What is The GRAND Tour? [AMA]

G

GrandTourPromo

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I'm Robert Bowman, President of Grand Tour Promotions. I began working on The GRAND Tour around September 1st, 2012, which makes it about 19 days old at the time of this post. I'm ready to start answering questions if you have any. This will be my first AMA in any forum of any kind. Bear with me if I take a while to reply, as I am still working my day job and will at times be unavailable or away from WiFi.

So with all that said, ask me anything...
 
NolesFan83 said:
Guess ill go first. What is the grand tour?
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The GRAND Tour is a project I've begun to address the need for growth in pool. It is a series of tournaments, the entries for which will be limited to eight players chosen by raffle. The prize pool is generated by sale of the raffle tickets to venues, leagues, tournament directors, cue services, equipment manufactures, and other entities who will then distribute the tickets to players as a form of customer appreciation for a variety of reasons, left mostly up to them.

For more info, check out the website at...

https://sites.google.com/site/grandtourpromotions/






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NolesFan83 said:
Interesting. How do the players in Jacksonville like it? Is this a monthly thing?
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The players in Jacksonville that we've spoken to are excited about the prospect of this happening. I know most of the regulars, both skilled and less skilled, and they are our motivation. Jacksonville and pool have a long history and we hope The GRAND Tour will hope showcase it well.

The first tournament's tickets are still in preorder, but the pace of the response has us feeling like November could likely be when the first tickets can be earned by players.

The first tournaments of The GRAND Tour will likely be held monthly to start, and with the growth we're hoping to achieve we could see them being scheduled bi-weekly at some point in the future.


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I know Jacksonville has good pool. The weekly tourney at park place is a monster field. Played in it once or twice. I can see this format going places. For some reason I see this as a pool room vs pool.room thing. With all fairness to the players. A room sends a good and average player to rep their room and instill some pride back into the game. The lesser player learns from the better player. About playing other people, being on the road(if its a drive to the other room), staying focused. I like that idea. I could be way off in my thinking
 
NolesFan83 said:
I know Jacksonville has good pool. The weekly tourney at park place is a monster field. Played in it once or twice. I can see this format going places. For some reason I see this as a pool room vs pool.room thing. With all fairness to the players. A room sends a good and average player to rep their room and instill some pride back into the game. The lesser player learns from the better player. About playing other people, being on the road(if its a drive to the other room), staying focused. I like that idea. I could be way off in my thinking
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I think you are right on with your thinking...


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Cdryden said:
How much are the raffle tickets going to cost.
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Well first understand that players will earn their tickets from venues, league operators, weekly tournament directors, tour operators, cue repair services, etc.

Those entities seeking to appreciate their customers in a new and exciting way will purchase them at a price that depends on the quantity they purchase. The supply of tickets will be limited for each tournament and this will encourage those entities to purchase them early so as best to give their players time to make plans in case they should be so lucky to be drawn.

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Sounds like it's something that will be unique to the Jacksonville - Florida area. Any plans to expand to other areas or Nation wide?
 
Celophanewrap said:
Sounds like it's something that will be unique to the Jacksonville - Florida area. Any plays to expand to other areas or Nation wide?
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We are currently just focused on getting GTP off to a great start with GTP 1, which will more than likely just include the North Florida region.

We will likely expand to Daytona Beach and Orlando next, with the rest of Florida to soon follow.

As we move forward we want nothing less than to expand to every pool hall/bar in the country with at least one table. Our events won't be limited by a need for space or time, as these are just 8 player tournaments we are putting on.

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GrandTourPromo said:
Well first understand that players will earn their tickets from venues, league operators, weekly tournament directors, tour operators, cue repair services, etc.

Those entities seeking to appreciate their customers in a new and exciting way will purchase them at a price that depends on the quantity they purchase. The supply of tickets will be limited for each tournament and this will encourage those entities to purchase them early so as best to give their players time to make plans in case they should be so lucky to be drawn. ...
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OK, I see in your example payout on your website that you might pay out a total of $1850 in cash prizes to the 8 people who are drawn to play in the tournament. What is the total value of raffle tickets you plan to sell for such an event? $4000? Roughly what volume of sales would a billiard retailer have to see before he gave $10 worth of raffle tickets to a customer? $1000?

Perhaps your plans haven't crystallized to the point that you can answer such questions, but anyone you try to sell raffle tickets to is likely to ask them.
 
Bob Jewett said:
Do you plan to prevent good players from entering the tournaments?
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Absolutely not. I expect plenty of good players to try and earn tickets. What I won't expect is for pool halls to give their tickets away for free. They will be awarding them to players who are good customers. The same with league operators and their players. I won't expect POOL300 to give their tickets to players who only play ABL. When a player gets his tip replaced by a local cue service, he might get a ticket as a reward in hopes that said player gets drawn and wins the $1000. When I ask the player how he/she got his ticket, it will be mostly a rhetorical question as that information will be written on the ticket. The answers will be cheap advertising for the venue/league/service that rewarded the winning players.


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I like the idea of players EARNING their shot at this instead of paying for it. Say a room hold a tourney for these raffles. The players who finish in the top three earn winnings plus a raffle ticket. If you hold the 8 players tourney at the end of the month it gives all.the players a chance at earning a ticket. You HAVE to play well in order to get one. In the tournaments I play in locally anyone has a shot at winning. It would be good for the room as it should draw a.big crowd if promoted correctly and for the players fuse there is something more to play for then just money. I really hope this makes its way to central Florida. Hell all over for that matter.
 
Celophanewrap said:
Do you have any sort of target or time line for expansion?
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Right now we're solely focused on bringing the players a quality tournament, i.e. GTP 1. Think of it like a dessert at the end of the month to give players something to look forward to. It's not going to replace the meal, that is their current participation in pool. It will just be a short, very sweet event that most players won't want to miss.


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NolesFan83 said:
I like the idea of players EARNING their shot at this instead of paying for it. Say a room hold a tourney for these raffles. The players who finish in the top three earn winnings plus a raffle ticket. If you hold the 8 players tourney at the end of the month it gives all.the players a chance at earning a ticket. You HAVE to play well in order to get one. In the tournaments I play in locally anyone has a shot at winning. It would be good for the room as it should draw a.big crowd if promoted correctly and for the players fuse there is something more to play for then just money. I really hope this makes its way to central Florida. Hell all over for that matter.
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Central Florida is on our short list to expand to. We're well connected in that community as well and look forward to seeing you soon.

I went to school at UCF, and spent much time playing pool there, probably more than I should have.

For now Jacksonville is our home and we want to prove ourselves here first. Expect more soon...




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