I got the same email. One of the least professional looking emails I've ever received if I may say. And I agree with Esool that this email did nothing more than make me feel like a dumbass for paying the full $159 myself.
It would have been a lot more effective (and at the same cost to them) to offer $30 off to both the bring-a-friend recruiter and recruit.
As Esool has alluded to, all signs are pointing to the fact that they are having trouble selling tickets to this. (e.g., earlybird registration has been pushed back a few times, discounted price bring-a-friend promo) Continuing to market themselves as "almost sold out" is rather sad, and together with their other promos, a minor insult to the intelligence of anyone who stayed awake through Econ 101.
All that said, I share Dave's excitement for this event, and I'm definitely looking forward to it. From a participant's point of view, I don't think it's such a bad thing if they don't quite sell out, as long as the situation isn't so grim that it has to be outright cancelled. After all, it's easier to teach (and interact with) smaller groups of students. And the physical aspects a room filled to capacity with pokerholics may not exactly put everyone in a state of nirvana.
Of course, I'm still hoping for the sales to be better than they (apparently) have been for a bunch of reasons:
1. To ensure the speakers & staff are paid well for their time & effort.
2. So that these sorts of events are more likely to happen again in the future.
3. So the class sizes are not too small. It's almost as hard (and not very fun) to speak to a group which is to small as one that is too large.
Anyway, this ends my poker-players-love-to-complain^TM session. I'm honestly not too worried about the ticket sales myself (but still hope for the best) since a thing that poker players generally are besides complainers is last-minutephilic. I wouldn't be surprised if they sold a bunch of tickets in the last couple of days, or possibly even at the door (if available). :cool:
Seeing as I haven't registered yet.... YES!!!!!!!!
How do I sign up, buddy?
Wait a couple more days and maybe it will be $79. :frown:
Actually I just read the email again and it expires today at 5pm. They sent me the email Feb 27 at 9pm, so that left me less then 48hrs to start a friendship and pass the offer on.
Not to worry, I am sure this offer will be extended as well. :redface:
I sent them an email asking wad up wit dat. I will keep you posted Mr. Fce
Sent : February 27, 2005 9:00:11 PM
Subject : CAPS Friend Reward
Dear Sucka,
.
.
We are offering you the limited time opportunity to BRING A FRIEND to the Summit for $99! Spots for this offer are extremely limited and will be given on a first come first served basis. The offer expires at 5:00pm this March 1st, 2005.
.
.
:mad: "As part of a reward for being an early bird registrant, we have randomly draw a few select people for a huge prize - nothing like getting a prize at the "turn"!
We are offering you AND two(2) of your friends the limited time opportunity to attend the Summit for $99! That is over 60% off the early bird rate!!"
A huge prize? That's not a prize, that's an offer.
And 60% off? No, that is $60/$159 = 37.7% off.
Or, if they're saying it's $99 for all 3 (which I doubt, but the e-mail is not clear on this), then it's ($159 * 3 people) = $477 less $99 paid = $378/$477 = 79.2% off.
Enough to make me wonder if any of the speakers will even show up.
Boo. I am one of the scoundrels who was waiting to see if it was actually going to happen before I gave them my money. It goes without saying that if everyone does this, it won't happen, so I feel .01% responsible.
As you said, kudos to them for cancelling well in advance, and for trying to get it happening in the first place. Now on to the question: why wasn't this thing HUGE? Poker is huge in the world right now, and I have reason to believe it's huge here in Canada, too. No offense to any of the speakers, but would it have made a difference if they had a big WPT star billed as their main speaker? Is this another case of Canada not supporting its own, as in music, movies, theatre, and television to some degree... or am I way off-base here. Do we need a big famous international "poker star" to get us off our asses and into the seminar?
I hope not. Let's face it, Dave and many of the other speakers would probably be more articulate and insightful than a lot of the WPT pros. Sure, a big star can play, no doubt, but for a seminar you need someone who can play AND teach others how to play. I think the summit had the right idea in this regard, but it's too bad that they couldn't fill the seats without MASSIVE STAR POWER.
If I sound hypocritical, I apologize. Again, I am a scoundrel. Just throwing some thoughts out there...
Instead of touting this event as "almost sold out", the organizers could have treated the possible attendees as half intelligent human beings (or highly intelligent monkeys) and came out with some statements to the effect of "You only have until such-and-such date to reserve your seat". As corny as it may sound, wouldn't simple honesty have been the best policy here?
The way the organizers were playing silly marketing games is disappointing to say the least. IMHO, this event could have happened.
I am one of the scoundrels who was waiting to see if it was actually going to happen before I gave them my money.
I'm pretty sure that loads of people were doing this. The organizers needed to be clear on the (apparent) registrarion deadlines they were facing themselves, instead if noodling around with earlybird registration nonsense.
ARRAGGRGGAGRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHH
Oh yeah, I almost forgot. I've got some prime Florida real estate for sale.
needless to say, i'm 100% pi55ed about it as well. terrible to miss out on such a great opportunity. i'm glad i took the time off work...glad i cancelled plans (even a wedding...well, i didn't cancel a wedding...)...there's no reason this couldn't have happened.
better be careful i guess...no need to turn this into a nasty thread.
[edit] just a prediction: judging by what other similar events are charging, if we see another opportunity like this here again, i'm certain we'll be paying huge for it.
[edit 2] also ironic that they finally update their site just to cancel the event...hahahaha
Sorry to be the bearer folks, but I just received this.
It has now snowed 10 inches here in the last 24 hours and to be
completely melodramatic about it, the dullness and freezing temperature
pretty well reflects how I feel right now.
After much discussion over the last three days with the Summit
Organizing Committee, they made a decision to cancel all four Summits.
It was an extremely difficult decision - even more so since the Toronto
event was doing well.
I know that you do not need these details, but I am emphasized to the
committee that it's important that I have the opportunity to give you as
much detail as possible as a cancellation reflects very poorly on
everyone. The added element to it, is that I feel a bit foolish caught
in the middle - haven't been asked to help out and be one of the
partners in coordinating the sponsors and now left to manage the
situation.
There are a few key factors that have inevitable led to this decision.
First and foremost was the fact that the Summit was not yet sold out in
Alberta (Edmonton and Calgary) or Vancouver. With one month to go, they
felt that risk was simply too much to proceed at such a late date with
uncertain sales. The last thing I would have wanted to see is having
you fly here and the Organizing Committee unable to provide you with a
full room of delegates as promised.
We had extensive discussions on what has gone wrong and a big part of it
was the mistaken scheduling of the event on the Easter long weekend in
Edmonton and Calgary. Despite heavy marketing on radio and print in
both of those markets, sales had not reflected the amount spent. The
decision was made to cut the huge financial losses now and minimize the
risk before it gets even worse.
All delegates that have registered to date will receive an immediate and
full refund. Your credit card has not and will not be charged with any
sponsorship fees.
I realize that the Organizing Committee have now put you in an
unfortunate position of having booked time and arranged your schedules
accordingly. Again, I am extremely sorry and I feel a deep sense of
personal responsibility since I've spoken to everyone on the phone and
worked hard to develop a rapport to get us to where we are. I ask for
your understanding in that the Summit was unable to attract enough
registrants despite our best marketing efforts, agenda topics, and
promos.
It is a shame that this event was cancelled as I would have like to attend.
My own thoughts were that we need more events like this and $ 159.00 was not too much, as I have seen advertizements for alot more in other cities(not Canadian).
I hope we can have a summit like this in the near future.
Does anyone know if we are sure to get the $159 back, or should i be contacting VISA to try and get the charges reversed. I have no urgency but i don't want to sit idle and then have the comapny claim that they won't give refunds but an offer to participate in their next event.
Who knows if the Toronto summit really was or wasn't doing well? My guess for the lack of sales (Toronto or out west) would be in the lack of customer support. The original website looked half assed to me and once word got out that caps was not returning phone calls I am sure potential customers got cold feet.
I feel that if their website was set up properly in the beginning and they had followed basic customer relation skills, ie return emails/phone calls, things would have been different.
Too bad, I really needed this summit. :frown:
Chugs
esool, i'll split the cost with you on that ...
actually might i recommend, if some people want to lets do a pub outing with toronto forum members.
I just hope this does not put a dark cloud on future similar events. I am shocked that this was not co-ordinated with the Casinos in all regions. If Fallsview can fill a room for Loverboy (for those of you old enough to know who they are), I am sure they can fill a room for Evelyn Ng and Dave S.
Matt and Esool, I guess I wont get a chance to meet you in person.
Does anyone know if we are sure to get the $159 back, or should i be contacting VISA to try and get the charges reversed. I have no urgency but i don't want to sit idle and then have the comapny claim that they won't give refunds but an offer to participate in their next event.
Don't forget the GST. They might lol.
They better give refunds, like by the end of next week I want to see my money.
You paid for this event, not a different one, so I don't think they can do that. Besides, what guarantee is there that there'll be a "next event" with these guys anyway?
If the Toronto sales were doing well, they wouldn't have sent that e-mail out. It had been "almost sold out" for at least 2 weeks, so it's clear that was another marketing ploy to get people to sign up.
They better give refunds, like by the end of next week I want to see my money.
You paid for this event, not a different one, so I don't think they can do that. Besides, what guarantee is there that there'll be a "next event" with these guys anyway?
If the Toronto sales were doing well, they wouldn't have sent that e-mail out. It had been "almost sold out" for at least 2 weeks, so it's clear that was another marketing ploy to get people to sign up.
I believe that the Toronto show was going well. The problem is that they can't cancel 3 & leave 1, it's all or nothing. This is due to the sponsorship packages that were sold for all 4 cities.
Thank you for your support of the 2005 Canadian Annual Poker Summit. Because of your overwhelming support we have COMPLETELY SOLD OUT. We thank all those who have registered and look forward to seeing you at the event.
Huh?
I assume this is just their way of blocking further registrations.
Some sort of details on how/when the refunds will be done might be more useful.
Have people actually personally received an e-mail indicating that the event is cancelled, cause i never received any e-mail from them along those lines.
I ask cause i've just basicly now filled my day, and if i have to go and again re arrange my plans to clear that saturday, i'm going to be really pissed off.
Comments
How do I sign up, buddy?
i really had high hopes for this event ,but i'm getting more doubtful by the day.
maybe we can get aces to come and hand out some Blue ... it is the official beer of poker in candaa
It would have been a lot more effective (and at the same cost to them) to offer $30 off to both the bring-a-friend recruiter and recruit.
As Esool has alluded to, all signs are pointing to the fact that they are having trouble selling tickets to this. (e.g., earlybird registration has been pushed back a few times, discounted price bring-a-friend promo) Continuing to market themselves as "almost sold out" is rather sad, and together with their other promos, a minor insult to the intelligence of anyone who stayed awake through Econ 101.
All that said, I share Dave's excitement for this event, and I'm definitely looking forward to it. From a participant's point of view, I don't think it's such a bad thing if they don't quite sell out, as long as the situation isn't so grim that it has to be outright cancelled. After all, it's easier to teach (and interact with) smaller groups of students. And the physical aspects a room filled to capacity with pokerholics may not exactly put everyone in a state of nirvana.
Of course, I'm still hoping for the sales to be better than they (apparently) have been for a bunch of reasons:
1. To ensure the speakers & staff are paid well for their time & effort.
2. So that these sorts of events are more likely to happen again in the future.
3. So the class sizes are not too small. It's almost as hard (and not very fun) to speak to a group which is to small as one that is too large.
Anyway, this ends my poker-players-love-to-complain^TM session. I'm honestly not too worried about the ticket sales myself (but still hope for the best) since a thing that poker players generally are besides complainers is last-minutephilic. I wouldn't be surprised if they sold a bunch of tickets in the last couple of days, or possibly even at the door (if available). :cool:
ScottyZ
Wait a couple more days and maybe it will be $79. :frown:
Actually I just read the email again and it expires today at 5pm. They sent me the email Feb 27 at 9pm, so that left me less then 48hrs to start a friendship and pass the offer on.
Not to worry, I am sure this offer will be extended as well. :redface:
I sent them an email asking wad up wit dat. I will keep you posted Mr. Fce
:mad: "As part of a reward for being an early bird registrant, we have randomly draw a few select people for a huge prize - nothing like getting a prize at the "turn"!
We are offering you AND two(2) of your friends the limited time opportunity to attend the Summit for $99! That is over 60% off the early bird rate!!"
A huge prize? That's not a prize, that's an offer.
And 60% off? No, that is $60/$159 = 37.7% off.
Or, if they're saying it's $99 for all 3 (which I doubt, but the e-mail is not clear on this), then it's ($159 * 3 people) = $477 less $99 paid = $378/$477 = 79.2% off.
Enough to make me wonder if any of the speakers will even show up.
Sigh... Too bad, it would have been a lot of fun. However, I prefer that it be cancelled still in advance than left to the last minute.
A gallant try on the part of the organziers, I think, and a shame that it will not go ahead.
As you said, kudos to them for cancelling well in advance, and for trying to get it happening in the first place. Now on to the question: why wasn't this thing HUGE? Poker is huge in the world right now, and I have reason to believe it's huge here in Canada, too. No offense to any of the speakers, but would it have made a difference if they had a big WPT star billed as their main speaker? Is this another case of Canada not supporting its own, as in music, movies, theatre, and television to some degree... or am I way off-base here. Do we need a big famous international "poker star" to get us off our asses and into the seminar?
I hope not. Let's face it, Dave and many of the other speakers would probably be more articulate and insightful than a lot of the WPT pros. Sure, a big star can play, no doubt, but for a seminar you need someone who can play AND teach others how to play. I think the summit had the right idea in this regard, but it's too bad that they couldn't fill the seats without MASSIVE STAR POWER.
If I sound hypocritical, I apologize. Again, I am a scoundrel. Just throwing some thoughts out there...
Instead of touting this event as "almost sold out", the organizers could have treated the possible attendees as half intelligent human beings (or highly intelligent monkeys) and came out with some statements to the effect of "You only have until such-and-such date to reserve your seat". As corny as it may sound, wouldn't simple honesty have been the best policy here?
The way the organizers were playing silly marketing games is disappointing to say the least. IMHO, this event could have happened.
I'm pretty sure that loads of people were doing this. The organizers needed to be clear on the (apparent) registrarion deadlines they were facing themselves, instead if noodling around with earlybird registration nonsense.
ARRAGGRGGAGRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHH
Oh yeah, I almost forgot. I've got some prime Florida real estate for sale.
Almost sold out.
ScottyZ
Sorry to hear it has been cancelled. I was looking forward to meeting Dave and the other forum members, and especially Evelyn
I, too, was waiting to make sure this was really going to happen. I hope those who have paid have no issues getting refunds.
And, for the record, my only involvement was as a speaker. I have no economic interest whatsoever.
Too bad though... it would have been a lot of fun.
They don't deserve any kudos whatsoever until all refunds are paid in full. Given the way they've handled it so far, not gonna hold my breath.
better be careful i guess...no need to turn this into a nasty thread.
[edit] just a prediction: judging by what other similar events are charging, if we see another opportunity like this here again, i'm certain we'll be paying huge for it.
[edit 2] also ironic that they finally update their site just to cancel the event...hahahaha
oh well i guess i'll apply the $150 towards poker books ... god knows i could use them
All Aces, I will pay you $159 to teach me how to win a major NL tourney by March 9.
esool, i'll split the cost with you on that ...
actually might i recommend, if some people want to lets do a pub outing with toronto forum members.
It has now snowed 10 inches here in the last 24 hours and to be
completely melodramatic about it, the dullness and freezing temperature
pretty well reflects how I feel right now.
After much discussion over the last three days with the Summit
Organizing Committee, they made a decision to cancel all four Summits.
It was an extremely difficult decision - even more so since the Toronto
event was doing well.
I know that you do not need these details, but I am emphasized to the
committee that it's important that I have the opportunity to give you as
much detail as possible as a cancellation reflects very poorly on
everyone. The added element to it, is that I feel a bit foolish caught
in the middle - haven't been asked to help out and be one of the
partners in coordinating the sponsors and now left to manage the
situation.
There are a few key factors that have inevitable led to this decision.
First and foremost was the fact that the Summit was not yet sold out in
Alberta (Edmonton and Calgary) or Vancouver. With one month to go, they
felt that risk was simply too much to proceed at such a late date with
uncertain sales. The last thing I would have wanted to see is having
you fly here and the Organizing Committee unable to provide you with a
full room of delegates as promised.
We had extensive discussions on what has gone wrong and a big part of it
was the mistaken scheduling of the event on the Easter long weekend in
Edmonton and Calgary. Despite heavy marketing on radio and print in
both of those markets, sales had not reflected the amount spent. The
decision was made to cut the huge financial losses now and minimize the
risk before it gets even worse.
All delegates that have registered to date will receive an immediate and
full refund. Your credit card has not and will not be charged with any
sponsorship fees.
I realize that the Organizing Committee have now put you in an
unfortunate position of having booked time and arranged your schedules
accordingly. Again, I am extremely sorry and I feel a deep sense of
personal responsibility since I've spoken to everyone on the phone and
worked hard to develop a rapport to get us to where we are. I ask for
your understanding in that the Summit was unable to attract enough
registrants despite our best marketing efforts, agenda topics, and
promos.
regards,
My own thoughts were that we need more events like this and $ 159.00 was not too much, as I have seen advertizements for alot more in other cities(not Canadian).
I hope we can have a summit like this in the near future.
I feel that if their website was set up properly in the beginning and they had followed basic customer relation skills, ie return emails/phone calls, things would have been different.
Too bad, I really needed this summit. :frown:
Chugs
I'm in for that!
The website www.canadianpokersummit.com still is not updated with being cancelled.
Should I cross my fingers.
I just hope this does not put a dark cloud on future similar events. I am shocked that this was not co-ordinated with the Casinos in all regions. If Fallsview can fill a room for Loverboy (for those of you old enough to know who they are), I am sure they can fill a room for Evelyn Ng and Dave S.
Matt and Esool, I guess I wont get a chance to meet you in person.
Joe
Don't forget the GST. They might lol.
They better give refunds, like by the end of next week I want to see my money.
You paid for this event, not a different one, so I don't think they can do that. Besides, what guarantee is there that there'll be a "next event" with these guys anyway?
If the Toronto sales were doing well, they wouldn't have sent that e-mail out. It had been "almost sold out" for at least 2 weeks, so it's clear that was another marketing ploy to get people to sign up.
I believe that the Toronto show was going well. The problem is that they can't cancel 3 & leave 1, it's all or nothing. This is due to the sponsorship packages that were sold for all 4 cities.
Huh?
I assume this is just their way of blocking further registrations.
Some sort of details on how/when the refunds will be done might be more useful.
ScottyZ
I ask cause i've just basicly now filled my day, and if i have to go and again re arrange my plans to clear that saturday, i'm going to be really pissed off.
I haven't received such an email. (That's why I was checking out their website to look for a possible update.)
I'm still assuming it's cancelled. Hey, if Dave Scharf's not going, I'm not either.
ScottyZ
This whole thing is like a bad joke.
Marketing no nos 101..
Umm, if that's their way of blocking further registrations, I wouldn't be expecting a refund...
Almost 4 days and no word of cancellation to anybody, and now they've apparently sold out completely.
Maybe they lost the registration fees playing poker haha :club:
Or, they've absconded down to Mexico to live happily ever after with some hot little senoritas.
Let's see, $170 * 1,000 tickets (guessing here) = $170,000. Might be tempting... :diamond:
Ok just speculating here
Did Dave's contact have the correct information?