Salisbury, Vermont

Salisbury’s Community Events Committee ran another superb event last weekend.  The Spring Fling Dinner was their third annual Green Up Day event, and has apparently become a tradition along with their summer Town Picnic and winter Holiday Tree Lighting events.   

As always, the evening’s highlight was a sumptuous feast prepared under the talented direction of Gay Truax, with lots of expert help from Dolly Dame, Chris Sylvestri, and Mary Beth Tichacek.  There was additional support from Ken Tichacek, Tom Dumont, Lynne Pirkkanen, and excellent emcee John Nuceder.  (Login and comment below to add the people I neglected.)  This crew works really hard to organize, run, and clean up after these events, and can always use some extra hands.  Get in touch if you would like to help with the Town Picnic at Branbury Beach this summer.  The state park is a great place to hold this event, but they need lots of help transporting everything over there and setting up.

The Spring Fling included lots of entertainment this year.  Chris Turner reported on Green Up Day results via a contest to see who could guess how many bags, tires, and large items had been collected so far (maybe somebody can post a final report in a comment below).  Old Bones, an excellent country and folk band of local musicians were on stage for most of the evening.  The conservation commission held a fundraising raffle of about 25 items donated for the event and raised $127 in raffle ticket sales.  Thanks everyone who donated items and all who bought tickets.

Our auctions came to an end last Thursday, and we were very pleased with the results.  We were unsure about how many people would participate in our first online fundraiser, but there was lots of interest in the local items up for bid.  It looked like everyone was having fun bidding, and we appreciate your interest and support.  The final bids on the 17 items total $1071, and we thank everyone for the lively bidding.  Of course the event was only possible because our neighbors around Salisbury generously donated all of the auction items.  It’s wonderful to have such support in the community, and humbling to learn of all the talented folks who created many of the items.

For those of you curious about how the event progressed, here are some stats.  During the 12 days the auctions were active, more than 30 people placed 220 bids on the 17 items.  A total of 43 people registered at the auction site, but I can’t determine exactly how many of them placed bids (if your bids were always lower than the high bidder’s hidden maximum, your name was not revealed).  During the days the auctions were active, 136 different people made 456 visits to the auction Web site and viewed the 19 pages 3998 times.

I have included a graph of the number of visitors (unique computers which accessed the auction Web site) and the number of visits (including the same computer returning to the site multiple times).  The graph includes several days before the auction started, and two days after it ended.  It also shows when I sent emails to our list of interested people and when an article about the auction appeared in the Addison Independent.  I was surprised to see this evidence that some people actually read my emails.

The graph also includes the visitorship to the conservation commission’s main Web site.  It looks like a few people were clicking over from the auction site while the auctions were happening.  I hope some of you continue to check this site for news of our activities (I guess you have!).

Click on the images to enlarge.

The Conservation Commission’s online fund-raising auction went live this morning with 17 items ready for bids.  Every item was created or donated by a Salisbury resident.  Take a look at the auctions and you will agree that there is both tremendous talent and great generosity in town.  Thanks to everyone who donated the wonderful items.

Several bids had already been placed by 9:30 Sunday morning.  Although these first bids were less than a dollar more than the starting bids, the bidders might have bid more than that.  When you place a bid, the system automatically bids just enough to outbid others.  To find out how high the actual bid entered was, you have to place another bid.  The system will tell you when your bid is high enough to become the current high bid.  When the auction ends, you might win the item for less than the last bid you entered. For more information, see the Instruction page.

All of the auctions will run for 12 days and end on Thursday evening, April 29, between 7:00 and 8:04 PM.  The auctions will end sequentially in the order they are displayed on the auction home page.  Each auction will end four minutes after the previous auction, at the time noted on each auction page.  Save the date, and be prepared to bid again if someone tries to top your bid by a few dollars at the last minute!

All proceeds from this auction will support the education, research, and conservation programs of the Salisbury Conservation Commission. Enjoy, and thanks for bidding.