Blog articles on geocaching decline

Quo Vadis Horreum Terrae?

 

• You hear/read about geocaching
• Download the app
• Go on a hunt close to home
• Have an average experience because
• It's a mint tin in the park because that's what's close to most homes
• You can't find the cache because you lack experience
• It's all too much at once: guidelines, etiquette, creed, ...
• Think it's a quirky hobby but not for you

-------------------------------

It's Going Downhill

-------------------------------

Geocaching Stickiness

3/4 of all people who’ve cached in Australia stopped logging caches at or before 224 days! 1/2 of them (55,000 or so) stopped caching within two weeks!

-------------------------------

The End of Geocaching as I Know It

When I started, premium membership was just a few added bonus features, it wasn't necessary for every day use, just some luxuries to help things along. It made sense, pay a few bucks, get a few perks. That's rather changed now, both as geocaching and the website have evolved, membership has gone from a luxury to a near requirement. The current website operation and your interaction with it are quite crippled without membership.

There rarely seems to be any new exploration. It's all to common to find myself showing up at the exact same spot in a park I've visited many times or partaking in the same activity at the same venue. The poison ivy, bugs, scrapes and bruises, dirt and sweat all seem to weigh heavily against enjoying nature. Even the amount of exercise has diminished as it's all too easy or required to drive from parking lot to parking lot. Finding a nice walk to a cache takes a special effort. The challenges involved in the activity seem to have stretched from fun and accessible to difficult and time consuming, to arduous, expensive and life altering to impossible. They just aren't worth it, not only has the difficulty increased but the rewards have decreased. Social activity is the biggest hold out, but even that has diminished to a great extent.

-------------------------------

Do Nanos Suck?

-------------------------------

Has Geocaching Finally Peaked, and on the Decline?

-------------------------------

Why is Geocaching Declining in Canada?

Project GC screenshot July 5 2017:

What are your thoughts on the decline of geocaching in Canada? It's summer, there should be an increase in activity. Project GC stats show a decline for at least a year. 

Could it be that many geocaches look like this?:

 

And the slim-pickings larger size caches look like this:

Geocaching growth is not 'sticky'

Australian statistics, which may be comparable to North American statistics

From Reddit: How is the popularity for geocaching?

[–]TassieTigerGeocaching Australia Dev/Admin (CraigRat) 7 points 3 months ago* 

It's grown, in theory...... but based on data from my country there is a huge amount of people who come in, find a handful and go away. We are talking the majority. It looks bigger, but Geocaching on a percentage basis isn't retaining players in the numbers it used to.

Most players find less than ten caches before losing interest.

I'll try to find the analysis I did. It was quite an eye opener.

[EDIT] Found it:

Out of 110497 people who have logged caches in Australia since 2000, 3/4 of them (82,000) have only ever found 17 caches or less!

3/4 of all people who've cached in Australia stopped logging caches at or before 224 days! 1/2 of them (55,000 or so) stopped caching within 2 weeks!

Growth of new cachers is pretty spectacular with 32000+ new players in 2014, however the longevity of most is still quite low: 3/4 of those people found < 9 caches and logged for only one month (approx)

It would seem that geocaching, although increasing in numbers does have any real significant 'stickyness'.

The moral of this story: Embrace the new players, but don't bother to remember their names, they won't be around for long (statistically)

You might think it's growing, you ARE seeing more new names in the logs, but they ain't sticking around!

If I made my business selling premium memberships I'd be fair shitting myself.

http://imgur.com/6RFhKES

http://imgur.com/3om0GAf

http://imgur.com/M5AXELN

http://imgur.com/J8mmplR

http://imgur.com/hnrskQv

http://imgur.com/mqN080E

New cachers

3rd Quartile Caches Found vs Year Started

3rd Quartile Days Cached

Average caches found per cacher vs year started

Cemetery Tour Spring 2016 Mid-Eastern Ontario

A so-so cemetery geocaching spring vacation this year.

The best cemetery cache hider was coman123. I found 4 of his cemetery caches. They were in good shape, swag size, in good locations and interesting finds. Most of his puzzles were easy and straight forward.

Unfortunately my first day was spent finding mostly Dragonflyexpress cemetery caches. All of them neglected by the cache owner. Many missing. Many in bad shape. All leaky free or $1 containers - film canisters, magnetic key holders, dollar store containers. It soured the day's experience and set a mood for the rest of my geocaching vacation.

On day 1, there was one cemetery geocache, by Staygold678. I found it at the end of the day, it was a relief from the carpy containers.  This one was an authentic Lock & Lock; a classic hollow nook in a tree hide; it was great shape; it had a logbook - not a damp moldy sheet. I gave it a favourite point.

Most of the other Prince Edward County, Hastings, and Lennox Addington county cemetery caches were either missing or in bad shape. Most were micros. Almost all of them looked like they had been planted then never visited again by their owners.  It felt like hiders were carrying a sackful of micros and plunking one down any time they passed a cemetery.

I posted a lot of DNFs and NMs and a few NAs.

I left a day earlier then planned and headed back home. The geocaching experience in the area wasn't worth the extra day hotel room cost, gas and food expenses.

Blog.TO promotes geocaching in Bayfield, Ontario

http://www.blogto.com/city/2015/06/the_top_5_weekend_getaways_three_hours_from_toronto/

The top 5 weekend getaways three hours from Toronto

Posted by Amanda Storey / JUNE 8, 2015

Go geocaching in Bayfield 
Charm and historic status aren't the only things going for this small town off the coast of Lake Huron. It's also known for its geocaching -- which, for those who don't know, is a complex but fun sort of modern-day treasure hunt. This is one of Ontario's hotbeds for the activity, which requires a GPS system to track down a hidden cache left by other players.

Wise words of Brian Snat regarding power trails

briansnat 

• 
• Nine time US Geocacher of the Year
• 

• 

• Group:Moderators
• Posts:38124
• Joined:14-September 01

Posted Today, 05:45 AM

Dame Deco, on 19 May 2015 - 08:01 PM, said:

Groundspeak needs to stop publishing power trails. They are giving caching a bad name.

As I've been saying since the first power trails started appearing, no good would come out of taking a low impact, low visibility activity and turning it into a high impact, high visibility one. And that's precisely what these PTs and most of the "geo art" have done.

I was pretty much a voice in the wilderness in the beginning. Glad to see that more and more people are starting see this nonsense for what it is, a threat to the long term viability of our game. We're already seeing the fallout from power caching in NJ with a new, draconian state parks policy and a total ban on some state lands. 

* In Colorado Geo-Art to be Archived forum discussion

Perth and Huron Counties Cemetery Caching Adventure

This Spring 2015 my area of choice for cemetery caches was the Perth and Huron area in Ontario. 


Overall it was disappointing. Last years cemetery vacation caching was much better.

The region is mostly populated with OCC, HCC and BRANCHES cemetery caches. Most were missing or not maintained despite logs about issues with the caches. 

There were many micros where larger caches would fit.

Many leaky caches with mostly wet moldy logsheets inside.

Checking those finds today (one month later), none of the problem caches have yet to be addressed by the cache owners.

For well maintained swag size cemetery caches drive to the Waterloo, Oxford, Elgin, Middlesex counties region. 

Dundeejim (Bone-Yard Series) and BC & MsKitty (SQ - Spirit Quest and CCF series) are still the hands-down champions of cemetery cache hides in southwestern Ontario. See last year's post. 

Has geocaching reached it's tipping point?

What's with geocaching these last few years?

Carpet bombing every available spot with leaky throw away containers. 

Junk caches that never get maintained.

Throwdowns by people trying to qualify for challenges or who can't stand not recording a find on a cache.

Lots of members logging finds on caches that aren't there. 

Angry COs who chastise anyone who posts an NM on their cache they never plan to maintain. Or go ballistic if an NA is posted.

Has geocaching reached its tipping point? 

New: Open Caching North America locationless challenge caches

The OCNA challenge caches are Locationless, so to speak. If you qualify, you can log it. They are owned by a special Admin account, OCNAChallenges, and are all Unknown (?) type caches. More about OCNA challenge caches...

Announcement at GC.com - a one year moratorium on new challenge caches

Pause on New Challenge Caches


Beginning April 21, 2015, a one-year moratorium is in effect on all new "challenge cache" submissions. It does not impact previously published challenge cache listings.

Why is a moratorium needed?

Challenge caches encourage cachers to set and achieve fun goals. They run the gamut from finding caches on every day of the calendar year to finding one for every Difficult/Terrain combination.

However, there are many aspects of challenge caches that can make them frustrating for the community. They are neither a separate cache type nor do they have a specific attribute, so the logging requirements are easily misunderstood. Challenge caches can also be very difficult to publish due to the large amount of subjectivity involved relative to other geocaches. While they account for only ~1% of all geocache submissions, challenge caches comprise the bulk of appeals made to Geocaching HQ. More...

Provide feedback at: User Insights - Challenge Caches