Conference Call 8/2/11 - Team Juicy Racing's Racing School and Race Series Forums

cdh · #1 08-02-2011

I was not able to listen in, does anyone have anything to report about the call today?

Sz28r · #2 08-02-2011

I would like to know too

SBRS_Pup · #3 08-02-2011

Hi All,

Thanks for the participation on the call today and all the feedback you provided. Approximately 70 people joined the call in total.

If you could not make the call, here is the recorded play back.

Call in and listen via phone;
Toll-Free 1-800-234-7201
Once dialed you will be asked for a replay ID "745240003"

Also a copy of the call in MP3 format can be downloaded from or Streamed from:
http://www.skipbarber.com/conference/08022011.mp3

Today's recorded call will also be emailed out to all race series customers.

Stay tuned for a monthly Customer Call schedule which will be forth coming both on SF and email.

Bye for now

Kyle

GregS · #4 08-02-2011

Quote:

Originally Posted by SBRS_Pup

Hi All,

Thanks for the participation on the call today and all the feedback you provided. Approximately 70 people joined the call in total.

Thanks for posting this!

PageTwo · #5 08-02-2011

I just listened to the entire call, and have wondered to myself why I even care about these issues after having only done one race weekend. Unfortunately when you remove the instructors, you also take away the people we want to impress and gain admiration from. For the older racer it is certainly this acceptance and acknowledgement of our achievements in the school and race series that makes it worthwhile. I could definitely hear that frustration on the call and in the forums. Medical school and residency was definitely that way for me. You are taught skills, shown procedures, and occasionally yelled at by the attending surgeons that someday you call your colleagues.

I need to be able to show a few of the instructors that I'm not a total bozo in a race car, and in fact, am only occasionally a bozo in a race car.

I run a private practice which is a bit rare and getting rarer. I've got a few employees that have been there longer than me. These people may not be the best or most efficient, but they are essentially untouchable. I can't fire them without doing some permanent damage to the corporation. The morale of all the others would tank if I did that and likely I'd lose some patients and other employees. At the end of the day they are really nice people and I wouldn't do that anyway.

I applaud the conference call, and will try to participate if able in the future. I enjoyed my first race weekend and want Skip Barber to succeed, but as importantly I want the instructors/staff to be well taken care of. In my mind, that is way more important than car upgrades, data acquistion, and will keep the experience what it needs to be.

dalyduo · #6 08-03-2011

Once again... Nice job PageTwo.

LimeRockRacer · #7 08-03-2011

While I applaud the process of communicating with the customer, it is my hope that the series management team truly listens and acts on our input. Actions speak louder than words and the recent actions have done a great deal of harm to the very loyal long term customer base and instruction staff.

Other than the parts status and installation schedule most answers were very thin and answered in very brief sound bites without very much detail.

Trust is earned and is very hard to regain once it is abused. The top three management level people let go are a wealth of knowledge and experience that wil be very hard to replace. The bad will created by this move has stung everyone and it would not be a bad idea for the leadership to find a way to fix what is wrong by trying to repair these relationships sooner than later and not waiting six months to cool off.

The conference call was not scheduled at a convenient time for many of us. I listened to it last night and was glad to see so many people on the call although few had a chance to talk. Mgt. Should assess who was not on or silent and find a way to reach out and get their thoughts and opinions.

I think the focus should be on the customer that has been paying the way for many years, the customer that has left, the customer who has never been and we need to attract and ultimately how you keep them longer than in the past. It is much less expensive to keep customers than to find new ones all the time at the pace that is needed to keep the compan
Lastly, the relationship with support and instructional staff needs to be repaired if there is any chance of success. No one feels the sting of the changes recently made more than these wonderful people. Do not ignore your most valuable resource.

I truly wish Kyle and Kevin the best of luck with all they need to do. They are in a very difficult place and have a lot ahead of them....my two cents...

ORBlues · #8 08-03-2011

Hi,

I was interested in this last event in the Skip Barber saga and was not going to comment, but the top of the pages says "Hello ORBlues! It appears that you haven't posted in our forums in several weeks. Why not take a few moments to ask a question, help provide a solution or just post something you find interesting in any one of our forums?

Quote:

Originally Posted by PageTwo

I run a private practice which is a bit rare and getting rarer. I've got a few employees that have been there longer than me. These people may not be the best or most efficient, but they are essentially untouchable. I can't fire them without doing some permanent damage to the corporation. The morale of all the others would tank if I did that and likely I'd lose some patients and other employees. At the end of the day they are really nice people and I wouldn't do that anyway.

No one is untouchable. You might assume that, but life happens. I saw a small doctors office turned upside down for years with the accidental death of one person. She was great, but no one knew what she did, or how she did it. I started as a Skippy customer in 1976 until 1979 and worked in the organization from 1980 - 1988. Now that may seem like an eternity ago for some. I have seen a lot of good people come and go, but you can't keep everyone.

The decisions management has to make has to be about the company, not the persons. As an extreme, you lament the loss of some people, but what if keeping them meant the end of the company itself. Which way would you vote? A lot of racing schools, like race tracks, have come and gone, but none has lasted and accomplished what this one has. And yes mistakes have been made and will continue to be made. I am not defending the owners - hell, I was a pain in the neck at times (ask Skip or Carl).

So does the race series (the school portion was not any part of the discussion - in fact if the race series ended today the school could still be very profitable) become a private playground or a racing for the masses? In my day it was the latter. Today the first might be a better business model. That is what they have to figure out. One thing that was promising, was the quote "we have to refocus on the racing". I think if they focus on that, the "Entertainment" will take care of itself.

Well - maybe that message will not pop up for a few months!

ChrisZ

Jim Pace · #9 08-04-2011

Thanks for posting the link. I made time to listen last night.
I started Skippy in 1987 making many dear friends there. Father, brother, sister, brother-in-law raced there, a dozen of family members did schools. I have to be high on the family-participation-list? Great times in the past...It has always been about the people and the people have never been silent. Never a lack of input from experienced customers and staff...
It was nice to hear some of the voices from the past. Really nice!
JP