blonde poker forum

We now have 3 added value tours in the UK...GUKPT and Gala and, to a different customer and at a far lower buy in level, APAT

All are sold out well in advance usually, all overwhelmingly popular as you would expect from good strucutred comps with added value and part of a "tour"

beneath this the traditional UK festival cicrcuit is suffering. The Luton Springfest, a week before Mancester's GUKPT, saw poor turnouts

this weekend we hear from tikay that Aspers, a superb Newcastle  casino, attracted 20 for its £1000 event. It of course clashed with the Brighton GUKPT.

the schedule gets ever more crowded, players travel far and wide for "value" and therefore....


what is the future for non added value festival poker and what can the organisers do to ensure longevity of this scene?

is the simple answer that "normal" festivals have to add value too?

Maybe saturation point has been reached?

Actually Tighty, SEVEN showed up for the £1,000 main Event.

By reducing it to a £200 one rebuy & one add on, we managed to find 20 players.

Surely with only 20 runners they were able to have a good comp, without the usual pressure on the blinds that a bigger turnout would have caused? With only 20 runners the better players will suffer less due to variance.

In these days of sold out festivals, surely quiet tournaments offer a choice for those who don't want a donkament?

It was tremendous fun, Andrew, I could not have enjoyed it more.

Tidy Final Table, too, with J T Law, Steven Liu, George Geary, Carlo, & Alan McLean. You don't get much better than that!

And yes, the better players did do better. Until it got Heads-Up, that is.....

but how long will the venues even offer such events?

if they do not, is that a case for regret, or just market forces in action?

Well, seven is a little light.

Before the days of internet poker, the festivals were simply the only place to play these types of tournaments. The players were a captive audience so the casinos didn't have to add anything.

Now, if they want to attract the players, they do have to add something. The question is, once they've done the sums, will they actually make anything out of it?

If they decide not, then it's goodbye to casinos putting these tournaments on off their own back and hello more £20 rebuys to get the usual gamblers through the doors.

Do the poker players need the casinos more than the casinos need the poker players?

Remember that the only reason why casinos run poker tournaments is to get people through the door and get attracted by the flashing lights and wheels of death. If they're not getting bums on seats, then it's goodbye tournaments.

Regretful - yes. But the pure poker players have no power - they're not who the casinos get their money from. The casinos only care about the gamblers.

i don't think it is as simple as that anymore, a lot of poker rooms now act as profit centres not merely cost centres/adjuncts to gaming floor


eg Grosvenors move from reg fees to session charges


However I accept your realism/cynicism is historically well founded....

There writes a man who understands the situation.

But we CAN influence & help, & we must.

More from me later tonight or tomorrow, after I've done some research, but I hope we can get a healthy debate going here. We need to.

I was watching one of the very recent WPT events earlier today and the sponsorship they get by the big companies budweiser etc is pretty staggering these days.

Every other televised 'sport' (or whatever the best name for poker is) benefits from the sponsors padding out the prize money, surely poker has got to follow suit here. Or are we just too accepting that only the buy in money comes out the other side in terms of prizes.

I'm not a 'live player'. I have had the occasional dabble but it's never 'stuck' when compared to the internet, for lots of reasons (logistics, bad structures, etc).

The casinos only want poker players if they're going to make money out of them. How do they do that? The changes to session charges will help, but the margins on pure live poker are really, really slim. You need numbers to get any sort of economy of scale going. There just aren't that many players willing to enter multiple £500+ tournaments across the country.

I can only suggest that all the casinos get together and work out one calender of big poker tournaments. One place every week. Any clashes and the smaller one (usually more regional one) will be a ghost town. As we've seen this weekend, even putting 350 miles between events doesn't help.

Sponsors have been adding money for a while now, in return for "badging" the Tourney. But it's only started filtering down to the players in the last 9 months., notably via the excellent Tours started by Blue Square/Grosvenor, Gala & APAT.

But that's not the real issue here, it's the lack of an organised framework or structure for tournaments really. For such a large scale venture, Tourney Poker in the UK has no "form", or cohesive structure. When it gets one, the Sponsors will be queueing up.

Poker in this country is like golf before Arnold Palmer, or women's tennis before Billie Jean King. Get tournament poker into a form where Sky Sports want to show it every week and the money, and sponsors, should come. The breakthrough will be when non-poker/casino companies want to get involved in sponsoring it.

I think that is close.

They are there, ready & waiting, but they won't commit while there is a chance that 7 runners show up!

Which won't happen for a televised tournament with added money.

There are two issues here.

One is 'how do we get more sponsors/attention/coverage/money into tournament poker in this country?' The second is 'how do we stop a £1000 tournament getting seven people showing up for it?'

The answer to the second is 'don't run it on the same weekend as a televised tournament at the other end of the country which will attract most of the players who will play in a £1000 event.' Aspers thought the market was there for it and gave it a shot - they were wrong. They'll learn and move on.

For the first question, as Tikay says, the GUKPT is a massive step in the right direction. The USP of televised UK tournament poker would be that there is a very reasonable chance for the guy sat at home watching the TV one week to be playing on the TV the next week. We've seen an element of this with Poker Night Live and Sky Poker on the internet - converting that to a live experience would be a winner.

In fact, here's an idea I'm giving away for free. Sky Poker start up a UK tournament tour across the country. £1000 buy-in tournament every week (or every other week). Play down to the final table at the casino at the weekend. Play the actual final table in the Sky studio during the week. Proper structure (Will Hill Grand Prix style - roll the blinds right back and take all day about it). Show that on Sky Sports the day after the highlights programme from the weekend at the casino.

Run the satellites with proper structures (not the turbo crap on the TV now) throughout the week on Sky Poker. Emphasise to the viewer at home how it could be them sat in the studio playing on Sky Sports next week.

The casinos get people through the doors. Sky Poker get people playing on their poker room. Potential sponsors and advertisers get widespread TV coverage. Players get added money and value to their tournaments. Everyone's a winner.

I may have just given away my chance to be the next John Duthie but I'd be far too lazy to make it work anyway.

Andrew, you have obviously given some thought to this, one question, will they have guinness in the sky studio?

Is this what you want? I don't think i do (though i'm not 100% sure). I want some freedom in comps, I want to pay my fees for a profesionally run and structured comp. Ok every now and then- tv, added money etc great but at what price?

I love playing poker and i want a fair crack at winning- but not to play in crap-shoot finals.. Though i'd quite like to get to one lol.

The Sponsors - in my little dream world - would have no influence AT ALL on the Tourney structure. It can de done & it has been done. Now we just need to organise things better.

Until the BMA approve human cloning and we have 2 Tikays......

It HAS been done, & we can do it again.

Bigger is neccesarily better, I'd probably play more a few more events if the fields were smaller....

Just a note about "added money"

303 runners in brighton i believe.

303 x £50 = £15,150

'added money' = £10k + £3k seat.

Not exactly great value is it! I do not play the GPT because of the 'added money'

 I see the South of England Championship in Southampton this Bank Holiday weekend has been cancelled.
 Is this down to lack of runners? It certainly doesn't help that Blue Square refused to run any sats for it .....like they did last year.
We all know how big and sucessful the GUKPT is but please lets find a way of keeping other mini festivals running.

Until the advent of the GUKPT Blue Sq gave a sum of money to each Grosvenor festival. Luton, for example, used this sum to add seats to live satellites on the Sunday prior to the festival and these events were extremely popular.

At the start of 2007 Blue Sq decided to dedicate this extra money to the GUKPT which is perfectly understandable...they presumably only have a certain pot of money and they have shiny new toy to play with and promote

the consequence is though that the live satellites for the regular festivals are putting less runners into the events

And, as you say, the online satellite schedule is on some cases curtailed/absent too........


Perhaps at the end of GUKPT Season 1 when the suits are debriefing they might consider the knock on effects onto their longer term non- GUKPT festival planning.

Only the final table will be at the Sky studio, so it won't affect you. There'll be plenty of Guinness at the casino for you to get stuck into a hour after the tournament starts.

I believe that Aspers scheduled their festival before the Brighton dates had been announced.

Chris, the cardroom supervisor said that he was "devastated" when their week got counterfeited.

I must add that after a few days up there I was really impressed by Aspers and I'm sure that they'll have many successful festivals in the future. It has friendly locals, a huge comfortable cardroom in pleasant surroundings and excellent staff.

I will definitely visit again.

What about DTD, surely this will be the UK benchmark?

It may become so, but my question referred to established festivals and exisiting comps

As i understand it all the non gpt festivals are unlikely to run due to lack of runners.

I also believe there will be a lot more GPT events next year (replacing the old festivals)

Did you exclude the word "not" there Patrick?

Personally, I adore the smaller fields, 40, 50, 60, seem to suit me better, & I do better. I guess less folks to beat!

It's more comfy, not all squished up, the atmo seems friendlier, everyone on first name terms. Horses for courses I guess.

I actually think £13k of added money is excellent. (A dozen times a season....). Every little helps....It MUST be a step in the right direction, surely? In effect, they are reg fee free.

I agree 100%, they (mini-fessies) are just the ticket.

Yup, missed the 'not'...

I only play 2 or 3 £500+ events a year. I don't mind travelling to pay £300-£500 to an event that I know I'll enjoy and that I think I have a reasonable chance in. That reasonable chance is reduced once the field swells much over 100 runners. If I played more live that wouldn't be as much of a factor, but these tounaments are expensive in terms of time and money and a few in row without a cash really hurts the bottom line.

personally i aint going to travel anywhere in the country anymore for a 1k event (i have in the past) but i would be more willing to play a 300 or a 500 2 day event the same weekend as another casino is holding a 1k or 3k event

so if 2 casinos are holding festivals or major events the same week 1 needs to go for the lower end of the market make events like 100 freezeouts and a smaller main event to encourage newer players to play this will also encourage the pros who get knocked out early in the bigger buy in event to try and make it as they know that some hobby players and dead money like myself will be turning up and making it more profitable that all the sharks in the big 1-3k buy in events

Agreed Ralph, it's a super venue, with great staff & players.

Last week must have cost them a bomb in wasted Dealer costs, & they won't wanna repeat that in a hurry. I genuinely feel sorry for them, they really tried, but it just went wrong somewhere in the planning or diary.

Personally, I love Tournament Poker if it's well structured & well-organised, in nice Venues, and when I sense it's under threat, especially the Fessie part, it concerns me muchly. Remember, if these guys pull the plug, we have a problem.

The Tours are quite splendid, no doubt about it, & the sell-outs time after time prove that, but to me, the Fessies are the backbone of our circuit. But we'll always have mid-value "specials" here & there I believe. (Well, I hope).

Noooooo! Say it aint so!

I am 100% supportive of the big Tours, & Jon Raab has done a splendid job, all credit to him, but the thought that our traditional Fessies are under threat (if your understanding is indeed correct) is just horrible, imo. I do hope you are wrong! But if Grosvenor were to call a halt to their Fessies - & I can see why they may, (to better concentrate on their flagship GUKPT) then I guess other Venues would run them. They need to synchronise Diaries though, to avoid the Aspers debacle. I honestly believe the demand for Fessies is still there. But it must also be noted that here is only so much money to go round, & if the Major Tours soak most of it up, we do have  problem.

In the long run, the laws of supply & demand will prevail.

I don't think it's "sharks" so much, as guys to whom the money matters less. The sponsored boys (& good luck to them) are playing with other peoples money, freerolling, so they can afford to take more risks, play looser & lairier, as can the very considerable "nipping brigade". For the rest of us, we need to manage our bankrolls, & that CAN affect the way we play. And that's maybe one of the reasons why I seem to do better in the small field, £100 to £500 range - the big boys are not so interested in them.

Agreed in terms of the buy in. It's not that i can't afford a £1,000 entry, just that I am too sensible to gamble this sort of money (whether on poker or any other gambling). I would like more £100 freeze outs and at the time of day that some one working can take part in. Something that winds me up is when they have satellites to festivals starting at 3pm on a work day.  ::)

Excellent Post. There is a demand for such comps, run at sensible hours too.

There may well be a demand for such comps but any comp that is aimed at employed people with 'normal' sleep patterns is by neccesity a crapshoot if it has more than 50 runners.

There may well be a demand for such comps but any comp that is aimed at employed people with 'normal' sleep patterns is by neccesity a crapshoot if it has more than 50 runners.
[/quote]

Wardonkey is entirely right.  The more popular these 'small' comps are, the worse they are in terms of play.  I can't see it being financially viable for casinos to cap them at the numbers a few of you seem to like - 50-60 - either.
____________________________

Someone mentioned all the advertising at the WPT - yes there were logos aplenty, they toasted the victor with "The official Beer" and everything, but I saw no benefit to the players themselves in any of this.  A terrible final table after five days of the best tournament in the world.  Shocking - surely some of this advertising revenue could be used to cover the $1,000,000+ costs quoted as arising over the course of the WPT series (and given as an excuse for the eventual 15 minute levels).  Financial constraints involved in filming a final table where they're playing for multiple millions, to which is attributed the bad end structure are a joke with this much interest from the public and advertisers alike. 

Wardonkey is entirely right.  The more popular these 'small' comps are, the worse they are in terms of play.  I can't see it being financially viable for casinos to cap them at the numbers a few of you seem to like - 50-60 - either.
____________________________

Someone mentioned all the advertising at the WPT - yes there were logos aplenty, they toasted the victor with "The official Beer" and everything, but I saw no benefit to the players themselves in any of this.  A terrible final table after five days of the best tournament in the world.  Shocking - surely some of this advertising revenue could be used to cover the $1,000,000+ costs quoted as arising over the course of the WPT series (and given as an excuse for the eventual 15 minute levels).  Financial constraints involved in filming a final table where they're playing for multiple millions, to which is attributed the bad end structure are a joke with this much interest from the public and advertisers alike. 


[/quote]

Wardonkey is entirely right.  The more popular these 'small' comps are, the worse they are in terms of play.  I can't see it being financially viable for casinos to cap them at the numbers a few of you seem to like - 50-60 - either.

Not necessarily so. Cardiff run a lovely £250 Freeze once a month, on a Sunday, it starts at 4pm & generally finishes around 1am, (earlier for most....) & it has a lovely (all things considered) structure. It's cost effective for the Venue, too. 40 runners at £25 Reg fee covers the cost of the 4 or 5 Dealers needed, after allowing for some extra gaming table income.

But of course any structure's integrity is a function of the time "allowed" to play it. Thus one day comps can never be as good as 2 day-ers, etc.  That's just a fact of life, & the only alternative is Online, where the much faster pace of play (almost zero dealing time, limited time to act, & 5 minute max breaks rigidly adhered to) allows better structures.

As to the point that sponsorship & TV money is still not always finding it's way to the players, I agree entirely, it's astonishing that Poker has allowed this to become the norm. It amazes me even more that "outside interests" (Hole card TV Table coverage etc) actually delays play, interferes with the game's flow, & causes Blinds to be accelerated. How on earth did we allow THIS to happen, without so much of a squeak from the players? As long as we allow it though, it will happen. And it will happen until Poker gets itself properly structured & organized. It just will.

Fortunately, we have seen a good bit of added money reach UK Tourney Poker in the current 12 months - probably £250,000 or more in total from Blue Square/Grosvenor, Gala & APAT. The start of a trend, one can but hope.

Why can't competitions start at 3pm on a Saturday afternoon? That would leave plenty of time for an excellent one or two day structure.

That's a staffing issue, casinos are busiest on Saturdays. They close at 4am at which time they are usually quite busy. The gaming floor is not busy until the evening so the casino will open with as few staff as possible and then load up on the backend of the shift. If they start a dealer dealt tourney at 3pm the staff will have done a full shift by the time the casino getting busy. Getting staff to do a double shift on a Saturday is not only difficult it's also expensive.

We shouldn't really count private tournaments like APAT in figures like this.

Going back to my earlier point, its nice to see blue square add 13k to these events, it is however sad to see Grosvenor take 15k out of them.......

Not to mention the juice they charged me for a tournament a i didn't play! I haven't forgotten the rant, i am saving it for when i have the time to respond to the counter argument.

http://www.blondepoker.com/index.php?q=node/9942

tikay's article refers



as to the point he asks about "normal" night numbers at Luton...either holding up or very good depending on the night....hard to predict which in advance though....and as you know we have 4 nights a week of good structured freezes/semi-freezes

From reading Tikay's article, it seems that the 'normal' runners for the £1000 event simply chose not to play (because of the self-fulfilling snowball effect), rather than were drawn elsewhere.

Perhaps, in ye olden days, these people would have turned up regardless because there wasn't anywhere to go. Whereas now, they'll think 'I can just stay in and play the big Sunday tournaments online'

Maybe simply the fact it was on a Sunday was a contributing factor - it's the day when the internet has its biggest pull for the high stakes tournament player.

The Newcastle Event was on the Saturday (&, for those that survived, the Sunday).

jen and patrick say that casinos would need to cap comps at 50-60 runners to make them playable in 1 day and they cant see a casino doing this, but look for an answer and you shall find

lets look at aspers or walsall or luton all have capacity for about 20 tables

now if you wanted a 1 day comp to finish in 12-14 hours without turning it into a crap shoot but dont want to have 2/3 of the table sat around empty then hold 3 comps at one time

£50 a £250 and a £1000 (3 amounts to suit the players they could all be the same) gives you the abilty to run 3 differnet start times too say 2pm 2:30 and 3pm meaning meal breaks can be staggered easier ok it would be slightly more expensive (only slightly) than running 1 comp with 180 runners but everyone will feel they got more play for there money and wont feel so cheated
prize pools will be down obviously but then the chances of making the money increases

I could have sworn that article said Sunday for the £1000 event earlier.

Is it perhaps that the market is starting to reach saturation point, especially for the amount of regular uk players. It's pretty obvious that a lot of the players (pros) around are losing money or making very little. Getting by on % swaps with other players. Has the costs involved in playing (rake, accommodation, travel etc) slowly burning up the money in the poker community?
The GUKPT and Gala tours offer the big payday and perhaps players are targeting them instead of the smaller fessies.
As has been touched already, sats, particularly online are now aimed at the main tours, this must be affecting the numbers for the other fessies.
Bearing in mind the costs are players opting to play internet poker rather than the fessies, as they are more cost and time effective.

I still think there are loads of potential players out there that would love to play live but are too shy/scared or however you call it to give it a try in a casino which can be a daunting experience for a newbie.

Everyone always states "the casino's" make money out of us. Well in poker tournies we dont. Most comps run at a loss every single day, by the time we add up all the overtime, hotel costs, traveling, food, extra uniforms and other bits these comps are very costly to run. This week for the GUKPT brighton casino had to put me up in a hotel for 7 days £650. They then had to pay for all the other bits and i am not as slim as flushy I can eat. I also worked 97 hours (57 hours overtime) and 4 hours travel £1600.

So in total it cost Brighton casino around £ 2300 just to have me there for the tour week, now there are 3 tour managers they have to pay.

we had 12 visiting staff, they may not of worked my hours but thay worked hard and long (50 hrs average) £5300. 12x hotels for 4 days £4300.

So far that is around £15,000

for the main event we had 305 runners x £50 =£15250

Now you add all the extra tea girls, bar men, car jockeys, receptionists, pit staff, managers, door staff, cooks ,kps,cashiers and handymen. All these people put in overtime.

Then put in a full buffet x5 days for 200 people. (includeing Flushy/chopper)

Grosvenor are dedicated to running good comps for players we did not move away from cardrooms when poker was dropping of, these charges we make are needed to make these comps a option. Southampton was cancelled because of last years poor attendence in our other festivals, we could not operate as a buissness if we took the chance of running it. Now this is my home club and is greatly disheartened not to be able to run a festival, when I spend half my life helping to run other casino's comps for them.
 
But please keep surporting us, to keep the poker boom going I can not go back to dealing in the pit.

Nice post phat.

BTW- That hotel was bloody expensive.

That £15,250 is just the start of the money that comes into the casino. Hourly charges for instance. 

I would imagine that the bar had its busiest week of the year(probably more than double the usual amount), and the restaurant, and the table games probably had at least 2/3rds extra down the box. Whether or not the casino is able to capitalise on it is a different story. You can't just look at what they pay as a registration fee. They bring so much more into the casino.

Yogi

Not to mention the TV rights to the tournament.  I'm sure Grosvenor didn't give them away for nothing.

thought standard poker TV deal was sponsor pays for everything, TV channel gets a free program ??? in america some of the TV channels are charging to put the stuff on.

Not forgetting the fee's they just kept from people, when they unregistered from the tournaments!

Bastards owe me £10!

do tell..........................

Nooooo. Don't start him off again, PLEASE.

If you're going to waste their administrative time by registering then un-registering, they deserve to keep your tenner. I'm amazed you have had a go at the casino for making £15,000 on registrations fees for the tour. They are running a business and are entitled to make something from it - in any case, as has been pointed out, the majority of that money has gone back in added prize money. Almost £200,000 is being added to the tour and if you think that's peanuts, go boil your head. There's certainly no justification in deriding the value this adds.

There's lots I want to comment about on this thread.
First of all, let me dispell some of the untrue rumours that are abounding here:

1. Grosvenor is not looking to end normal festivals, but I believe they should be more streamlined - we had 13 festivals in 2005, rising to 26 last year and about the same this year. This is too many - both to economically support as a sponsor and bad for liquidity, as there is only so much entrance money going around. Lets not forget that GUKPT events take place within festivals - they are not stand alone events in their own right

2. This year many Grosvenor clubs are undergoing refurbishments and this is the reason why some festivals are not taking place - Blackpool, Bonanza & 2 festivals at the Vic. It is not 'unlikely that scheduled fesitvals will run because of the Tour.' One or two other events have not been scheduled this year or have been cancelled as it became obvious that there was little demand for them in an already overcrowded festival calendar.

3. No decision has been made yet about what will be included on the Tour next year, but it is likely that Aberdeen (hope you will be there Ironside) will be included as there will be a Grosvenor opening there before the end of the year. With 11 events it is already a big tour and we have no desire to massively increase the number of events, but it would be nice to run things such as the Grand Prix and Poker 6 under the GUKPT banner.

What I do believe is

- Some clubs run too many festivals
- Overall the UK festival circuit is overcrowded, with clashes now a common occurance - a few years a go nothing ever clashed
- The likes of Napoleon's in Sheffiled, Rendez-vous in Brighton and Aspers have scheduled festivals against the GUKPT - they do so at their own peril...
-That there should be no more than 18 full week festivals on the Grosvenior Calendar (inc GUKPT ones).
- All GUKPT festivals should be a week long
-Weekend or 3/4 days festivals, which make up the majority of the increased number of Grosvenor Festivals over the last two years should not be called or marketed as festivals. These bleed marketing money and spread it to thinly when it comes to promoting the week long events. I would call these 'Long/Big Weekends' or something similar and promote them at a club/regional level rather than a national one.
-Every club should run a monthly bigger tournament, similar to Walsall's £300er
-Grosvenor did not get anything for the TV rights - in fact the cost of the TV coverage is being entirely covered by Blue Square.
-Poker is not the professional sport that some of you think it is and it appeals to a much smaller proportion of the population than some of you may imagine.
-Sponsors are not falling over themselves to give lucrative sponsorship deals to the winner of every event that takes place and until significant non-gaming sponsors get involved in poker, things are unlikely to change.
-Give somethingback to the players? Yes, we have done just that for the last 2 years and we are continuing to do so - In 2005 and 2006 Blue Square added £3,000 to every week long Grosvenor Festival and £1,500 to shorter ones. Now we are adding almost £200,000 to the Tour and £21,000 to the Poker 6.  Yet so many of you still do not recognise this and continue to bleat that your casinos do nothing/little for you. What do you do for them? Lets also not forget that many of you are getting the chance to increase your profiles via the TV coverage WE are paying for.

 :goodpost: ;kneelsucker;

I like this idea

Every club should run a monthly bigger tournament, similar to Walsall's £300er

1. Grosvenor is not looking to end normal festivals, but I believe they should be more streamlined - we had 13 festivals in 2005, rising to 26 last year and about the same this year. This is too many - both to economically support as a sponsor and bad for liquidity, as there is only so much entrance money going around. Lets not forget that GUKPT events take place within festivals - they are not stand alone events in their own right

2. This year many Grosvenor clubs are undergoing refurbishments and this is the reason why some festivals are not taking place - Blackpool, Bonanza & 2 festivals at the Vic. It is not 'unlikely that scheduled fesitvals will run because of the Tour.' One or two other events have not been scheduled this year or have been cancelled as it became obvious that there was little demand for them in an already overcrowded festival calendar.

That is a GREAT relief JR, & I'm delighted to hear it.

Grosvenor have been the backbone of organised Tournament Poker since I've been involved in the game, & without them, well, things would have been very different.

As to Added Money, everyone knows my view on that.  Long may Added Money prevail.

The Monthly £300 at Walsall is a corker, as is the Monthly £250 at Cardiff, the more of these the better.

But, as a matter of interest, what's your view on the disappointing numbers at this year's two Luton Fessies? A blip?

You made one other suggestion that I like very much, but you have to guess which it is.

Flushy's head in a saucepan? lol

Luton Festival disappointing numbers - well, there's the obvoious reason - that they had moved and it was not strongly marketed - but I think there's more to it than that.  Luton run 4 festivals a year - a few years ago when the calendar was less crowded they could support having 4, but now, with more poker festivals to go to, thery struggle to fill them all - not to mention the other big events they clash with or run very close to (EPT and GUKPT).

I think Luton needs to downsize to max of three festivals a year and lose one of the December/January ones that are IMO too close together.

I agree with this

Luton needs a monthly signature comp too.


The boil in the pan suggestion I personally would not go for. Unless strongly seasoned.

The one thing that really gets my goat, and it's been mentioned in this thread and I've chewed Jonathan's ear off about it on a number of occassions is that we STILL have to pay a registration fee to play in UKPT events.

The winner is getting the lot anyway, why add the 10 grand to his pocket? The seat in the grand final is enough to add to the winners purse.

By Blue Squirrel covering the registration fee every player is getting something from the sponsor and that's how it should be IMO.

I guess that makes snse.

Typical, though, my winning-most Fessie-venue (only winning venue some'd say....) & they gonna have to downsize!

Such is life. It's such a relief to know there will still be a decent Fessie Circuit.

Please try & lobby for this Rich, as the Luton Stool Pigeon. The Monthly Comp I mean, not boiling Flushy's head. You must not boil prospective Mod's heads. For long, anyway.

I've eaten goat's head soup, whilst we're on the subjects of flushy's head and The Camel's goat  ::)

Do they Chop it up?

mr rabb

i certainly will attend the fesitval that will be part of the GUKPT and i will attend a live sat or 2 for the GUKPT in aberdeen but i doubt i will play in it unless i win a seat as the cost of the buy in would mean that i would not be able to play 3 or 4 other event
and i love traveling and playing different casinos

FYP

Ralph you fool

1) i certainly will be there
2) its spelt probably

Jon i think you were a bit unfair, i am a big supporter of the GPT, i love the events and i love the fact that blue square add to it, i am just saying it can't stop here as the added money just about counts as a juice free tournament. Not exactly 'great value' (unlike the poker 6 which is)

As for keeping reg fees, i just don't see the point, Grosvenor to me appear to want to do more and more to piss of their customers, how can they justify £10 for admin fees, how hard is it to un-register someone from a tournament?

They chopped your tenner 5 ways, they were last seen enjoying a Latte and a tuna sarrnie and the £10 went to the waitress fora tip. so well done chopper, your money fed and watered 5 people and still made a waitress happy.

seriously though, if you left unregistering til the last minute, i can see why they wouldnt refund the reg fee.

And remember, it is a REGISTRATION FEE, so you pay it to register. 

I gave them a 4 hour warning.....

The £10 is a service charge, i received no service.

There are more circuit tournaments coming. Stanley which generally gives its managers the chance to run there own tournaments are running a 3 day festival in Torquay (I will post the link if requested) the first one it has seen for 14 years!! I believe that if successfully that these will roll out across the U/K. With the buy in and structure at a more affordable rates I believe that this will attract many more players. This is also linked to a 10 week league that has just started which is a great way to qualify. There is no entry fee and all the entry fees from the league are being issued as prizes for seats in the main event. This is the way I believe that poker will go in the future,various size tournament circuits with multiple cost entry levels. The should be satellites for this tourney on Playtech, we will know within the next week. I am trying to be careful with how I post this as I have a vested interest in this tournament.

wee wee wee, all the way home !

happy daze.  wtg   d.  gl

 rotflmfao