Owner: Trials And Tribulations URL:http://www.funfairgames.net/weblog Join Date: Fri, 18 Jan 2008 05:15:10 -0600 Rating:0 Site Description: The trials and tribulations of running a fairground company in the 21st century Site statistics:Click here
Hummer 2008-05-06 03:34:00 Arthur and I were at 3 different events last weekend. At the first of these, we supplied a number of attractions for a private party just North of Newcastle upon Tyne. The estate was absolutely stunning, and must be one of the most impressive private homes we have ever operated at. After setting everything up, the transit van and trailer we were using sank in the soft ground. After 2 hours of trying to dig it out and extricate it using skidmats we were well and truly stuck. Just then the estate owner walked up, dropped a set of keys in my hand and said "I'll leave this with you lads."
As he walked off I spotted the vehicle he had left us, an American Hummer
, the smaller version of the American military Humvee off roader. When I say smaller, its all relative, the Hummer was smaller than s
Green City Festival 2008-05-08 17:03:00 Over the last few years, we have moved most of our business away from traditional fairgrounds and into the corporate arena. However we do take on new funfairs from time to time depending on our corporate workload. Recently we were offered the chance to form a joint venture with another operator to take on a number of new events in the Sheffield area. Although we haven't decided on a trading title yet, we have just secured the first of these events in Hillsborough park over the whitsun bank holiday.
The flyer is pictured below;
It looks a promising event and I will include a full write up here after it has taken place. One of the deciding factors in winning this was our environmental policy, and we will be placing recycling stations and waste collection services around the site.
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Read more:Festival
, Green
Universal Funfairs 2008-05-21 03:38:00 As mentioned in a previous post, we have formed a joint vebture with another operator to acquire and run a number of events in the Yorkshire region. The first of these is in Sheffields Hillsborough Park and the microformat is below for anyone that can make use of the standard;
Green City Festival:
May 25th-
26th,
at the Hillsborough Park Sheffield
We have taken and organised the Read more:Universal
Environmental Friendly Funfair Update 3 2008-05-23 21:03:00 "The diligent farmer plants trees, of which he himself will never see the fruit."
— Cicero
Our environmental sustainability project is progressing nicely. We have the biodegradable consumables and recycling schemes working well, we are using Fairtrade products as standard and our on site waste composter is steaming away merrily. At an event we are running over the weekend, not only are we co Read more:Friendly
, Update
Green Is The Colour 2008-05-31 03:43:00 The recent Green
City Days festival in Sheffield, which we presented under the Universal Funfairs banner along with Yorkshire showman James Holmes saw us undertake the first working trials or our bio diesel initiative. We have been running a test generator on various blends for a while, but this was the first time we used it to actually operate at an event.
Most of the generators there were on va Read more:Colour
Coming Events 2008 2008-06-01 06:30:00 Here are the microformats for some of our upcoming events;
Gainsborough Riverside Festival:
June 7th-
8th,
at Gainsborough, Lincs
Future Perfect Festival:
June 8th
at the Racecourse, Durham City
Yarm Gala:
June 21st-
22nd,
at Yarm, Cleveland
The event in Yarm is a revival of a community festival that hasn't been held in over 100 years, a major br
Thornbridge 2008 2008-06-03 16:46:00 For the past 3 years we have provided attractions to the annual Thornbridge Hall open day. This is one of the most stunning private estates in the country, and the 6th July is one of the very few days that members of the public are allowed into the estate.
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Hectic Times 2008-06-16 19:45:00 I tend to read a lot, everything from fiction through to autobiographies. Reading the success stories of many businesses it seems they have a commen thread, an individual with exceptional drive, energy and flair. Within our business that person is Arthur. Pictured below is this human dynamo at the recent ball we operated at in Bristol.
What happened is that Arthur was running a college event Fri Read more:Hectic
, Times
The Lunatics Are In Charge Again 2008-07-03 18:05:00 The very first stall of my own that I operated was a shooting gallery. It used the Brocock range of pistols which looked like real guns and used a clever system of mini air cartridges which resembled bullets. You charged the cartridge up, placed a pellet in the end and then loaded the pistol just like you see the cowboys doing it on telly. You then had 6 rapid shots, opened the cylinder and ejecte Read more:Again
Help From HM Constabulary 2008-06-30 03:25:00 The recent event we attended at Yarm, (the revival of its gala after about 70 years) turned out to be quite a success. We only attended with a Big Wheel, helter skelter, round stall and catering unit, due to the fact that we were positioned right outside a shop that is renowned for its rabid opposition to Yarm fair. The shops owner must have an automatic system for complaining to the local papers,
Birth Of A Cult 2008-06-26 17:38:00 When we started this blog it was meant to be a mix of information on the fairground industry, personal views and a lighthearted look at our adventures (and misadventures) in the world of corporate entertainment.
Over time the stories of Arthur have attracted a steady following. Indeed its quite normal on meeting a client for the first time for them to become excited at the thought of meeting Arth
The Nation Undressed 2008-07-23 05:39:00 We had an interesting week just gone, perfectly illustrating the wide variety of jobs we undertake. We started off by travelling down to Godstone in Surrey on a Tuesday afternoon. Once there we set up a number of attractions ready for the arrival the next day of Trinny and Susannah for their Undress the Nation series. We were providing a traditional village fete backdrop to make the program a litt Read more:Undressed
Who Do We Help 2008-07-21 18:17:00 I've just encountered an interesting problem. We switched our catering units to Fairtrade a while back and since then we have used only Fairtrade sugar on the candy floss carts. Whilst picking up some sugar from a supermarket for a last minute job I took the time to read the blurb on the back of 2 different packets. The Tate and Lyle packet made a big splash about how they were switching their ent
Dick Turpin Wore A Mask 2008-07-28 20:54:00 We recently picked up a block booking for one of our candy floss carts from a Yorkshire radio station, Galaxy FM. The first of these events took place in the Trilogy nightclub in Doncaster on Saturday evening. We transported a cart through Saturday afternoon, parked in a pay to park car park outside of the club and set the candy floss cart up ready for that evening. We arrived back at the club abo
National Memorial Arboretum 2008-08-19 14:30:00 The most persistent sound which reverberates through men's history is the beating of war drums. ~Arthur Koestler, Janus: A Summing Up
Like people from all other walks of life, some travelling showmen made the supreme sacrifice during the two world war conflicts of the last century. On 18th August 2008, a memorial to the fallen showmen was unveiled at the NationalMemorial
Arboretum near Lichfiel
Portable Boating Lake 2008-08-12 17:10:00 We are in the process of broadening our horizons and branching out into full event management. In truth we are pretty much acting as an event management company already with many of our clients requesting various non funfair related items. In readiness for the launch of our new company, we have been adding numerous items to our portfolio. Some we have acquired ourselves, others in reciprocal deals Read more:Portable
No title 2008-08-11 14:40:00 I recently found myself with nothing to do one evening. Well that's not strictly true, I am still putting the finishing touches to the launch of a new company, and I always have some internet promotions work I can be carrying out, but for once I had nothing urgent screaming at me to be done. The upshot was that my wife, daughter and I jumped in the car and nipped out to the xscape centre at Castle
Mobile Blog 2008-08-08 14:24:00 We have just taken advantage of a new service that turns our blog into a formatted version suitable for viewing on the new generation of mobile phones. If you point your phones browser to Funfairgames Mobile
Blog it will load up a miniaturised version of this blog, complete with a commenting system allowing you to read about Arthurs adventures anywhere you may be.
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Grace, Pace and Space 2008-09-14 18:21:00 We have a number of different vehicles we use depending on the requirements of each particular job. We own and operate our own heavy goods vehicles for the larger events, or events requiring heavy equipment to be transported. For mid range jobs we have an operating arrangement with a local van hire company who provide a wide range of vans tailored to our precise requirements. The smallest of our r Read more:Grace
, Space
Its Raining 2008-09-05 15:51:00 “It always rains on tents. Rainstorms will travel thousands of miles, against prevailing winds for the opportunity to rain on a tent.”
Dave Barry
The above quote by the American humourist, Dave Berry should perhaps have the word tent replaced with fairground. Last season saw a large section of the year washed out, and we all thought that lightning couldn't strike twice, but it has. Read more:Raining
West End Girls 2008-08-25 18:12:00 We have just added a new soft scoop ice cream cart to our portfolio (pictured below). This was in operation over the weekend at Aldermaston for a wedding event. Dunnita travelled down there with the cart as I had kit in operation during the day for a Coca Cola event, and on the evening at another of our Galaxy radio bookings. Everything went smoothly with Dunnita ringing up at one point to report Read more:Girls
Twenty Four Hour Petrol 2008-09-23 16:05:00 We attended a corporate event recently in Glasgow. With other events we had on the same day it was down to me, my other half and Lisa, the famous Arthur's wife, to run everything.
The event went well and we had a good time. On the way home, one of the girls suddenly noticed the low fuel warning light was on, (in actual fact it had been on for about 10 miles but I was hoping they wouldn't notice Read more:Petrol
promotional stalls for hire 2008-10-20 07:21:00 Promotional Stalls For Hire
Whilst we were still heavily involved with the traditional fairground industry, the current thinking in sidestall design was to produce a stall optomised for a specific game. As a result there tended to be shooting galleries, basketball stalls etc that only ever operated as shooting galleries and basketball stalls. When we made the move into corporate entertainment we
Mulled Wine Carts For Hire 2008-10-05 13:44:00 One of our most popular lines is our range of Victorian style catering carts. To date we have a range of carts with candy floss, popcorn, hot dogs, espress coffee, tea and hot chocolate, crepes and French pancakes available. We have just expanded this range with the addition of roast chestnuts and mulled wind. In fairness we have been supplying chestnut carts for a couple of year, but we have just Read more:Carts
Radio Ga Ga 2008-10-05 03:01:00 At the moment we are at the great Nottingham Goose Fair, supposedly one of this countries premier fairground events. In truth over the last few years it has become a shadow of its former self, with many of the smaller 'private' funfairs up and down the country providing a much better return on investment. Whilst stood at the front of our helter skelter I was approached by a young lady from Notting Read more:Radio
Flexibility at Goodwood 2008-11-04 14:29:00 After adapting our sidestalls for promotional use, we are continued to be surprised by their flexibility. A recent pre bonfire event requiring a combined chestnut, candy floss and popcorn stall, but with limited space saw us using the front counter set up we had designed for the Croydon Food Festival to produce a compact stall with all 3 items. The next night we were down the country at Goodwood
H
Long Distance 2008-11-27 17:51:00 Normally by now, the rush is over and things are slowing down. This year the opposite has happened and November has been one of our best months, December is set to surpass it, even beating the peak period of June/July. The downside is the distances we are covering. I have drove around 1400 miles in the last 4 days. We were in London Monday, Cardiff Tuesday, Stockton on Tees to set up for the new C
New Events In The North East And Lancashire 2008-11-13 16:03:00 I haven't updated this blog much lately, simply becasuse I have been too busy. We have been down to London regularly, over to Lancashire
and around Yorkshire quite a bit, added to this I have been designing a new hot roast chestnut cart which has the addition of a special drop down panel to take 2 electric warmers fot mulled wine. This will allow us to keep up with the demand for these two product Read more:North
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