The differences between operating a profit and non profit historic steam tourist RR

Wow, the original title of this thread is pretty inaccurate, based upon the nature of the conversation. It should be titled instead 'The differences between operating a profit and non profit historic steam tourist RR'.

The C&TS is of course, run as a non-profit, with a Friends organization to support a lot of behind the scenes and background projects to support various photo charters and special events. Plus, the RR operates with only one round trip per day, so adding an extra train to the schedule does not significantly complicate operations.

Grand Canyon RR is a For Profit operation, and operates similarly to D&S. I can understand Al Harper's point of view. The few times we have tried to run Steam Railfan specials or photo charters, they end up being more trouble than their worth. Even our monthly Steam Saturdays don't really draw a significant increase in ticketed passengers from any other Saturday. One exception is Pete Lerro's photo charters, which actually make a small profit and generate positive marketing for the company. But if you look at the prices Pete has to charge to make money on these events (or basically barely break even), you can get an idea as to what these truly cost the RR.

Additionally, the company is going to reflect negatively to anything that disrupts the daily 'bread and butter' business model. A For Profit company does not have a wealth of volunteers or Part Timers waiting in the wings to make up the extra workload for a special event. It depends on the regular staff, adding additional responsibilities to their busy schedule, for an event that lasts only a few days. For Polar Express, we hire an additional 100 Part Time employees for an event that lasts 8 weeks and sees 100,000 visitors. It takes an event of this magnitude to make it all worthwhile.

And the few times a special has developed an over the road problem that delayed the regular passenger train created serious internal headlines and tremendous negativity at a corporate level. Tickets get refunded in those circumstances, resulting in lost revenue and bad publicity. In this day of Social Media, a disruption of 500 regular passengers can generate more negative publicity to our standard audience than the positive publicity of 100 railfans on a Special Charter.

We need to be thankful that we have the C&TS's in the world, that provide opportunities for Railfans on Special Events. The Bigger, For Profit Operations, are always going to be limited.

Eric