Alan - Can we get a special section for all the "Special Runs"?

Yes! The site is becoming a commercial billboard. That of course is useful to us, but could there be a separation from the thoughtful content?

Jan

Ya got my vote.

Stu

Guys...I like your idea but we are "full up" on creating new sub-forums.  In fact for the past year we have been trying to find ways to consolidate some of them.  How about the special runs being put in the announcement forum?  Because the sponsors pay to promote their products, we have allowed them to post where they feel they may want to in order to be able to market to as many of you as possible thus the reason why you see them posting in different forums/threads.

+1. It would be great if new posts were limited to the dealers or clubs offering the custom runs (everybody can comment within the thread) to limit clutter in the sub forum.

Alan, it seems like the sponsors could still put the announcement in multiple forums if they choose (they pay the bills!), but I think the goal would be to have a repository of them in one place so they can be “shopped”.  

Could some of the club news subs be combined to free up options?  Most of them haven’t been posted to in months, some in years.

I am a huge fan of the special runs that are being done.  I think a separate thread makes sense AND wherever else the business wants to put it is fine.  

For the businesses, it would be really helpful to include the road name of the special run item, versus needing to open the specific thread.

John

@OGR CEO-PUBLISHER posted:

Guys...I like your idea but we are "full up" on creating new sub-forums.  In fact for the past year we have been trying to find ways to consolidate some of them.  How about the special runs being put in the announcement forum?  Because the sponsors pay to promote their products, we have allowed them to post where they feel they may want to in order to be able to market to as many of you as possible thus the reason why you see them posting in different forums/threads.

Sounds like it's time for "SHONGZ"  ...  I'd throw lego in there but...

@jbmccormick posted:

I am a huge fan of the special runs that are being done.  I think a separate thread makes sense AND wherever else the business wants to put it is fine.  

If you post the news in the new forum and elsewhere, comments for each announcement will be split up over multiple threads (unless I mis-understand your meaning).

@Jacobpaul81 posted:

Sounds like it's time for "SHONGZ"  ...  I'd throw lego in there but...

Sorry, but I think the S Scale Trains forum should remain as is and not lumped in with HONGZ.   The S Scale Trains forum remains the best place to discuss the good (and bad) of S without all the static.

S Scale Trains is currently running about 1000 more topics than HONGZ.

Rusty

You can have an entire forum on just the MTH so called special runs. 

@OGR CEO-PUBLISHER posted:

Guys...I like your idea but we are "full up" on creating new sub-forums.  In fact for the past year we have been trying to find ways to consolidate some of them.  How about the special runs being put in the announcement forum?  Because the sponsors pay to promote their products, we have allowed them to post where they feel they may want to in order to be able to market to as many of you as possible thus the reason why you see them posting in different forums/threads.

While I like the idea of a unique place for "Special Runs," I am definitely in the camp of there are too many subforums now.  I personally believe that more people would be reached with a dedicated subforum at the top of the forum list for Sponsor postings but what do I know?

Without a doubt, any modification/consolidation of existing forums would cause an uproar, that said, I do think it should be done.

I appreciate your thoughts guys but as I said above we have contractual agreements with our sponsors.  Adding and/or creating more sub-forums would only complicate things because there would be a significant number of folks that would not post in the correct forum.  Heck, 30% of our time is spent moving posts from one forum to another.  So...for now, things will remain as they are with perhaps a few adjustments.