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IAMA ENTRY FORM AND RULES FOR 2006

IAMA sees some changes this year

Tucson, Ariz., July 22, 2006. The primary change in the IAMA program this year is to forego formal presentations of the awards for the immediate future. Dates for entries and announcement of awards are also changed.

I’d like your input on the following: reasons, entry schedule, awards distribution, etc. This is not a sudden decision, but it’s later than I had hoped for getting feedback from a few key people—

Reasons:

The number of people attending each year is dropping, to the point that the awards breakfast attendance was somewhat embarrassing. The lunch crowd looked good, but that was mostly Chowderheads.

Many who would like to attend cannot because of the cost of travel, room and board. And, more and more people have to be at car introductions and events that are the basis of their livelihood--regardless of cost.

John Lamm couldn’t come—he had to be out of the country. Jerry Flint and Beverly Rae Kimes were New Yorkers, so we lucked out there.

Additionally, the publications are cutting back on paying for their people to receive awards in person--even when they get the top awards.

Entry date:

The cutoff for entries is moved from Aug 24 to Sept 8—just AFTER Labor Day. The past three years more and more people found it very hard to make the August date, so we were having to give extensions which cramped the judging time.

Awards distribution:

The awards will all be shipped at the same time, December 18th, so he awardees receive their awards at about the same time.

(Presently, we give about 30% at the awards presentations ((or at least announce them because some of the people who come can’t carry the awards on the planes and we have to ship them from Tucson anyway!)) in November.)

Make the announcement of awards December 18th. This way, we can give the judges a little more time, and have some time to prepare the awards list and have it printed for inclusion in each shipment.

Last year the crunch was so bad that Elaine did not get to bed the night before we flew to NJ, and the computer crashed so she had to spend the weekend re-keying the awards in order to be able to announce them Tuesday at Sardi’s. There was no time to have copies printed to hand out—and needless to say, this certainly was not the professional image that should be exhibited.

Promotion of the IAMA program:

Take the monies that would go to making the formal presentations and direct it towards an expanded effort to gain more publicity for those who have received awards and towards the program overall—to help it better achieve its purpose of “recognizing and encouraging excellence in automotive media.

Future:

I’m not ruling out formal presentations in the future if we can come up with a time and place that would permit more people to participate personally, and a sponsor that would underwrite some of the costs involved. 

What’s your input:

This program is not the “Walter and Elaine” thing—though we are the administrators, facilitators—the key people are the entrants and the judges.

We’ve posted the 2006 IAMA Entry Forms today, simultaneously with sending this letter. I am asking for your input about these changes over a very short period of time.

I look forward to receiving any input you would like to make, by July 31, 2006.

Sincerely,

Walt

Walter R Haessner