NCMUG Fun Day (12/8/2001)
by Veda Lewis and Kathy Aanestad

Store manager, Terry Johnston, stood outside the Santa Rosa CompUSA store taking a quick break. He wouldn't stay long because this afternoon he's hosting an Apple Demo Day and North Coast Mac User Group (NCMUG) specials. (Veda Lewis outside the store, Terry was too fast for the camera.)

Inside the store, more than three dozen club members cruised through the Apple Store within-the-store and took in vendor demos in training rooms CompUSA uses for their training classes. NCMUG board members (Joan O'Brien, Janet Mobley, Alan Kantor, Lorene Romero, Juan Caro, Ronnie Roche, Veda Lewis, Kathy Aanestad) Julie Dinkins, Jim Liebich, Dick Heine (with Terry Neckritz on the left), and Nate Friedman) were there in force, clad in their distinctive black polo shirts sporting the club logo, website and their first name. Looking very much like store employees, they found themselves answering questions and demonstrating Mac products for customers.

Throughout the afternoon, vendors from IBM, Handspring, Hewlett-Packard, Microsoft, Corel, and Strider Software showed their latest Mac products, emphasizing releases for OS X. Vendors:
Peter Christensen - Strider
Brian McCarthy - IBM Via-Voice
Karen Wolf - Handspring
Hank West - Corel
Gary Wilson - Microsoft

Club secretary Joan O'Brien used a shopping cart to transport paperwork to the welcome table NCMUG set up inside the store near the entry door to sign up new members and club members‚ renewals (13 months for the price of 12). Big thank you's to Terry Neckritz (the Apple Solutions Consultant for CompUSA) and Terry Johnston the Santa Rosa General Manager for hosting this wonderful event. With dozens of entries, the contest winners: George Reel won an HP printer and Nate Friedman was the lucky winner of Corel's Paint 7!

CompUSA's Apple and Vendor Demo Days is good for business, it's good for club members' pocketbooks (some substantial savings to be had), and it's good for public relations for both the store and the club.

Many members were especially appreciative that the vendors took time to demo their product and answer questions. Those club members who attended had a terrific opportunity to learn and buy at some significant savings (depending upon product). Club members Nate Friedman and Kelly Corderos (An Apple Employee) were busting their buns helping answer folks' questions and demoing product. Congrats to all... especially, big thanks to Lorene for inititiating this. Club members, this was quite an event... short of MacWorld S.F. for getting deals on lots of product!

Terry Johnston, the CompUSA General Manager was so impressed he wants to do another Fun Day this summer. Keep an eye out on the clubs site for more current information.