What is the best way to introduce the public to paintball?

[Random Invert]

Something like wakestock or freeze festival, combining sport with a music event would pull in a large varied crowed, it was attempted once in Llangollen (Xuberance extreme sports festival) but due to poor ticket sales the event was canceled.

Could be an option for the future.

Maybe try something like xuberance with more varied under ground sports (Paintball, rollerblade, skateboard, motor cross, white water sports etc) with music, try and appeal to a larger audience.

 

[Sinister]

I vote we get a SupAir field at Glasto, Reading and V next year. Job jobbed.

 

[cowface]

music festival would be good, or something relating to X spots festival

 

[Random Invert]

Warpeds inflatable arena at V would be brilliant!

 

[echo34]

the best way would be to combine rec days with walk ons, and use sup air fields for rec days, run sites similarly to how they do in the US. merge both elements rather than having the rec players and the "tournament" players.

promoting tournaments to the general public is pointless with paintball as it is now in this country. how many people are going to go stand in a muddy field to watch a load of rag tag "teams" of overweight middle aged men pretend they are professionally athletes? the events as they are are poor, they are too localised, and teams don't represent anything or anywhere and generally seem to have ridiculous names, there is a lack of professionalism about everything, and paintball is generally boring to watch, it is more of a highlight game.
why try to force paintball into the public's view when it is still a mess, it is still developing and will eventually gain slightly more recognition, but it will never be mainstream.

 

[cowface]

is it because we dont play as 'hard' as the yanks do ? or the finesse ?

 

[Biscuit]

where are most people introduced to paintball ? answer at a rental site
so the best place to get people interested is at a rental site
know most rental players think of paintball as being rambo for the day
so they can relate to the scenario side of paintball easily
if we look at that side of paintball there are more players than tournie players
so maybe taking a step back and introducing people to woodsball tournies would be a good idea
sup-air is alien to none paintballers
we have to start again and build from the bottom up,but this time don,t get rid of the foundations
we did that last time round by going head long into supair and getting rid of the woodsball tournies
you ask why go this route
1 lots of site teams will develop
2 sites will invest more in the tournie side
3 rental customers will see the appeal of it instead of scenario
4 low cost for event organisers
5 more local venues to play mini series
6 keep it cheap and cheerful
7 players are not going to get butt raped by fire power and put off playing
most off all people that want to step up to sup-air will and make better teams
but best of all we will have a steady stream of players

who buy lots of products from the manufacturers who then invest in teams
things like this need supporting so get your local walkon site to get involved
http://www.ukpsf.com/goldentickets.php

most of all guys if you work at a site talk to people ,let them know about the tournie scene.
things like youtube help when telling people about our sport/hobby

but we need to go backwards to push this sport forwards in the UK

1. 
   go back to the woods and start again

 

[SabreWolf]

I totally agree with that, most people who i mention paintball to that have never been before, automatically think of running around the woods for a day climbing towers and hiding in huts or crawling through the ferns pretending to be rambo and generally having a laugh etc..

When i mention sup air ball and tournaments, they are all like huh? whats that then ? and when you explain they seem to switch off and start talking about running around the woods again.

It simply doesnt appeal as much to the run of the mill joe public looking for a fun day out.

Getting the public to firstly "Try Paintball" is the aim, once they have tried and enjoyed that first day out thats when they will most probably look alittle deeper into other realms of the sport.

Force feeding someone a game that looks completely beyond their skills and ambition from the view of the punter, can be a total put off and supair ball can look very intimidating to anyone thinking of taking up the sport.

 

[Phoenix]

where are most people introduced to paintball ? answer at a rental site
so the best place to get people interested is at a rental site
know most rental players think of paintball as being rambo for the day
so they can relate to the scenario side of paintball easily
if we look at that side of paintball there are more players than tournie players
so maybe taking a step back and introducing people to woodsball tournies would be a good idea
sup-air is alien to none paintballers
we have to start again and build from the bottom up,but this time don,t get rid of the foundations
we did that last time round by going head long into supair and getting rid of the woodsball tournies
you ask why go this route
1 lots of site teams will develop
2 sites will invest more in the tournie side
3 rental customers will see the appeal of it instead of scenario
4 low cost for event organisers
5 more local venues to play mini series
6 keep it cheap and cheerful
7 players are not going to get butt raped by fire power and put off playing
most off all people that want to step up to sup-air will and make better teams
but best of all we will have a steady stream of players

who buy lots of products from the manufacturers who then invest in teams
things like this need supporting so get your local walkon site to get involved
http://www.ukpsf.com/goldentickets.php

most of all guys if you work at a site talk to people ,let them know about the tournie scene.
things like youtube help when telling people about our sport/hobby

but we need to go backwards to push this sport forwards in the UK

1. 
   go back to the woods and start again

Absolutely....
Something similar to koth but in the woods.
Sensible prices, rental players only with rental kit only thats included in entry price, with entry into the next event free for each event's winning team as well as cheap as chips trophies for top 3 at each event. One type of event, no league's no divisions always kept rental kit only. Players are invited to cross-over by the organiser into a more tournie orientated event such as pre-mentioned koth, once they start talking about getting their own kit and showing real interest.
Perhaps such an organiser would already have a league that he/she organises so he/she could invite a couple of teams from that down to do a couple of demo games and they could mingle to. If it's not to far to travel for them and they were helped out with paint. My team would do something like this purely to bring new players in and do our bit for the sport, doesn't have to be the same teams get the teams most local to any given site, if they cared about their sport they would help out, wouldn't they?
Each site that is hosting an event premotes it to their customers and in return they are exposed to the other rental players visiting their site.
Any sites that have home teams, ask their home team to be there on the day to helpout, share advice, promote the site, event and tournie ball. Any home team that doesn't agree to this should not be a home team!
Tournie ball must get intouch with the rental player again! The scenario teams are and they are recruiting fresh blood into their scene all the time.
There are quite a few on this forum that miss the fact that scenario ball is pretty respectable in size now. Those players travel the length and breadth of the country to play and spend a fortune on kit and paint doing so.
I know this because I have only made the swap very recently. Tournie ball needs to take a long look at what the scenario scene is doing regarding recruiting new players because they are getting something right they are there at the sites with the rentals drawing them in...

 

[Markie C]

It shouldnt be us who have to do any thing it should be the companies who make the money to promote it in the right way,

To many people think it is our job to do this, sooner the big boys stick their hands in their pockets and try and promote it the better.

Little supair sites cant take the cost of sticking expo events on it should be the retailers who should do this.

We should just be able to play our sport what we pay a lot of money do to so.

It is them who will benefit in the long run any way.