I’ve been fortunate to volunteer at Breyerfest 11 times - as a Seminar/Workshop Attendant in 2011, a Diorama Contest Volunteer in 2013, and the results guru for the Children & Youth Live Show every year since 2016 (except 2020, when results were automatically done through the PonyBytes website and there really wasn’t anything for me to do).
In exchange for roughly 8 hours of work, completed in a single shift or broken up over the course of the weekend, volunteers receive an exclusive model. Quantities have varied; when BreyerFest first started and was a much smaller event, volunteer model quantities were as low as 30-50. From 2000 through 2019, the quantity slowly increased each year. In 2020, Breyer split the colors on the volunteer models for the first time with Ben Nevis, who came in both bright chestnut pinto and liver chestnut pinto. Splitting the run into multiple colors to keep quantities down became standard practice in 2023; for that year and each one since, three colors have been offered on the same mold, with the quantities of each hovering around 130 pieces.
I used to get really, really serious about trying to predict the mold that would be used for each year’s volunteer model. Had a spreadsheet and everything. (What? Me? A spreadsheet? You don’t say.) It was fairly easy to figure them out through 2013, since Breyer always put a copy of the volunteer model in the auction. Of the 28-30 Live Auction models, it wasn’t hard to distinguish which paint scheme(s) could translate well to a run of 100-200 models vs. those that clearly had OOAK-level detail.
In 2014, Breyer stopped putting the volunteer model in the auction, so that made it quite a bit harder. Still, there were patterns. The mold they chose tended to be either a same year regular run or previous year regular run, so that narrowed the choices quite a bit. Since 2012, all molds chosen had been a non-BreyerFest Special Run in the past six years, so that helped as well. Until Carrick blew up all my volunteer mold prediction algorithms in 2016 when they used him for like a hundred things at BreyerFest, the volunteer mold had also never been a same-year SR. When Croi repeated this egregious sin in 2023, I stopped taking volunteer mold prediction seriously. I still do a spreadsheet every year, but there aren’t any noticeable patterns I can rely on anymore, so it’s pure speculation.
[I don’t think work would support me tossing all the data into a Power BI on my work laptop for better analysis, but I can’t say I haven’t been sorely tempted.]
Though I now have twelve volunteer models to my name - I earned two last year by also stewarding Breyer’s online fall show, BOO - there’s one who is more sentimental than all the rest, so he’s getting his fifteen minutes of fame today.
In exchange for roughly 8 hours of work, completed in a single shift or broken up over the course of the weekend, volunteers receive an exclusive model. Quantities have varied; when BreyerFest first started and was a much smaller event, volunteer model quantities were as low as 30-50. From 2000 through 2019, the quantity slowly increased each year. In 2020, Breyer split the colors on the volunteer models for the first time with Ben Nevis, who came in both bright chestnut pinto and liver chestnut pinto. Splitting the run into multiple colors to keep quantities down became standard practice in 2023; for that year and each one since, three colors have been offered on the same mold, with the quantities of each hovering around 130 pieces.
I used to get really, really serious about trying to predict the mold that would be used for each year’s volunteer model. Had a spreadsheet and everything. (What? Me? A spreadsheet? You don’t say.) It was fairly easy to figure them out through 2013, since Breyer always put a copy of the volunteer model in the auction. Of the 28-30 Live Auction models, it wasn’t hard to distinguish which paint scheme(s) could translate well to a run of 100-200 models vs. those that clearly had OOAK-level detail.
In 2014, Breyer stopped putting the volunteer model in the auction, so that made it quite a bit harder. Still, there were patterns. The mold they chose tended to be either a same year regular run or previous year regular run, so that narrowed the choices quite a bit. Since 2012, all molds chosen had been a non-BreyerFest Special Run in the past six years, so that helped as well. Until Carrick blew up all my volunteer mold prediction algorithms in 2016 when they used him for like a hundred things at BreyerFest, the volunteer mold had also never been a same-year SR. When Croi repeated this egregious sin in 2023, I stopped taking volunteer mold prediction seriously. I still do a spreadsheet every year, but there aren’t any noticeable patterns I can rely on anymore, so it’s pure speculation.
[I don’t think work would support me tossing all the data into a Power BI on my work laptop for better analysis, but I can’t say I haven’t been sorely tempted.]
Though I now have twelve volunteer models to my name - I earned two last year by also stewarding Breyer’s online fall show, BOO - there’s one who is more sentimental than all the rest, so he’s getting his fifteen minutes of fame today.
This is #711430 Nottingham, the volunteer model from BreyerFest 2011. I’d had such an amazing time at my first BreyerFest in 2010 that I decided to toss my hat into the ring as a volunteer for 2011. Given that I was so new to BreyerFest, I only chose the Seminar/Workshop Attendant option, even though I knew that might limit my chances of being selected. On Sunday, June 5, I got a call from the volunteer coordinator that she’d picked me!
My schedule was Friday from 9:30 - 3:30 at the seminars in the Visitor’s Center (which worked out awesome, as that meant I didn’t have to miss my friend Penny’s collectibility seminar) and Saturday from 9:30 - 11:30 at the workshops in the gallery above the Covered Arena. I was not sad that all my volunteer time was spent in the nice air conditioning instead of the sweltering Kentucky-in-July heat.
Sometime on Friday, we found out that the volunteer model was Nottingham. I love the Silver mold and bay roan is one of my favorite horse colors, so I was really happy it was him. When one of my seminars ended early, I wandered out into the Visitor’s Center lobby, where all the Live Auction models were on display in glass cases. I remember looking around the lobby, soaking in the feeling of being in what had quickly become my favorite place and my favorite event, and looking at Nottingham in the case, and looking at my volunteer name badge, and feeling really lucky that I was there and that I would be getting such an awesome model. Fifteen years later, I still clearly remember that moment.
I’ve liked all of my volunteer models, but Nottingham is extra special as my first.
My schedule was Friday from 9:30 - 3:30 at the seminars in the Visitor’s Center (which worked out awesome, as that meant I didn’t have to miss my friend Penny’s collectibility seminar) and Saturday from 9:30 - 11:30 at the workshops in the gallery above the Covered Arena. I was not sad that all my volunteer time was spent in the nice air conditioning instead of the sweltering Kentucky-in-July heat.
Sometime on Friday, we found out that the volunteer model was Nottingham. I love the Silver mold and bay roan is one of my favorite horse colors, so I was really happy it was him. When one of my seminars ended early, I wandered out into the Visitor’s Center lobby, where all the Live Auction models were on display in glass cases. I remember looking around the lobby, soaking in the feeling of being in what had quickly become my favorite place and my favorite event, and looking at Nottingham in the case, and looking at my volunteer name badge, and feeling really lucky that I was there and that I would be getting such an awesome model. Fifteen years later, I still clearly remember that moment.
I’ve liked all of my volunteer models, but Nottingham is extra special as my first.
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