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Originally Posted by Kevin Sevcik
I'll note, again, that Long Island is hardly rural. Brief research reveals that Nassau and Suffolk counties alone have a population of 2.7 million between them. That isn't counting Brooklyn and Queens. We'll assume 10 of your teams are in Suffolk, however. That's a population of 1.4 million in an area of 911 sq. mi. Given 10 teams, that's a base of 140,000 people per team in an area of 91 sq. mi.
Now, apologies to Tonya, but I'm using her as an example. Ponca City has a population of 26,000. Kay county has a population of 48,000 in 911 sq. mi. That is quite a bit of area to cover for a third the amount of people. Not to mention that I'm sure Suffolk county still attracts more corporations than Kay county.
As an aside, I note that it appears the median houshold income around Long Island is about twice that of Ponca City.
So, rural America faces very large hurdles to competing in the FIRST competition. If you had to do a build season in the red and do all this other stuff, I'm sure you can see that it has to be atleast 3 times as hard for Tonya's team.
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Then look to Grundy for inspiration. I don't know the entire story, there are others on here who know it much better then I, but they are your rural America. Grundy is in southwest Virginia, old coal mining county where the mines are closing and people leaving. Not a lot of money there, but Grundy pulls it off.
Another favorite FIRST memory of mine is from Nationals in 2000. One team had their sponsors listed on the back of their shirts. All of them, in about a 15 point font took up the entire vertical length of the shirt. Including Linda's Lingerie Shop (actual name forgotten, but something like that).
You may have to look in some unconventional places, but there is money to be found.
Wetzel