Hello NDR Friends !

We have grown quite massive, and as such, we need some help to keep ourselves going. We need the help of our participants to keep going with the quality we want to have. So, to this end, we will be starting to assess OPTIONAL ENTRY FEES for our events. Optional because we don't want to make everyone have to pay, and realise that not everyone can pay. So, Optional means that we really would rather you send the money if you can, but we will not prevent you from racing if you do not pay.

Please see the official document about the fees, along with a schedule of fees here.

We invite your comments, questions, and discussions here. Implementation will begin with LFSCART Light World Series, and MiniFBM Series.

Jackson will be along shortly here to add his 2p to the situation.

Thanks,
dekojester

My post from the NDR Team Thread

Quote :

• Charging for Entry to Events
  

OH NOEZ, THOSE FAILERS WANT OUR MONEYZ!!

Basically, all of us here at NDR are unemployed, and 5/6 of us are students. We really don't have the finances to really get to where we want to be resource wise, so we're going to start charging OPTIONAL [yes, OPTIONAL] entry fees for some of our events. You won't get any additional benefits from paying [unless we can think of something that doesn't give you any advantage over anyone else, yet is still a reward], apart from the satisfaction of helping us

Rest assured that if you are kind enough to help us, ALL of you money will go towards NDR Events in some way - here are some of the things that we need money for:

LFS Server [x2/3 soon hopefully]
Vent Server
MultiBC Broadcasts
Prizes

In the single races the fee might feel a bit meh... but if a team runs a whole season in a series you should add some kind of prizemoney to the overall winner or podium finishers(if enough teams are willing to pay it that is). And this will really seperate da Teams from "teams"

so your saying why not just pay the person that wins the series championship if there are enough people that pay from that series that is.

No, I don't mean the whole sum but maybe a small part of it. Another idea could be to say something like this, "all the teams that are willing to pay for each round gets to fight for the overall prizemoney of <insert small amount here>".

of course

We're also internally discussing things such as sponsorship, to see if there's anything in it, how to go about it, who to go for, etc. It'll still be a bit of time before we take any action on that, that's all internal and behind the scenes. As far as me, I'd rather have a sponsor to offer a prize in exchange for track banners/stream mentions etc, and use any monies paid for either a small cash prize fund or to support all we need for the events.

But we'll have more details on anything sponsor related later on this year at the earliest.

d

Quote from Dru :

I also don't like the idea of 'not contributing' when others do. This is a classic thing which almost makes the 'not contributors' feel guilty - which I would certainly do.

For me here's the main problem in these "optional" entry fees.

Keeping in private the list of people wanting to pay would already better.

I keep telling 'em, I will hook them up with KFC so their overhead food costs (currently astronomical) decrease to 0. Then there'll be no need for entry fees!

Wow, a brave step from NDR.

I understand your reasons for the optional payments. There is a lot of time (and money) you spend into organizing a league, broadcast it and make the whole show.

Only one suggestion:
Did you think about a "season ticket"? About 10 pounds and you are free to compete in every league/race of NDR for one year. With special offers for team with more than 3 drivers?

Cheers
Tom

Quote from snoring_snoopy :

Only one suggestion:
Did you think about a "season ticket"? About 10 pounds and you are free to compete in every league/race of NDR for one year. With special offers for team with more than 3 drivers?

Tom is onto something i reckon.

That would defeat the whole purpose of making it OPTIONAL. If you have to pay to enter a league then im hoping that your giving prize money. They just need help to keep their servers going, the whole season pass thing is pretty stupid when its just an OPTIONAL thing.

Donations, rather than a fee as I see it.

Quote from PMD9409 :

Donations, rather than a fee as I see it.

That's how I see it. I see it as another way of saying ''donate if you want to.''

Yep, its just another way of asking for donations.

Quote from racer hero :

Yep, its just another way of asking for donations.

I don't like you very much.

But it's a better way of doing it. It's a much nicer way (IMO), and they should be getting something to set up expensive things like servers (game, vent, web), that comes with many other things for events we do weekly/monthly.

There's no problem with it, as their team is more of an organization than a racing team.

So good luck to them.

It's basically a little more formalized way of asking for donations, yes, but it's set up as it is now so it's a simple change if we ever decide to make entry fees compulsory (which is certainly NOT in our plans for the next loooong while).

But, it provides a more formulaic approach to it. We'll still accept "random" donations should anyone feel the need. But this will help us get a bit more money to do things. And be guaranteed, the more people pay, the quicker some things can be done, like cash prizes or trophies.

We'll be using the money, first and foremost, to get ourselves servers situated. This being done to prepare for GTAL most rapidly. Then after that's taken care of for the time being, the rest will be put to a prize fund stash, but I won't start dipping into that until I'm comfortable that enough can come in with each event to keep it at a decent level, and keep our reserves for servers up for when we need to renew.

We'll also consider the "Season Pass" suggestion from snoring_snoopy. That might be an easy do and potentially an attractive one for lots.

d

Donations can contribute to loads of things. An expensive thing is the option of a high quality MultiBC broadcast, and most people quite like having a broadcast of the race they were in. I'm not bothered if I drive in a race with a 'cast but it's quite a nice thing to have if it's available.

But the most expensive thing is the commentary. Those commentators are greedy ****s.

/me wants to admin for NDR if he gets paid!

Sounds like a good idea though and I hope it works out. A lot of people who aren't involved in planning/organising/running league events don't really know how much work actually goes on in the background.

Quote from Mp3 Astra :

But the most expensive thing is the commentary. Those commentators are greedy ****s.

We are greedy sods aren't we.

Quote from Wilko868 :

We are greedy sods aren't we.

Yes. Imagine the amount of buttseks they have to be provided to show up every race-night as we can't afford their prizes

Quote from hyntty :

Yes. Imagine the amount of buttseks they have to be provided to show up every race-night as we can't afford their prizes

You have been in the army for too long already :nol2:

Last 2 posts = horrendous.

Quote from dekojester :

And be guaranteed, the more people pay, the quicker some things can be done, like cash prizes or trophies.

I'd personally not step into the minefield of trophies for three reasons:

• We run so many events that we're probably only going to be able to afford plastic fake trophies which people would rather sling in the bin than put on display
  
• There is of course the question of where do you buy a trophy, how much do you spend on a trophy, and how nice does it have to be to make buying it worthwhile, because you can get some really horrible crappy trophies that they give out at football camps for 5 year olds...
  
• I'd assume that a number of people (I don't know, but I'm just guessing) would prefer some CASH .
  

Quote from hyntty :

Yes. Imagine the amount of buttseks they have to be provided to show up every race-night as we can't afford their prizes

Double Facepalm.