The 2024 Forest River Owners Group (FROG) International Rally is underway this week at the Elkhart County Fairgrounds and for Bob Byrne it’s very much a bittersweet affair.
This is the final FROG rally for Byrne as the club’s president, a position he has held for 13 years. Come November, Byrne and his wife Cindy will step aside. Rennie and Beth Roberts, who have been learning the ropes for a few months now, will be succeeding the Byrnes.
“We’re looking forward to the next chapter, but we are certainly going to miss the wonderful friendships we’ve made. We’ve had great adventures. The company has treated us wonderfully and we’re very grateful to Pete (Liegl, Forest River president) and the entire Forest River team for the opportunities we’ve had,” Byrne told RVBusiness.
The 2024 FROG Rally features about 380 coaches and 750 people – 40% of whom are first-timers – along with about 50 vendors, 65 seminars, eight tours around Amish country, a couple of nights of live entertainment, and, according to Byrne, “a lot of great opportunity to come here, renew old friendships, make new ones, learn about your RV, and just sharing friendship.”
Byrne was busy setting up for that night’s dinner banquet, but he took a few minutes to graciously reflect on his time as the FROG president.
“More than anything else, I’m going to miss the people,” he said. “We have made wonderful friendships. We’ve had great adventures with a lot of the members of FROG. We’ve had opportunities to travel extensively to work with a lot of the members if we’re not hosting a rally and helping others set up. I did an estimate the other day that, in the 13 years, we have probably either organized and hosted or helped others organize and host on FROG’s behalf somewhere upwards of 225 to 250 events, maybe a little over that.”
His thoughts then took him back to one of the very first events that took place after he became president, which was the Cherry Blossom Festival in Washington D.C. in March of 2012.
“This was before we were online with our registrations. Everything was mailed in and out, and we planned on taking 25 RVs with us. We ended up taking 76,” he said. “We needed to have three buses. It was a little bit like herding cats, but it was a great start and we figured if we can pull this one off, we’re going to be okay.”
Lastly, Byrne also shared the first time he found out he was going to become the president of FROG.
“I was sitting in my boss’s office, Jeff Rowe (Forest River’s human resources director), filling out some paperwork, and this guy stepped into the doorway and he said to Jeff, ‘Have you had him measured yet for the spandex frog outfit?’ And I turned and said, ‘Any pattern that needs this much spandex ought to be illegal.’ And Jeff said, ‘Oh, there’s somebody I’d like you to meet. This is Pete. He’s the president of the company.’ So it was an auspicious start,” Byrne said with a laugh.
In fact, Byrne had high praise for Liegl and his support for FROG over the years.
“We are very appreciative to Pete and to all of his management team, but not only the managers, but up and down the line,” he said. “We have worked with so many of the customer service people, the service techs, the salespeople. You go out here on the grounds and you see all the service work that’s being done and all of the goodwill that’s being spread, building relationships between the customers and the company, and we are very grateful to have had an opportunity to be a part of that.”
As far as his successors – and with Beth Roberts busy setting out desserts at each table behind him – Byrne also had nothing but the highest expectations for the Roberts, a Delaware couple who have been RVing for about 40 years.
“They have been key members of the FROG team and the Rally team for the last 12 years,” Byrne said. “They have organized and hosted events on their own. They’ve helped us with some of our remote rallies, so they’re bringing a good, strong background. But most of all, most important in my mind, they are extremely respected by the folks who are key to the organization, leaders in a lot of the setup work. I think that’s going to serve them very well, and it’s a well-earned respect.”
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