No man does right by a woman at a party.-Harry Golden

Cocktail party: A gathering held to enable forty people to talk about themselves at the same time. The man who remains after the liquor is gone is the host.-Fred Allen

Whoever takes just plain ginger ale soon gets drowned out of the conversation.-Kin Hubbard

'Tis the season for conventions within our industry segments and with the serious parts of the agendas are the inevitable receptions or, as some describe the events, the "attitude adjustment hour" (which is rarely of 60 minutes duration).

After attending the National Automobile Dealer Association (NADA) annual convention in San Francisco, one might find it difficult to distinguish this experience from a massive, continuous grazing party. Dealers, exhibitors, and the press do more than a yeoman's job consuming hors d'oeuvres and booze at an almost incredible rate. I'm convinced that that part of our economy need not be concerned about a recession.

Beyond the rumaki and bubbly, one thing screamed out at me during this convention. NADA has been around for more than a few generations. They have an organized staff to produce this huge function. About 25.000 people attend. About 250 exhibitors invest heavily to attract these people to their products or services. The agenda is top-notch, with extraordinary speakers like GM's Roger Smith, former President Gerald Ford, and NFL official Jim Tunney. Coupled with this is a dazzling array of over 150 workshop sessions, which about 25,000 people attended to increase their learning curve.

All this is fine until you study the listing of workshop sessions and the total agenda to find not one reference to "leasing.'' Not one! How can this be possible when 90 percent of Ford's dealers and two-thirds of GM's and Chrysler's dealers now offer leasing as an alternative to the selling process? GMAC and Ford Motor Credit each have over a half-million cars in paper from their dealers. Isn't leasing, as a whole, missing a golden opportunity to foster and train dealers in leasing? Wouldn't we all benefit if the American Automotive Leasing Association (AALA) presented a workshop on fleet and retail leasing? Wouldn't that help diminish the chronic complaint that the "new leasing companies don't know what they are doing?" Wouldn't it make sense for the National Vehicle Leasing Association (NVLA) to take a booth and offer counsel to these dealers, while also selling participation in their seminars and maybe picking up some membership, too? The National Auto Auction Association thinks it's a great idea; they have a busy booth year after year selling the auction concept.

This is at least the second year in a row that NADA has not had "leasing" on the agenda. It seems to me that someone should pick up the ball. Not so incidentally, the same could also be said for the topic of "fleet sales, but after NADA's concerted effort to eliminate incentives (for us), it doesn't seem likely that "fleet" will fly.