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Building Soaring Part 3
by Gene HammondMarch 1996 SOARING Magazine
The Soaring Society of America is continuing efforts to recruit new members for the SSA and for the soaring movement. In previous articles, Gene Hammond has spoken to Jayne and Frank Reid and Bob Wander who offered a view of how a commercial operator can help build soaring with new members. Now he speaks to Ron Clarke, a 15 year member of the Central Indiana Soaring Society, a glider club near Indianapolis. This Club was the leading member-getter in 1995 and Ron describes how his Club goes about it.
Gene Hammond (GH): Well, Ron Clarke, how does a club go about recruiting members?
Ron Clarke (RC): Well, Gene, frankly I guess it all starts with getting the club committed to it. Without that, without the members behind the project, it's probably not going to work as well as you would want. One of the things that had bothered our Club the last couple of years was the fact that we really didn't feel we had identified ways to bring in new members. There was more luck than good planning that got new members. So, we formed a membership committee and noodled around some ideas as to what we might try to see if we couldn't make up for what we feel is about a 15% loss of members each year. That in itself is a worry to any club considering that there are a lot of fixed costs and with that kind of turnover, there has to be a way to overcome that loss.
(GH): That's right. When I came into the SSA some 25 years ago, the turnover rate was about 30%! Fortunately, we've reduced that some, but not far enough. I'm glad you brought that up because it is not only important to get new members, but to retain the ones we now have. What did your group settle on as a method for getting and keeping members?
(RC): Well, a combination of actions. To put your finger on any one area that really works is not realistic. We took somewhat of a shotgun approach, but we did come up with three or four main areas we were going to focus on. As I said earlier, we decided to get the members behind the campaign because without the club members committed, we felt our efforts would not be as successful. So, we showed the members the financials to demonstrate what it would mean if in fact we couldn't add new members. We might have to increase flying fees, we might have to increase dues. This may seem like a scare tactic, but it certainly got the members' attention. It also got us a few other members to serve on the committee! I think any club has the ability to find someone from a local newspaper who is willing to put an article together about the club. We found such a member who had a good contact. That made it relatively easy to get a photographer to the field, take him up in a glider, even several times if necessary, get lots of good pictures, and then get the reporter to write the article. Because our reporter, like many reporters, was not familiar with our language and how gliders fly, we ended up helping write the article. This gave us excellent coverage in the biggest circulation newspaper in Indianapolis, a full page in the Friday edition with good photos. My firm conviction is that what helped more than anything with the article was to ensure we had a couple of good club contact points; names and phone numbers listed in the article. Why I say that with such conviction is that six or even eight weeks after the article, our phone was ringing off the hook and driving my wife insane with folks phoning about the glider club. Apparently, they keep those articles if something gets their interest. In addition to that, we also had a little TV slot. Another member knew someone from the local TV station. We coordinated all this to get the activity going just prior to the start of the soaring season, in the February, early March period. The TV slot featured one of the young members of the club, which is always appealing to a TV station; you get a school kid which adds a little extra interest to the feature. Even though we did get good coverage, we don't feel it did as much good as the newspaper article. We did several other things as well. We decided to reduce our entry fee to the club by one half. I'm not sure how big an effect that had. Certainly it didn't get the people to the field, but once they got there, it made it sound much more reasonable to them. Even with the reduced entry fee, the monthly dues was a welcome addition to the cash flow of the club. We also ran a series of seminars on Saturday mornings during March and April. We advertised this in the local newspapers, including the biggest circulation one, in the "What's Happening in Indianapolis This Weekend?" section. All it said was "Free seminar on gliding at the airfield on Saturday morning at 10:00." Actually it worked out very well. We set up a little slide show in the hangar and had 10-15 people come to that. By getting them into the hangar, they got the feel of the club and got to meet some of the members. One of us would talk about soaring - how to stay up, how the glider works. A second member would talk about joining a year ago, had never flown before, and now has a license and the sequence he went through with the club. Then a third member would talk about the club affairs, explaining the costs, how many flights to solo, and responsibilities of a club member. This presented an opportunity for the "outsider" to see how the club operated. We got about 6 of the 30 members we attracted in a two month period through those seminars.
(GH): That's a great way to recruit. It's quite different from commercial operators, isn't it? Your approach is almost a hands-on introduction to the ancillary parts of soaring as well as the real parts and how a club works and things like that, while a commercial operator takes the neophyte and puts him in the glider and gets him to flying and sells him the membership as part of the ABC Badge program, which all fits into a neat little package for the commercial operator. I can see the difficulty with the club, since in order to be a SSA Chapter, the club has to have 100% membership in the SSA, so the participants have to understand that out front.
(RC): In fact, we ensure they understand that one of the commitments is the annual fee to SSA. Of course, we sell the fact they get the nice magazine along with the other benefits. Incidentally, we have a supply of Soaring with literature such as the "Soaring in America" brochure plus a little brochure on our club with the charges, and so forth. I don't think we took any of those prospective members flying right away. We showed them gliders, but it was the next time before they got to fly.
(GH): So, to summarize what you've said, first and foremost is to get the support of the other club members in developing new members for the club. We've all thought of this as a private little society, and yet, we need new blood all the time. Next, have a good publicity campaign, keep the fee structure at a level that is not oppressive to prospects, hold seminars, and have good contacts for all these things. These are all great ideas and you should be complimented for putting these things together.
(RC): Let me add just another point or two. Bob Wander has written and spoken of being friendly and talking up the camaraderie among the members in the club. That was a very big feature for us and got a lot of people's attention when they visited the club. We had good and interested members there to talk to the prospective members to show interest. We were attracting from ab initios with zero flying time to one commercial pilot with 14,000 hours who turned out to be a tow pilot and instructor as well. You have to be willing to find candidates and talk at all levels, so you need members that can talk at all levels as well. I get quite excited about this whole thing. One other thing we did and used as a tool was to take the very nice counter display produced by the SSA and fly them around to different airports within a 30 mile radius of Indianapolis. We identified cities, like Kokomo and Anderson and placed those counter displays along with our club brochures at those airports. That's just part of the shotgun approach we use. We don't know the results of this project at this time but the last thing we've done is offer through the local newspapers a $10 flight to any students or school kids. This is one of the areas we have put extra focus on, getting young members into our club. Interestingly, we are at a point now that the club has asked that we not attract too many more members this year because some of the older members are feeling that perhaps it is going to slow down their ability to get a glider when they want, so we are backing off a little bit now.
(GH): That gets into utilization of equipment. If it is not being utilized it is sitting around eating up funds, but if it is busy, it is being utilized and someone is not going to get the glider when they want, but is turning cash. When that happens, members complain that they can't get a glider. This is a great position to be in. Your approach to recruiting is quite interesting and contrasts extensively from the commercial operators methods. We only hope other clubs and chapters can use some of these techniques to help support their club better and bring more members into the Society. It is obvious that the more people we have in the Society, the better our voice is in places where our voice needs to be heard.
(RC): I'm glad to have had this opportunity to describe our techniques and hope others recognize that it is not that difficult even though it might be difficult to put your finger on the one area that makes the difference, if you concentrate on several important areas enthusiastically, the result is predictable. We are definitely committed!
(GH): I want to compliment your group for a tremendous job of recruiting. Another club that has done a great job is the Caesar Creek group and Pat DeNaples. There are people out there working at the club level to bring in new members and to boost their club, and we can only hope the impetus is as strong in the future as it has been in the last couple years. Thanks a lot for taking the time to talk to me. Editor's note: It is interesting to note that since this conversation took place, Ron Clarke was elected to a seat on the SSA Board of Directors as a Region 6 Director, filling the seat vacated by Dick Schreder. While those who know Dick Schreder are saddened to see him leave the Board, the Board and the Region 6 SSA members can look forward to the same dedication demonstrated by Dick for some 24 years, and by Ron in his club's drive for new members.
