FoTU 2025 thread - are you planning to go?

[blackboilersuit]

The entry fee doesn't bother me, compared to the costs of coming down from Scotchland, hotel etc £35 is fuck all in the grand scheme of things. Mind you I might feel different if it was a local show for me. FOTU is a great show and if you've never been before then absolutely DO IT, you'll be blown away and have a great time. It's a fantastic event and a great social occasion. I've been for the last 3 years so will probably give it a miss this year because like all great things if you do them all the time they become just a bit samey, it's always good to switch things up and get a bit of variety. This year I'm planning on doing Rustival and Shitefest International for a change but may well return to FOTU in future years.

[beko1987]

I did enjoy it tbh, and going with/from my dad's near Spalding makes it not a huge trip for me. 

But having spent last year mostly down the show end of the event with my dad who has limited mobility i think next time we'll park up by the normal_cars end and stay up there! (or play the blue badge card and see if we could sweet talk the staff into letting us buzz down to the other end after a good while). 

My dad would do better with just sitting down around somewhere and chatting than walking. I'll keep an eye on the overall plan but am deffo going to Rustival. Should consider Chumley too if thats still on I guess. FOTU is last place in my limited social 'shit I wanna do this year' calendar though

[BorniteIdentity]

£40 for a full car of friends for a whole day is great value if you live in the real world of other leisure activities.

Football tickets for my beloved Ipswich Town weigh in at the same if I can get them, and that’s 90 minutes ending in disappointment. Four people to the cinema for a movie is £48. Meal for four? Say £100. Ten-pin bowling, theme parks etc all more expensive. 

Aye, it used to be free - and it has lost some of its charm since the early days. But in reality, it’s priced correctly. If it wasn’t, it wouldn’t sell out again and again. 

Anyway, hope to take the Mini this year. 

[wesacosa]

25 minutes ago, BorniteIdentity said:

£40 for a full car of friends for a whole day is great value if you live in the real world of other leisure activities.

Football tickets for my beloved Ipswich Town weigh in at the same if I can get them, and that’s 90 minutes ending in disappointment. Four people to the cinema for a movie is £48. Meal for four? Say £100. Ten-pin bowling, theme parks etc all more expensive. 

Aye, it used to be free - and it has lost some of its charm since the early days. But in reality, it’s priced correctly. If it wasn’t, it wouldn’t sell out again and again. 

Anyway, hope to take the Mini this year. 

Agree, although my only real gripe is that they don't offer a little bit of a discount to the people showing. They are more likely to want to take their own car rather than pile in with a mate so end up paying more than 6 mates who pile into a modern MPV 

[wuvvum]

Yeah, it's the fact that the exhibitors (who are, after all, the ones providing them with a show) are charged the same as the general public that gets my goat.  I wouldn't mind paying something for an exhibitor ticket, it's a cracking day out.

[BorniteIdentity]

1 hour ago, wuvvum said:

Yeah, it's the fact that the exhibitors (who are, after all, the ones providing them with a show) are charged the same as the general public that gets my goat.  I wouldn't mind paying something for an exhibitor ticket, it's a cracking day out.

Problem is - how do you decide who is exhibiting and who is visiting? Historically, they've not even been able to keep a modern supercar out of the display, so someone arriving in a 2002 Audi A2 could easily say "I'm displaying LOL" and it becomes confusing.  It would also slow down entries as well which is something they can ill-afford.  Yes, you could do it at the ticketing stage, but you'd just end up with everyone displaying and no revenue for Hagerty. As much as it was sweet when it started out, there's no way you can run something as large as this without a good income stream; even to justify the man-hours that go into it.

I do agree, classic car shows where they charge the display cars is a bit of a piss-take.  But this does feel like a one-day festival where everyone just goes for the craic. 

 

[brownnova]

11 hours ago, beko1987 said:

Should consider Chumley

No date given as yet 21st September is the date for this spectacle of shite.

(they updated that since I last looked)

Will get on the organisation as soon as tickets are out. 

[Lord Sterling]

Unsure to be honest. It's the day before the night I go back to work. It's not exactly local but not overly far either, then there is the £35 fee.

If I were to come up, it'd be in the Vectra as that's pretty "unexceptional" but, let's see how I feel nearer to the time. There's always something that's going to happen that disallow my appearance. 

[wesacosa]

https://www.tickettailor.com/events/hagertyenthusiastlimited/1520670

tickets now on sale and two big changes....

Early bird prices for next two weeks, £21

but bigger change is it's now per person not per car. So all those who take their own car will be delighted and those who pile into a car with their mates will be furious 

[Talbot]

10 minutes ago, wesacosa said:

 it's now per person not per car.

They clearly have no idea how to price this event.  I don't think there have been two consecutive years with a similar pricing structure.

Whilst @BorniteIdentity has a valid point about the cost of going out to do stuff, the comparison with other vehicle shows is what really matters, and on that point it starts looking very poor valu.

Shan't be going this year.  Or likely ever again.

[wesacosa]

37 minutes ago, Talbot said:

They clearly have no idea how to price this event.  I don't think there have been two consecutive years with a similar pricing structure.

Whilst @BorniteIdentity has a valid point about the cost of going out to do stuff, the comparison with other vehicle shows is what really matters, and on that point it starts looking very poor valu.

Shan't be going this year.  Or likely ever again.

given the size and popularity of the show i don't think £21 for a car is obscene. Rustival and Bromley are about £13 I think and Fotu has a lot more to see. Thats coming from someone who has been a single person attendee most years so I can see that bringing family along make it more expensive so maybe a discount on passenger tickets might be more appropriate.

[Talbot]

6 minutes ago, wesacosa said:

given the size and popularity of the show i don't think £21 for a car is obscene. Rustival and Bromley are about £13 I think and Fotu has a lot more to see. Thats coming from someone who has been a single person attendee most years so I can see that bringing family along make it more expensive so maybe a discount on passenger tickets might be more appropriate.

Rustival includes access to the motor museum, an excellent cafe, an autojumble (last year, anyway) and a much nicer atmosphere (IMO).  That helps a lot I think.

[wesacosa]

11 minutes ago, Talbot said:

Rustival includes access to the motor museum, an excellent cafe, an autojumble (last year, anyway) and a much nicer atmosphere (IMO).  That helps a lot I think.

yes fair points. I'm not arguing its cheap or even great value but I can see the per person addresses a lot of the concerns I'd seen around the penalising those who bring their own cars and a car plus passenger this year is £3 more than last year , which was pretty extortionate for a single person car entry 

[egg]

1 hour ago, wesacosa said:

but bigger change is it's now per person not per car. So all those who take their own car will be delighted and those who pile into a car with their mates will be furious 

Ha, I planned to bring a friend this year, saying it wouldn't cost them anything, now seems I'll still be paying £40 😆

Thanks for the link Wes.

[wesacosa]

12 minutes ago, egg said:

Ha, I planned to bring a friend this year, saying it wouldn't cost them anything, now seems I'll still be paying £40 😆

Thanks for the link Wes.

enter the Mondeo in the concourse. At best its accepted and you get free ticket for you and at worse you get a 15 percent discount on your ticket 

[egg]

43 minutes ago, wesacosa said:

enter the Mondeo in the concourse. At best its accepted and you get free ticket for you and at worse you get a 15 percent discount on your ticket 

Thanks, OK, will do. There's never been a Mondy in the Concours as far as I know.

[wesacosa]

26 minutes ago, egg said:

Thanks, OK, will do. There's never been a Mondy in the Concours as far as I know.

don't remember in the years I went seeing one. They seem to go big on background stories not just the car so try and big that up too if there's anything interesting or unique 

[BorniteIdentity]

3 hours ago, Talbot said:

the comparison with other vehicle shows is what really matters

But. BUT.  There is no standard for that, either.

Near me? We have everything from a travelling steam fair where you park up for £FREE (because you are adding to the attraction to them for free, justifying the pedestrian ticket cost of £10) to £10 to show a car at a bigger show 2 miles up the road to another local one where it's £20 and they literally force you to stay the whole fucking day and woe betide anyone who thinks they can nip out an hour early.

What Hagerty have succeeded at brilliantly here, is it becoming a Festival.  When I first went in 2016, it was just a load of drab old cars driven in by the usual adenoidal types who'd get the car out on a Saturday morning, do this show and then another one the next day before putting it away again for the week.  It's now a vibrant, colourful, day-long event with attractions etc.  I've already previously said that some of the charm has disappeared from earlier events, but measured PURELY on revenue, footfall and exposure, it is now a runaway success for Hagerty.  I wish them well.

[BorniteIdentity]

3 hours ago, Talbot said:

Rustival includes access to the motor museum, an excellent cafe, an autojumble (last year, anyway) and a much nicer atmosphere (IMO).  That helps a lot I think.

I hope to see you there this year - I somehow missed it last time.  I think there's space for both events (genuinely) and a lot more.  

[JakeT]

To be fair, the per person pricing makes it a little more difficult to justify if one goes with friends. Now, for the same costs you can take two cars. Okay there’s fuel and such but otherwise it’s not so bad. The friend I usually go with is out this year so I’m unsure. It is a full day out, and I’d say with tickets and fuel it’s under £100, as I take a picnic to have.

 

I’ll give it a think. There’s time on the early bird and the only thing I have booked is the truck show in Ciney, Belgium.

[WillCarter]

Tickets booked.

The cost of organising events is massive, and I can't imagine the complete and utter ball ache it is dealing with the general public and people who think everything should revolve around them personally so £20 a pop is a small amount to pay in that regard. People will find something to slag whatever they do, so they're in a lose/lose situation regardless.

[captain_70s]

I've always considered this more of a social event than a car show, given I can only really afford to do one or two trips to southern England a year and it attracts a good number of the AS contingent.

To be honest the Hagerty bit of the show is the worst bit and leaves me less enamoured with the experience each passing year. The panels are fine, if not really my thing - I have it on good authority most of the folks doing them aren't paid much more than "exposure". The band last year were dreadful and made half the field unpleasant to venture in to, presumably relatives of an organiser. A lot of stands for posh suppliers/specialists which clashes with a field full of Talbot Horizons and Corsa Bs. The food trucks are, admittedly, good if pricey, but given you're in a field a million miles from anywhere it's sort of a captive market. The "Hagerty Driver's Club" area is just cringe and seeing the folk wandering around it with their plastic champagne flutes hurts my soul.

I still maintain that charging the people who provide the vehicles which make up 95% of the show the same as a visitor in a new Mokka X is a piss take. We didn't even get the cardboard mirror hanger as a momento last year...

I'm going to sound like an old man yelling at clouds but I remeber a decade ago a big car show would be £5-10 and include a couple of tokens for the tea/sandwich tent, a rosette and a printed programme so you knew when somebody was going to carve an owl out of a tree stump with a chainsaw...

Doing Rustival this year instead. Half the price and includes entry to the British Motor Museum.

[clayts450]

Jeez, £40. When I were a lad this were free..... last went 5 years ago in the 620.

 

[quicksilver]

4 minutes ago, clayts450 said:

Jeez, £40. When I were a lad this were free..... last went 5 years ago in the 620.

 

Ah yes, 2019 at Claydon was peak FOTU for me and also the last time I attended. Great venue just a few miles from home, plenty to see and still free for exhibitors. I think that was the only year they had the Anniversary Class and we got to park the Maxi in the walled garden. It lost something when the founders left Hagerty and it moved north.

[brownnova]

Yeah, Claydon 2019 was the last one I went to too… Grimsthorpe is much more off a ballache to get to from Welsh Wales! 

[Gompo]

An annoying change with the tickets. Theoretically if I get the early bird tickets the price has not risen much, for myself + passenger + 14 year old. £5 or so. I'm sure it will stop some attending, but perhaps not necessarily effect too many of the actual cars? We'll see. It's disappointing that they've left the ticket release comparatively late given the change, and should have still offered a 'per vehicle' option even if £50 or something.

From being an automatic choice it's definitely made me wonder if 2025 will be the last year for me. However, I try to attend an event every weekend; usually just a typical classic show. Is FotU the most appealing show of that weekend for me? Definitely, so I that kind of makes the decision for me. As others have mentioned, the more it turns into a day 'festival' type event, the less it appeals even if it makes it better for my passengers.