Quote:
Originally Posted by EricH
Noting their location (Philly):
$6000--KOP+Philly Regional
$500--T-shirts/promotional
$200--practice field--may vary by year
$2000-3500--Additional robot materials
$1000--hand power tools (drill, hacksaw, etc.). May be less if you already have said tools.
$8000--Funds to keep you going for one more year assuming no fundraising (or a recession). May be accumulated over 2-3 years.
Total:$17,700-$19,200 for one event; add $4000 registration and extra for travel for each additional event (except for CMP, when it's $5000).
Someone's probably going to come in here and say that half of this stuff is unnecessary, and they're right: the only required part of this is the $6000. However, the rest is "expected" of a team.
For my old team, who did 2regionals + Championship for as long as anyone can remember (until this year), we figured $15,000 registration, probably around $4000 for robot parts and materials, $500 for shirts and stuff like that, and travel was paid mainly by the students and parents. (All numbers are approximate or guesses or both, except registration.) And I know I'm missing some things...
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As several people have noted, 2 regionals and Championship for a rookie team may be too optimistic. However, I feel that planning for Championship will benefit you because it will cost a LOT of money. If you do not qualify you can keep this money in the bank as insurance for next year. I would budget for it each year and keep the money in a bank account as a rainy day fund. Estimates based on how 397 ran in 2008 (two regionals, home and away, and Atlanta)
$6000 KOP + Home Regional
$800 Shirts/Promo material (always budget MORE than you expect)
$200 Practice Field
$4000 Away Regional
$1000 Lodging at away regional (book early to get good rates, also, if you and another area team both go book together if you guys can't get group rates, we are also an incredibly small team though, your mileage may vary)
$1000 Robot Materials (397 builds with hand tools and raw materials and makes extensive use of KOP as such 2008's robot cost $800 to build)
$5000 CMP Registration
$1000 Lodging in ATL (Again, small team your mileage may vary)
$19,000 TOTAL
Note, this assumes that you already have tools, otherwise I would budget $1500 for tools, only spend $1000 if you can but this way you have extra in case something breaks. I also assumed that students pay for their OWN travel and food. Depending on where you are this may be a bad assumption, I know 397 has the students pay for nothing and as such our costs are much greater.
My personal suggestion, CMP is nice, it is a lot of fun for all involved but frankly it is expensive, prohibitively expensive. I would suggest instead of dropping $6000 + Travel to go to CMP that instead you put that money in the bank for a rainy day. After all, I think that a team should be able to run for a full year should a sponsor suddenly back out on them.
There is a rough budget for running a team, as I said, there are more expenses associated with starting a team, mostly tools.