For those who are not aware, the 2011 Tall Ships Race will be visiting Greenock. The program is as follows.

Waterford, Ireland Thurs 30 June - Sun 3 July
Race One
Greenock, Scotland Sat 9 - Tues 12 July
Cruise-in-Company
Lerwick, Shetland Isles Thurs 21 - Sun 24 July
Race Two
Stavanger, Norway Thurs 28 July - Sun 31 August
Race Three
Halmstad, Sweden Fri 5 - Mon 8 August

The trust has an excellent opportunity, due to the fact that we will hopefully have our new Headquarters on the waterfront at Greenock. Last time the Tall Ships Race came to Greenock there were 800,000 visitors. You may think that 2011 is a LONG time away, but we need to start preparing now to make it a success.

There will also be plenty of opportunities to get involved, i will keep you informed as they arise.

However the first chance to be involved, is that we need some ideas about how we can take advantage of this opportunity?

Thanks

Stuart

I think we should have a big OYTS tent where we serve muffins and tea which has free Wi-Fi and soft furnishings such as bean bags and cushions. In there we sell OYTS merchandise and show films about OYTS. We could host corporate hospitality and at night turn it into a Ceilidh hall / Discotech with a different live band each night! I’d go.

Matt, it almost as though you've been thinking about this one for quite some time...

A giant hospitality OYTS tent makes a great deal of sense though... free wifi would get people through the gates and then we could just ply them with cake and beer until they join up! Could the tent be by the quay with all of our boats tied up alongside so that the brightly painted mastheads could guide in all the guests and so we could give tours to potential crews and mates?

It would be really good to have an innovative design for the polo shirts to be worn by our crews at the tall ships, are there any budding designers out there?

Stuart