[Sca-cooks] "the Coopers" was Pennsic history
Bronwynmgn at aol.com
Bronwynmgn at aol.com
Sun Jul 30 06:49:43 PDT 2006
In a message dated 7/30/2006 4:39:26 A.M. Eastern Standard Time,
phelpsd at gate.net writes:
My reply:
Yes and they have reportedly done very well by their relationship with SCA.
A fact that I do not begrudge by the way. However some of their reported
actions in past years I do take issue with.
I don't think they've done nearly as well as people think. I mean, if they
are so well off why, when one of them got a "new house" a few years ago, was
it a new double-wide trailer??? If Pennsic made them so wealthy, surely they
could have afforded to build a house.
Was written:
They do not gouge the SCA nor the people who attend
Pennsic.
My reply:
Well... I would not go that far as for example I recall the reported hay
controversy of some years back.
Don't know about any hay controversy and I've been going for 16 years.
Was written:
They don't raise the prices in their store.
My reply:
Yes but reportedly they have protected their sales monopoly on certain items
of necessity over the years by actively attempting to discourage people from
buying at a lower price elsewhere and bringing in items, such as hay bales,
for personal use.
My understanding on the hay bale thing is that you are to buy them from the
Coopers because that way they know which camps will have hay that needs
cleaned up at the end of war. Since it's a real pain to clean up, I think that's
reasonable. Certainly, even though they sell firewood and food in their
store, they also allow ads to be placed for other people that sell firewood and
food, on their premises and even in the site book.
Was written:
They have gone
out
of their way to add facilities (such as an ATM, an on-site bank and post
office), additional water lines, etc., to benefit our event. This has
caused their taxes to be raised and they pay much more each time they
imnprove their property so that we can get to the far parking lot, have
camp sites, and so on. >>>
My reply:
In my opinion such was purely a business decision brought on by the need to
expand facilities to handle the increase attendance. Having served in the
public sector in a regulatory capacity and holding a master's degree in
Environmental Management, I suspect that some of these improvements were
most probably required by environmental and health regulations at the county
and state level.
They don't have to keep expanding to suit us. The site is private property;
it would be perfectly within their rights to tell us that they are capping
the event at 10,000 people and once that many are signed up, nobody else can
come in. Instead, they keep renting and buying and clearing more land for us,
most of it land that is NEVER used the rest of the year. The ATM, onsite
bank, and post office are certainly not required by any environmental or health
regs, and while the ATM is probably useful the rest of the year, the bank
and post office are only there for Pennsic. As far as the water lines, my
husband was up there once in the off season and found Dave digging up all the
half inch piping and replacing it with 3/4 inch; Dave told him he figured he
might as well do it since he was working in that area anyway. It wasn't
necessary, just something that might make things a little better.
Ok all that being said I attended Pennsic for quite a number of years before
I stopped merchanting. My observations of the actions of "blue shirts" in
those years were not, shall we say, universally positive.
Nor are all the actions of all those who attend Pennsic and sometimes even
those who run Pennsic on the SCA side. We're all human. Much of what I've
seen as "restrictive" actions on the part of the Coopers has been in response
to boneheaded or at least potentially seriously dangerous stuff done by us.
It is also my
belief that certain elements of "the Coopers" actively attempted to squelch
the site of the 25th Year Celebration. I gained this opinion from personal
conversations at the time with certain non-SCA personnel, i.e. a public
official in one case, who were connected with the site negotiations from the
other side.
I also heard, although I admit that this is hearsay and not based on direct
personal knowledge, that "the Coopers" attempted to squelch the site for
"Gulf Wars" early on.
I find that extremely hard to believe, but I can well believe such a rumor
got started by someone in the SCA who didn't like how the Coopers handled
something they wanted to do. According to some people, you'd think the Coopers
were collectively the embodiment of evil greedy slime. Why they keep paying
such evil people to come to Pennsic I don't know. If I thought someone was
that unfair and nasty, I'd think about 20 times before paying them money and
putting myself on their property and under their rules for my vacation.
Brangwayna
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