I don't think it came out too early, but I do know it ended too early.  The echo generation/generation Y whatever term you want to use has just started to enter the targeted age that emerging spirit used.  Why wouldn't the church want to target this large demographic?

The timing of when it started/ended was not the major problem with Emerging Spirit.  My problems with it were:

a) the lanuch of teh ads/WonderCafe and teh beginning of the congregational awareness and trainging were backwards

b) there was an urban bias in the information given out about how to use the findings of the research so that many of the suggestions at the congregational events made little sense in a small rural community

We find newspaper (old dead tree edition) and cable TV to give us better exposure than social media. We also have a changeable signboard on a main street with 12,000 cars/day passing by.

Adn the BEST exposure any organization can get is the witness of its members.  All the other tools dwindle in importance to congregation members saying to others "would you like to come to...?"

DKS -- good stuff re the sign.  Not sure why people have such a challenge regarding these items.

GordW -- yup, bad reputation spreads really quickly.