GNAS Fees and membership??

[oldy]

How is that GNAS have put our fees up again ,when not long ago they were telling us that they had record membership numbers. Surely more members = more fees ,so a reduction ought to have been in the offing?.
Another thing while I am in grumpy mode (having just had to tell our juniors that their fees are going up by £2),that is GNAS claim these numbers which I am not disputing but where are they ? sitting watching TV thats where and various other things but not at the archery club.
Talking to other archers,they tell me the same thing, good membership but just half a dozen at the club on Sundays.So if you roll this out across the country GNAS have thousands of members who hardly ever go near the sport. Years ago we had 45 members and on a Sunday we would have 30 plus at the club, now we are lucky to get eight. So hardly a cause for celebration at GNAS, as the sport seems to be shrinking to me, so if GNAS keep upping their fees it will shrink further.
I must be off now(I've got to go and kick the cat).

[ben_e71]

surely the non-shooters are the best ones. They pay each year but don't take up resources.

[pelican]

£2, big deal!

If some people keep paying their membership but choose not to shoot, then that's their business. In order to renew I assume they turn up at their club at least once a year voluntarily, no-one is dragging them in.

Do you have enough juniors to register as a junior club, we do and only charge juniors £5 GNAS then £10 club/outdoor shooting fees, other than that they only pay 70p each indoor session. Including SAA fees our junior club costs £87, so it really is cheap for kids to shoot.

[Bald Eagle]

Perhaps they are away in competition!! Sundays are a bad day for club shoots as most competitions take place then!!!

[Thunk]

The perceived problem is that GNAS is very inefficient. And part (but not all) of the root problem is that the office is dreadfully understaffed.

It's only a couple of weeks since we were talking about a real increase in GNAS fees - say an extra £10 per year, which would still be a pretty insignificant sum. On that basis they could employ a couple more staff and thereby provide a better service to members.

There may be an increase in membership, but whilst that provides further income it also increases the workload on the existing staff. It's a vicious cycle which can only really be broken by a fee increase. If when they have sufficient office staff they are still inefficient, at least we shall have removed the major excuse for it!

[Barrythebow]

My small gripe with the GNAS is their 'Find a Club' feature on their website, particularly Nottingham district. 22 clubs listed, hardly a contact listed for any of them, just a phone number to phone the GNAS office & ask for help. Yet a google search will find websites & everything for many of them. I have e-mailed them contact & website details for Burton Joyce Archers & they thanked me & said they would add it to their website-nothing has happened.
Moan over

[WhitehartFB]

Originally Posted by Barrythebow

My small gripe with the GNAS is their 'Find a Club' feature on their website, particularly Nottingham district. 22 clubs listed, hardly a contact listed for any of them, just a phone number to phone the GNAS office & ask for help. Yet a google search will find websites & everything for many of them. I have e-mailed them contact & website details for Burton Joyce Archers & they thanked me & said they would add it to their website-nothing has happened.
Moan over

Unless it has changed recently it is not the fault of GNAS if the details are incorrect it is the fault of the clubs. They have direct access and responsibility to update their own entry, being able to add any information they feel of interest including pictures telephone numbers and website links.

This is a great facility for getting new members and it is very much under used by clubs, especially for those clubs that still do not have a website.

[Robin the Hood]

Originally Posted by Bald Eagle

Perhaps they are away in competition!! Sundays are a bad day for club shoots as most competitions take place then!!!

Interesting point but a couple of years ago at a North Wales tournament we were talking of the days when the field was full. These days a local tournament can be more like a Club shoot used to be. But what was more ironic about it, was the fact that the membership in North Wales was greater. I don't know the reason for sure but, one thing that comes to mind is transport costs.

Paul...

[Barrythebow]

Originally Posted by WhitehartFB

Unless it has changed recently it is not the fault of GNAS if the details are incorrect it is the fault of the clubs. They have direct access and responsibility to update their own entry, being able to add any information they feel of interest including pictures telephone numbers and website links.

This is a great facility for getting new members and it is very much under used by clubs, especially for those clubs that still do not have a website.

Well, yes, it is true that there is a lot of appathy within the clubs, point taken

[grimsby archer]

All these extra members must be at our club.
We certainly have more active members than ever before, and also a higher percentage of the club that ARE active.

May I re-inforce what has been said about junior clubs en-bloc fees.
We have approx 30 juniors. At £26 each that would be a lot of pocket money. We set up the official junior club and now pay £70 no matter how many juniors we have. A huge saving. Perhaps it isnt in the original spirit of the thing (exclusive junior club, focused on the needs of the junior?), but really its just a paper exercise, as we all shoot together and share the same committee.
Other advantages are that certain funding streams favour junior clubs and as a junior club plus a senior club we can apply for some funding twice.

On "find a club" I too was dismayed at how few clubs in my county had taken up the option to provide contact details. However, internet searches fail to provide much more about the clubs in my county. If I were a person interested in archery, some clubs are impossible to find. Putting modesty aside for a moment, my own club have a listing on GNAS, come high in the search engine listings for "Archery" and my town or county name, we are listed in the yellow pages and thompson local, not to mention posters in the local leisure centers, libraries and articles in the local newspapers and I STILL get people who say "I didnt know there was an archery club"
This could be a new thread: "How does your club publicise itself?"
Sorry to have carried a bit off topic