Urgent Advise needed to entice people into our club or we are gonna fold as a club.

[Terryturnip]

Hi All

I just need your opinion on what to do?
Our club was founded in 1987 where we had 40 active members in our club, now we are down to 15 club members.
We get an average of between 7- 14 out each match, we fish on average 24 matches per year.
Its £20 to join our club, and for that you get guaranteed placings on a match before guest, we have regular meetings the tuesdays before each match to confirm whos going, bait bans and also places to meet.
We also run a league, with club knock outs, biggest weight of the season, best improved angler of the year and much more.
We have a prize giving every year for trophies, but the only thing that is missing we do not have any waters.
I have been plugging away at this for a couple of seasons now with no joy.
Can you help?
What do i have to do to get people to join our club?
The areas we fish are Reading, oxford, guilford, aylesbury, west drayton, ivor, east sussex & the longest we would travel to a match is around 60 miles.
As a club we have around £7000 sitting in the bank doing nothing and £5000 of that is is premium bonds.
Each match we go out on we pay £20 thats £10 pegging, £8 pools & £2 towards section wins, and any money left over from the pegging usually goes towards the club.
I think members are now turning their noses up and leaving the club due to paying £20 each match, so what do we have to do to keep them happy.
We have to keep a strict budget on venues we go on due to our membership numbers, and we would not book a venue if it costs more than £150.
We are finding ourself as a club booking more and more half lakes to counter react the numbers fishing.
What would you do if you were in our shoes and how would you entice more members or would you be thinking of amalgamating with another club or purely just fold.
There is only me (Match Secretary) and 2 others that really do anything for the club and without us 3 the club would definately fold.
We some times fish free venues then we pay £15, £10 pegging and £5 to the club.
We mainly fish commercals with the occasional canal, and no rivers, this is through the choice of our members.
I try to find at least 4 or 5 new venues each year and return to some of the venues we have fish previous.
what is your advice for our club?
I look forward to your reply.

All The Best

Terry Swan
Ealing Anglings match secretary

[Colin_K]

Hi Terry

Your club is well off financially at the moment. So why not slash your match fees to cost only, pegging and optional pools. In these hard times maybe £20 for a club match is too much for people.

[Billy-No-Fish]

Terry, what kind of anglers are they? Competitive, club, open standard and finally open to change? I belonged to a little club that is so stuck in a rut it's unreal. They don't want to spend money, don't want change and expect it all on a plate.

Spend some money and put prizes up for matches. Get new people along and pay for their first match. Like Col K says, reduce the costs. With that money pay the peg fees. Maybe fork out for a top star to come along on a coaching day or match to give advice.

Times change so just think of what will attract new members.

[squeaky roller]

not thought about trying to obtain you're own water or a subsidised day ticket water on which you can call home ?

[wooper259]

same position as yourself , just resigned to the fact that if people want to join they will .

i get as many results put in local papers as i can on the sports pages (free) which gets me my 5-6 new members a year ,you will be suprised how many anglers are on your doorstep that probally dont know about you

reduce the match fees to individual peg fees plus a £6 for pools only 5 paid out ,1 for the club, do away with section payouts ,pay 1st 2 nd 3 rd only

see if you can get some deals with the lake owners--- they will budge

if all fails have a like for like club v simular size club for a trophy both payin half seems to revive a little bit of interest

we have like you 14-23 in match numbers and the above seems to work SO FAR

gissa shout if you fancy a get together we are in the herts ,cambs area

steve

[Merce]

Terry, if it was me I would propose to your members that you use club funds to enrol all your members on Match Fishing Scene for a 12 month trial period (£5 each I think). Use this forum to communicate with each other and meet other anglers (some of them sane). Try and attend as many MFS events as you can, as well as running a few of your own club matches.

If you like the way MFS works, then fold your club into MFS after the 12 month or 24 month trial period. If not, revert to how you are now. I think you are your members will really enjoy it, especially as it has a vibrant (!) events calendar.

I have no connection with the running of MFS, this is just honestly what I would do in your shoes. Only obstacle is if your members have not got PCs. But maybe its time they did anyway.

[Billy-No-Fish]

Probably the cleverest bloke on here that Merce....:D

Cheers Col, a very nice thing to say. I am sure they would be made welcome.

[Alan76]

Compared to our club your pools sound very expensive,why not use some of that money to subsidise your away match's by paying half the peg fee. Most club anglers don't fish for the money they do it for the crack, so you could probably reduce the pools. We charge £8 on away match's a fiver pools and £3 peg fee the other half is paid by the club.
For any club to survive these days you defo need your own water,then you'd attract member who want to fish the water and it-ll also give you a home venue for some match's.

[MarkT]

I think the £20 peg/pools is way to much for a club angler imho.

In a club i use to be in we paid £110 a year which could be paid in installments or in one payment, £40 of that was to fish our own water and the rest was peg fee's for the upcoming match's. Then on the day of our match we just paid £5 pools and some people even moaned about paying the £5.

Personally i think if you cut down the £20 on match days you will open it up to more people especially with money being tight for so many at this moment.

[Terryturnip]

Many thanks for all you comments.
I will endevour to put together a letter to all existing, previous and new members, asking what they like and dislike about the club.
I will look around for a cheap water to rent maybe that will do wonders for our club who knows.
The average age of our club members is 45 - 50 and we are made up of club members from Ruslip, send and MMsa and Royal oak, but some do pick and choose the one they want to go on as they know the waters.
We have a few members that do fish open matches as well.
If anybody knows any clubs around the london area that are also struggling like us i would like to hear from them and how they run their club e.g costs of joining, cost of each match and pools, i would also like to see what there members are getting for there money.
And we could even get us and you as a club fishing the same lake at a shared cost.
I look forward to hearing from you.
All The Best
Terry

[Church007]

Hi Terry, sorry to hear your predicament.

It seems to me that your match fee's are too high mate for club matches. I helped set up a local club 6 years ago, to cut a long story short we approached the local council and asked if we could rent a disused lake from them. After agreeing terms we set about getting funding from local community councils and the EA, which we successfully achieved, this money went towards building platforms (57 pegs) and transforming the surrounding area. Membership is £20 for the first year and £15 a year after for adults and £5 for juniors and concessions.

We run 20 matches throughout the year, 10 summer and 10 winter league matches. In these we have a points system, 10 for a win, 8 for 2nd, 6 for 3rd, 4 for 4th and 2 for 5th, everyone else thats weighs gets one point. We alternate the venues, home one fortnight and away the next. Home matches are £7 (£5 pools, £1 Golden peg and £1 to the club) and £13 for away venues (£5 pools, £1 Golden peg and £7 peg fee). We always get people moaning about paying £13 so i can honestly see why your struggling, especially as you have no home water of your own.

The £1's we take go towards trophies at our presentation night and we also have tackle shop vouchers for the top 3 in each league (£50, £30 and £20). This as a total costs us about £300 all in, and even at the prices we charge for matches there's a few quid to be won, something to go at in the league so there's always a reason to attend on bad weather days, and we just about cover the above costs from the £1's we take..................................So, having a league and keeping the prices down we always have a decent turn out.

Obviously having our own water helps our membership, but its always the same members on matches, and by keeping the prices down we always (nearly) fulfill the 15 away venue pegs i book. I would seriously look at reducing your match fee's, run a league so it always worth attending if you scored points on your last match and going forward, approach your local authority and ask if there's any waters available to rent, they should snap your hand off if you have a strong constitution in writing (on the grounds you will look after the venue and encourage angling and conservation at the water, and make angling available to all;)). It will save the council tens of thousands of pounds in maintenance if in your lease agreement (like ours) its your clubs responsibility to maintain upkeep of the water).

If you do decide to run a league, print some fixtures up and add details of the points system and the all in match fees. Tell people there's limited pegs so book in giving a weeks notice on a certain number. Also include brief membership prices for your match group and again, give a contact number interested people can contact you on.....................................Get these in every tackle shop in your area, all will help promote you as its in their interest.

Hope this helps in some way and good luck...........................

[Alan76]

Forgot to mention make your pools optional.

[Big Steve]

Speaking as someone a bit closer to your home and knowing something about the club I would say the obvious thing would be to amalgamate with Ruislip. You know there's an overlap ie members joining both clubs and Ruislip have their own waters and a healthy mixed-venue match calendar. You could also join the TVAA and get several stretches of the Thames plus the Jubilee River for £3 a head which although you've said you prefer commercials it gives the members some waters they can call their own for pleasure sessions and you can also book the stretches as a member club for matches.

Also, why have guests on matches? I bet you don't get many new faces as guests so why should people get the benefit of membership without being a member!

Dick Forty is the man to talk about Ruilslip [and I know he's an Ealing member!] and he'll fill you in about the TVAA as well no doubt. If you want to talk to someone else about TVAA then give me a call on 07887 770630.

[Hathers]

All clubs need a base, from that base you can grow. You don't appear to have your own water so you need to find a good water close to your membership and use that as your base. Regular match bookings on the water will help build that partnership and by keeping pools at a minimum will attract clubbies and keep gold miners away.

Next step it to arrange deals with local fisheries, where your membership book gets an angler discounts. Try to affiliate yourself to a local association, Reading DAA as an example and from there partnerships with other clubs will blossom..

You may need to offer some guarantee's to local fisheries by the way of a down payment and spend (risk) some of those funds.

Above all the key is to attract pleasure anglers as they are the bread and butter, trying to do it on a match angler basis only you will fail.

Evidence

I belong to 4 clubs just south of London:

club 1 - 1000 plus members, own waters(many), affiliations, has a match base of less than 60.
club 2 - 500 members, own waters (river/couple ponds), affiliations, match base of less than 40
club 3 - 500 members, own waters (river/couple ponds), affiliation, heavy discounts at local waters, match base of less than 30.

All of the above have a match calendar where they organise at least 40% as interclubs to share costs.

club 4 - No membership fees, word of mouth, use's 2 very good waters as a base, attracts awide variety of anglers, est a match base of 75.

[Jaap Stam]

£ 20 fees for a club match_ far too high.

[pakmei]

I've never heard of match fee's that high in norfolk, we pay £5.50 per match and when you consider that we can easily spend £30 on bait I think £20 would put me out of the game

[Jaap Stam]

Just a thought, who set the fee that high? when was it set and has this had an effect on attendances.

[blue_fish123]

Hi Terry
I have fished 1 of your matches and really enjoyed it. The £20 pools money is not a problem as down south it seems to be the norm. Well most of the club matches i fish it is £20 anyway.
What i would do is give anyone that has been a member of your club for the last 3 years a free years membership and cut out the payments for sections and pay 1,2,3 if the pools money covers this.

What some anglers dont realise is around here peg fees can be between £6 and £10 :eek: and sometimes you have to pay for a whole lake sometimes over £100 for a 14 peg lake and if only 8 turn up that has to be paid out of the pools money.:mad:

[markco]

Hi Terry,
I help run a small club 18 members , I agree with the above about the pools money why not have it either optional or try what we have done we had the same couple of lads winning the matches and framing all the time so we decided to have team matches as this gives the less able anglers a 50- 50 chance of taking home few quid this also means that everybody regardless of ability fishes for the full match as they may make a telling contribution to the winning weight:D.I must say that our lads are not the best in the world and we also have a league in place which has really got most of the lads trying to finish as high as they can.
We also have our own water which we got 5 years ago , I have advertised for members via websites and we have taken a couple on and have got people waiting to join the club now so it is well worth trying.

Mark

[Billy-No-Fish]

Terry, answer me a question. Why have all that money sat there? Make it do something. Subsidise matches, buy prizes, anything to generate interest to encourage people to join. If you carry on doing what you have always done you'll get exactly what you have now. There have been lots of ideas on here, use some of them.

[PeteP]

Terry, answer me a question. Why have all that money sat there? Make it do something. Subsidise matches, buy prizes, anything to generate interest to encourage people to join. If you carry on doing what you have always done you'll get exactly what you have now. There have been lots of ideas on here, use some of them.


Do you read alot of self help books BNF:rolleyes:?? or are you a secret AMWAY Rep:eek:

Sound advice though.

Our club Daventry no longer has any club waters and we have more members than a few years ago because we have settled on one or two match venues that are popular locally and have a better relationship with the owners because we are regulars.

Despite the going rate in your area being £20 which may be fine for opens but not really for club matches and not if you want to get youngsters or retired folk involved. Run some Golden pegs which only members can have and cap them at £50. You might have two or three matches where you have more than one GP and this can spark extra interest. Spend some of your dormant cash as suggested as it simply is doing nothing for the club sitting in the bank. With that much in premium bonds you should be getting regular payouts, are you? if so are you spending it or reinvesting in more bonds?