More Adjustments!
The fabulous and now world famous Parking Thugs!
We're now just a month away from our first apology due to weather. Maybe we'll get lucky. No, not that kind of lucky. Well, maybe.
As you can see, we've made a lot of changes to our website, and some of the pages have been rebuilt entirely. This included a needed software upgrade for easier editing without having to manually adjust the page after each change. We gave it a cleaner look and made it a bit more user-friendly on mobile devices. We completely rebuilt the volunteer and home page, so both are entirely new. The website overall should scale a lot better regardless of what you're using to see the thing.
The website is continually updated all year as it is. It's just that this is the one time each season when we can spend the hours giving it a deep tweak (not in a creepy massage kind of way) and rebuild entire pages without getting a lot of hate mail when something doesn't look right.
The entire site revolves around reducing FAQs while memorializing our brand and theme emphasis. It's amazing how many people show up for the first time and demand that we change our show somehow to better suit them. Nope. We don’t mind the suggestions, but we’re sticking with what works.
Still, the best thing we can do is make it as clear as we can that we're about a unique niche in the car world and that we're here to have a good time on a Saturday morning. We wanted to make the site as welcoming as possible to everyone.
We place special emphasis on the Thugs on our site because without them, we have no show. They are the personality and anchor to everything. They are there to keep it consistently fun for all of us, and we can never thank them enough for giving up their Saturday mornings to come out and help. I love looking at the photos of us over the last fifteen years with all the laughs and good times. I don't think I've ever laughed harder.
As always, we're continually looking for people to join the Thugs to make each weekend a little less challenging for our core group. We look for volunteers who are the kind of people that nuns wanted to whomp in school because they said something they thought was funny. Those personalities fit best. Our goal is to always make your Saturday morning something festive, something that brings a smile to your face just thinking about it without handcuffs. Save that for when you're home.
Judging by the amount of correspondence we're already receiving on all fronts, this is going to be another record year. We grow in overall popularity by about 20% each and every year. After fifteen years, the show has built an international reputation, and people go way out of their way to both attend as a participant or spectator. We now draw cars from everywhere. So, when you bring your car out, it’s a big deal and those photos go everywhere. Even on someone’s bathroom wall!
We get almost weekly inquiries about where to unload a trailer for those cars coming from far away. For that, we suggest offloading on the East side of the property over by the old Bed Bugs and Beyond now (H Mart). Semis offload where they can find room, but you need to be there early. If you get there super-early, it's way easier to offload a truck and find parking, and there are fewer people around who are going to gripe about something.
The website itself gets visitors from all over the world, and we're trending in Fresno. The more our show catches on around the globe, the harder we try to meet those expectations from everyone, so we're out to constantly improve everything. None of this would happen without the support of Redmond Town Center.
Some think we're somehow affiliated with RTC, but we're not, outside of using their lots along with their fantastic support. I bring this up because when someone gets their undies in a wad about something, come see us directly. We're always going to get someone who complains about something with a show this big. That's been consistent since we began, but we know that our show is a massive benefit to the whole region, and it brings community together, so we're going to just keep going and do what we do.