Laura speaks for me.

I think, that the idea of picking a city first is the problem. I've called/emailed with several places in Boston, but rates and availability are differing greatly depending on the date. I think that we should go back to picking the date first. Then at least we can get firmer numbers.

Isn't that the point of city first? Ask them about a few dates, pick a cheaper one for Boston, and go from there?

Isn't that the point of city first? Ask them about a few dates, pick a cheaper one for Boston, and go from there?

I think so, Trudy, that, and sometimes it's a combo of city/date that makes or breaks the F2F for people. In other words, some people are never going to be able to make it to Boston. Other people are never going to be able to make it to Durham. Some people will go anywhere, date dependent. Some people can only make it to the city near them on some dates.

It seems it's easier for the city people to have a fixed date to tell the hotels, so why not pick a date and then go from there to see what the cities can do on that date? It's not a perfect system, but it's a system, and it seems like we can't get much in the way of quotes until we get something fixed down.

Which is why I think (weather-wise) it would be good to pick an early spring date for the South and a late spring date for the North. That way each area has a specific date to get quotes for and we don't automatically eliminate one or the other before we even get a chance to see the potential hotel pimpage.

Looking back at the last few years, to the best of my recollection every year has ended up roughly the same weekend - the third weekend in May. (If anyone has different info, shout it out.) Can we start from there, and if it's prohibitive in one locale or another, maybe regroup? It seems pretty clear that that's a generally free weekend for most.

Boston in May or early June will be impossible due to all the graduations. I think we previosuly discussed that, if it was in Boston, it would have to be mid-June. Which also works out weather-wise, since May can still be pretty cold.

Yep. also we agreed that NC in May or June would be too hot for most, which is why we'd been talking about late March or early April for there.

So we're looking at choices:

1. South, March 23-25
2. South, March 30-April 1
3. South, April 6 - April 8
4. North, June 8 - 11
5. North, June 15 - 18
6. North, June 22 - 25

Should we do a poll on these? At least a preliminary "I can probably make it if it's this date/region" sort of thing?

I think that would be perfect.