Just a heads up on those going to the conference and plan to do the raffles, I received this email last night.
Pedro,
The Reef Conference is now less than two weeks away. It's the time of year when I get a box or two of donations every day. (I'm a kid in a candy store!). So, for those that are new to the club, or forgot how we do the raffle at the conference:
1. This is a chinese style raffle for dry goods and frozen food. This means, you buy a sheet of raffle tickets and they all have the same number. You keep the "stub" on the sheet as it has your number on it as well. When you claim your prize (or prizes), show the stub. There are 25 tickets per sheet and we will break it up if you want less. But, the price structure is such that you get the best deal buying the whole sheet. Or, you can do like me and buy multiple sheets!
2. There will be a separate livestock raffle. Vendors at the conference donate livestock (corals or fish) for the raffle. The livestock raffle is a "normal" raffle. Meaning, you buy individual raffle tickets.
3. We will close the vendor hall while we pull raffle tickets. This allows us to pull raffle items in a nice quiet, orderly fashion instead of a mad rush. This actually speeds it up considerably. The vendor hall will be closed at the start of the last speaker and will reopen when the last speaker is done. If you are a vendor, you may remain at your table if you choose.
4. You must be present to win frozen foods, refrigerated items and livestock. We will allow 15 minutes to claim these prizes after the vendor hall is reopened. If you don't claim it, we will begin pulling new raffle tickets for each individual item until they are gone. This part of the raffle will be "live". Meaning everyone will be in the room and we call numbers out loud.
5. You do not need to be present to claim drygoods. Keep your raffle stub if you leave before the raffle drawing! The next day, we will post on the website the winning numbers on the website and send out an announcement. You will have until the May meeting to pick the items up or you can get them at the May meeting. At the end of the May meeting, unclaimed raffle items revert back to club possesion (and now you know where we get most of our raffle items at our regular monthly meetings)
6. This year, we will have a "Grand Prize". That will be announced in the next day or so. The Chinese raffle sheet has a "Door Prize" ticket on it (only one per sheet). This will be your ticket for the "Grand Prize". In the past, the door prize ticket was used as a bonus raffle ticket. Not this year, it is prize specfic. If you aren't interested in the Grand Prize, you may use it as an extra raffle ticket. Please note that we are not selling extra Grand Prize tickets. You get one per sheet. As this is a fairly large item, we would prefer not to hold it until the May meeting!
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