The B.O.B. Cluster – An Idea Whose Time Has Come!

By Amy Fernandez

Group shows have become such an embedded feature of our sport that it’s hard to understand why AKC resisted the concept for so long. They offer the perfect compromise between specialty and all breed. Even so, for decades, Progressive Dog Club in NYC remained the sole standard bearer for this business model. And needless to say, that club’s greenlight came thanks to boardroom relationships. But all that’s ancient history and nothing illustrates it better than the upcoming, brand new B.O.B. Cluster in Doswell, Virginia.  Spanning Friday May 23rd through Sunday May 25th, their inaugural extravaganza is ready to launch.

The brainchild of Gregg Kantak and Richard Jackson, Richard explains, “The idea came about a couple of years ago. Gregg and I were out to dinner with some other dog folks talking about how much people loved group shows. We started bouncing around ideas and Gregg said, ‘What if there was an all group show cluster?’ At that time I was show chair for Maryland Sporting Dog. I’d taken it on about seven years ago and it has been very successful.” Plenty of weekends lean heavy into the group show format, but an entire weekend of only group shows? “Some time passed and we kept thinking about it. Finally we decided to ask Guy Fisher in Club Relations and he confirmed that he didn’t know of any such thing.” That broke the dam. “We decided to go for it.”

It’s good that Richard is a veteran at this stuff, having served on countless show committees for many years. He says, “We needed to start from scratch.”  Not only did it require intensive recruitment of volunteers, “at that point clubs didn’t yet exist for all the groups in the area. Others had died on the vine and needed to be revived.” For the record, B.O.B. is comprised of the Mid-Atlantic Working Dog Group of Maryland, the Virginia Toy Club, the Sporting Dog Club of Virginia, the Mid-Atlantic Non-Sporting Club of Maryland, and the Mid-Atlantic Herding Group of Maryland. (Hounds and Terriers come on down!)

The concept is both obvious and innovative. However, these ARE times of economic bad news, shrinking entries and scarce show facilities. “If we build it, they will come.” Hey, it worked for Kevin Costner.  Richard explains his rationale, “Maryland Sporting Dog started with 300-400 dog entries and now we draw well over 600 because we listen to our exhibitors. If we give exhibitors what they are asking for they will come back.”

Fast forward three years and all the clubs were fully recognized.  “Next, we needed to choose a show date and a location.” So why Memorial Day weekend, one of the most competitive weekends on the show calendar? There were a couple reasons. “We couldn’t compete with weekends like Westminster, Philadelphia and Orlando, which knocked out many of them.” Once they settled on this date, Richard says, “Meadow Event Park in Doswell is a beautiful site that’s become very popular for shows in the Mid-Atlantic and many other big events.” Doswell is situated in central Virginia and most people recognize it as the home of the immortal Secretariat. Today, it’s basically a southern version of the Big E. “We couldn’t compete with things like the state fair and the facility actually had a graduation scheduled for that weekend but they canceled. So we took it but we didn’t want just one year. We plan our show schedule way in advance.” Show planning is a long range project. Moreover, dog people are creatures of habit. The entire year is planned around a predictable show calendar. In view of all this, they took the risk of signing on for three years.

 “We’re not expecting to make headlines the first year but we have developed a three-year plan. We held a raffle and to participate you had to complete our detailed survey. It covered everything from indoor vs. outdoor shows, covered rings, breeder/judges vs. all breed judges, foreign or domestic.   We learned a lot and we have tailored this show according to the results.  A big issue was travel.” No surprise. Win or lose, after three or four long days of shows, doing the dogs, packing, and loading up–the last thing anyone wants is–bang–stuck for hours in a Belt Parkway Nightmare or the regional equivalent.

“On Memorial Day weekend, exhibitors really wanted to beat the traffic home, so we didn’t schedule anything for Monday.  We are offering back-to-back shows on Friday, and shows Saturday and Sunday. It still adds up to four shows but everyone can leave Sunday afternoon and breeze home before the traffic Monday.” They are also offering Puppy and Veteran sweeps, AKC NOHS, CGC, Fetch, FastCat and Miscellaneous Groups. And based on another survey finding many wanted a match, he says, “On Friday evening we planned a long-gone, everyday simple match show,” and yes, Richard confirmed that entries will hold to that long forgotten price of $5. “People wanted a simple, informal match where they could practice and train their puppies. We are also hosting a pizza party to go with it.”

This all sounds great, but let’s face it, to pony up the cash for a show like this judges are the deciding factor. “All of our judges have notable reputations in their particular group. We were careful to select judges that have not judged in this area for awhile. That issue came up frequently in our survey. Most of them have not done assignments in this area for months and sometimes for years. And for breeds hosting supported entries, we made sure to get specialist judges for that breed. This also came up in the survey. When clubs support the entry they want input regarding the judge.” And, possibly the best part, is they are actually offering reduced entries for BBE, Puppy and Juniors. Next year they plan to host parent club seminars on Thursday.  “Our club name, B.O.B., stands for Breeders, Owners and Blue ribbons. If we want our sport to last into the future, we must give exhibitors what they need.”

For more information contact MB-F or thebestofbreedcluster@yahoo.com

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Posted by Liz on Apr 2 2025. Filed under Breaking News, Current Articles, Featured. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. Both comments and pings are currently closed.