Car Show Registration: How to Set It Up So Show Day Isn't a Disaster

Strip it down to the basics. Your car show registration system needs to:

Less is more. Every field you add to your registration form is a field someone will fill out wrong, leave blank, or misunderstand. Here's my minimum required list:

• First and last name
• Email address
• Mobile phone number (not home phone — mobile)
• Vehicle year, make, and model
• Class (with a clear description of each class)
• Any special needs (accessible parking, trailer, oversized vehicle)

Don't ask for their mailing address unless you're mailing them something. Don't ask them to write an essay about their restoration. Every extra field is friction, and friction means drop-offs.

The class selection is the one that trips people up. Write your class descriptions clearly and exhaustively. "Stock/original — vehicle must be unmodified from factory specification" is better than just "Stock." A fuzzy class description is an invitation for someone to put their restomod in the wrong class on purpose, or by accident, and either way you're dealing with a reclass conversation on show day when you have other problems.

Cash and cheque registration died a long time ago, and you should let them stay dead. Online payment via credit or debit card does three things that matter: it confirms the entrant is serious (you get fewer no-shows from paid entries), it creates an automatic record, and it eliminates the envelope of cash you have to count and account for.

Yes, there are processing fees. Build them into your registration price or absorb them — most shows absorb a 2–3% fee rather than showing a weird total at checkout. Either way, it's worth it.

One word on chargebacks: some registrants will dispute a charge if they can't attend. Have a clear cancellation and refund policy, stated at the point of registration, and enforce it consistently. "No refunds after 30 days before the show" is a reasonable policy. Whatever your policy is, write it down and make people acknowledge it.

Every registration should trigger an automatic confirmation email. That email should include their car number, the class they registered in, the show date, time, and address, check-in instructions, and your contact information for questions.

I send three emails to every registrant: the confirmation at the point of registration, a reminder one week before the show, and a morning-of reminder with check-in details. You will still have people show up who say they didn't know what time to arrive. You cannot prevent that. But you can document that you told them.

If your show has a hard cap — and most judged shows do, because your venue only holds a certain number of cars — you need your registration system to enforce it. Not "sort of enforce it" or "I'll watch the count manually." Hard stop at your cap, automatic waitlist for anyone who registers after that.

Waitlist management is where a lot of organisers drop the ball. The waitlist only works if you notify people promptly when a spot opens. If someone cancels four weeks out and you don't tell the first person on the waitlist until two weeks out, they may have already made other plans. Set up automatic waitlist notifications or check your waitlist every time you process a cancellation — same day, not same week.

No matter what you say on your website about registration closing, someone will show up on show day wanting to enter. You have three options: turn them away, add them if you have space, or accept them into a "walk-in" class.

I run a walk-in class at the Great Lakes Invitational. It's not judged — it's a display class. Cars that didn't pre-register can enter for a fee, park in a designated section, and participate in People's Choice voting, but they don't compete for trophies. This gives the enthusiast who showed up a way to participate, and it doesn't disrupt your layout or your judging.

Whatever your policy is, put a sign at the registration table and train your volunteers to handle the question without hesitation.

If you collected pre-registrations through a paper form, a club spreadsheet, or a previous system, you don't have to enter them one by one. Car Show Expert's CSV import lets you upload up to 500 rows at once — paste your spreadsheet data into the template, upload, review, and confirm. All imported entries come in as Confirmed with payment waived, and car numbers are assigned automatically.

Your check-in list needs to work fast. Two minutes per car — that means the volunteer at the table needs to find a name in under 10 seconds. A printed alphabetical list works if it's up to date. A laptop with a searchable spreadsheet works better. Purpose-built check-in software that lets you scan a QR code and mark someone checked in works best.

Whatever format you use, print a backup. Venues fail. Wifi fails. Laptop batteries die. Have a paper backup, sorted alphabetically, and know where it is.