sure they are displayed if allowed by the center.  I'm also having round bumper stickers produced to give away to any bowler who wants one in an effort to generate conversation/interest about bowling the way Dutch Bros does with their stickers.  Those will be making the trip with me as well.

Thanks for your feedback, I'm doing my best to make things better, please keep the ideas coming!

Good thoughts and ideas...the thing I notice most is that in all tournaments the field seems to be limited to past participants and VERY FEW new recruits.  The lack of promoting tournaments and publishing results is a huge surprise, especially compared to other sports.  We need the local media!  ex:  The ladies 600 team champions came from my town and it was very sad to see a one inch blurb in our local paper...wow.  Why wouldn't the local bowling house owners welcome this publicity?  In addition, tounament entry requires practice - more reason for the owners to promote.  Bowling should be our next Olympic sport, but it seems the popularity is going in the wrong direction.