What is the purpose of the orchid society? Don't we qualify as non-profit
organizations because we educate the public?

If the xxOS show becomes just an orchid sales location we could lose our
educational status.

The society that I belong to requires vendors to put a display in the show
in order to sell plants in the tent. I know what a burden that puts on the
vendors. Vendors have not been invited back because they did not put a nice
display in our show in previous years.

At the show members of the society have guided tours of the displays
explaining orchids. When I would give a tour I'd tell them about awards,
point out easy plants to grow, tell them why orchid have fragrance, have
them smell a bulbophylum, point out the angrecum that Darwin spoke of,
explain why everything (it seems) got ribbons, etc. Done properly the
displays can teach the general public about plants and de-mystify orchids.
Then send them to sales tent to take an arm full of plants home.

There will always be the really stupid person who will take the plant home
and plant it in the ground like he saw in the display. Just when you think
you've seen the most stupid person someone will out do them! My favorite
story about stupid comes from Al....A person bought some phals (I believe)
for Valentines Day and planted them in the front garden. Of course they
froze and she brought them back to Al to complain. Being the great guy that
he is, Al replaced the plants.

Back to displays....This year I put my first display in the show. It was
scary and fun. I learned a lot and look forward to doing it again next
year.

I do hear our show chairperson has difficulty getting other societies and
members to put in large displays. I know the vendors find it a pain in the
neck trying to get set up for sales and display. There's the rush to get
everything torn down after the show and on the road. Maybe we should have
more volunteers to help the vendors during setup.

Think about this....if we didn't have the displays then anyone could order a
couple of hundred plants from Hawaii and set up a sales table and under cut
the prices of the real orchid people. I support the vendors who specialize
in orchids. I want them to sell those common phals for $50+ each. Those
phals pay the bills and keep the heat on so they can afford to offer the few
collector plants I buy. If the Al's and Brennan's of the world can't afford
to keep the heat on all winter we'd have to get everything shipped to us
from Hawaii and Florida. Nice orchid people would be out of business.

In conclusion after this long ramble, I think the displays are an important
part of the society show.

Good Growing,
Gene




"Susan Erickson" wrote in message
...
On Sun, 5 Mar 2006 18:47:27 -0500, "danny" wrote:

I guess people in south Florida may not need to have displays at each of
the
gazillion shows being put on every year, but in places like Georgia and
Alabama where there are only a couple orchid shows in the state each year
I
can't imagine doing them without the displays. Our society puts in
displays
at a few other shows 2-6 hours away so that those societies will
reciprocate
at our annual show. Florida probably has counties with more orchid
societies than we have in the entire state.
-danny

It is 8 hours from Denver to the Next society that does a show. We
are trying to push the Boulder, Fort Collins and Colorado Springs OS
into shows so we can get one closer than Omaha, Salt Lake or Santa Fe.

It is hard to participate when the next show is in the next state.