Membership fees

[haggis]

Hello everyone, I’ve got a little ? in my bonnet about membership fees.

Now I think this is going to be controversial.

I’ll come straight out with it, I don’t think we are paying enough for the fantastic service we all receive from the tssc. 

I would be happy to pay a higher membership fee to support the future of this club. 

Am I a lone wolf on this? ? 

Hag 

 

 

 

[Colin Lindsay]

I would donate all of my organs and those of my family to be a member.

We don't play them enough any more.

[Pete Lewis]

The rates were held down for a few years and the past couple have had a planned increase  theres another £1 being added this year

With direct debits getting £6 reduction 

So there is a plan to progressively increase in place .

Theres a play off with other clubs , each have differing options and memebership fees ,  if you inflate too far you drop members 

Its the old balancing act 

Pete

[AndyTV8]

I’d say it is currently good value and reasonably aligned to membership costs of other, similar, clubs. As Pete says, it is a delicate balance, if you push over perceived ceilings numbers will stall and it becomes a topic of complaint.

..... Andy 

[Guest]

2 minutes ago, Pete Lewis said:

Theres a play off with other clubs , each have differing options and memebership fees ,  if you inflate too far you drop members 

Indeed Pete,

I'm quite fortunate as I get to look at a lot of other classic vehicle club newsletters / magazines throughout the year.

Have to say when I look at their membership prices c/w newsletter and then view The Courier with other equally impressive club magazines, it is fair to say that the TSSC is light years ahead.

Additionally TSSC members get a monthly magazine compared to some other clubs charging the same membership fee but only, in many cases, producing 4x newsletters a year - none of which are particularly memorable.

Personally I could accept a levy up to £50 a year but that would be my absolute ceiling, for many that would be way too high and I fully understand that.

Regards.

Richard. 

[Pete Lewis]

One good reason for continuing the monthly courier as its cost is VAT free so it offsets a huge value at £3.50 per issue

Do the maths for around 4500 members and it saves £38k   reduce the courier and subs need to go up £9 

Pete

[dougbgt6]

Yes, I'd pay more, but I think we should take Colin up on his offer first. 

db

[Pete Lewis]

I have a wierd image of Colin as he dosnt play his organ enough 

Pete

[Colin Lindsay]

I know... I really want to learn the harp... so I can sit quietly in a corner and play with myself at weddings.

[Pete Lewis]

dont you feel the Oboe postion is more flattering ?

[Clive]

As above, a difficult balance. And it depends what you do get out of membership.

Forums are generally free and open to all, which is sensible as it does increase actual membership. And the club magazine rarely gets more than a cursory once-over thesedays (I appreciate it actually helps the club financially and that reduced membership for no courier is never going to happen as it wouldn't help) I guess I remain a member for historical reasons (joined in 89, lapsed for a year and rejoined in 91 with no break since) plus the agreed value insurance, CLM etc. 

But clubs are faced with real issues, especially if they have paid staff and premises. An putting up membership fees would be counter-productive as people would leave, the balance and parity with other clubs needs to be maintained. Not sure if TSSC could cut staff/costs any further and keep their USP. The staff do a remarkable job already, no idea what will happen when Angie and Bern do actually retire.....

[dave.vitesse]

The TSSC is a members focus club (Surprisingly not all are) and the sub's are in my view good value for what we receive. The staff at HQ work hard to support club members. I also echo Richard, Classiclife, views.

I am not involved in the management of the TSSC so no bias.

Dave

[Colin Lindsay]

3 hours ago, Pete Lewis said:

dont you feel the Oboe postion is more flattering ?

No, nor the missionary position either - tried that once and took me days to get back from Africa....

[dave.vitesse]

Colin, I wondered where you were going with this.

Dave

[Pete Lewis]

your'e  worried        theres strange forces at work and we are about to get a black cat  called Barley,  might change that to Malt

Pete

[dave.vitesse]

Wizard. 

[Colin Lindsay]

Reminds me of the guy who thought his neighbours cat was called Aw Jayzus, since that's all he ever heard.

"Aw Jayzus the cat's eaten our tea. Aw Jayzus the cat's gone on the bed. Aw Jayzus the cat's clawed the curtains..."

[Pete Lewis]

Now im even more worried where this is heading 

I mean Haggis had good intentions but this is drift by the sub normal 

Even a yellow one 

Pete

[Anglefire]

I do think the subs are fair and reasonable - any more and the risk is a drop in members - any less and no more would join I suspect.

The club premises and shop is excellent - it does perhaps need to focus slightly more on quality and unusual rather than cost - which is does in many areas - perhaps leave the usual stuff to the other sellers - though I do accept that they could mean slow moving items - which is not at all ideal so the balance does need to be struck!

[DerekS]

Yes, the club, forum, magazine, shop et al are superb and good value for money. There's no argument about that. Please don't run away with the idea that everyone can afford increases in fees though. Some members must be tip-toeing on the edge of "affordability" with all aspects of their cars, what are small amounts to some could be the decider in whether to continue ownership or call it a day to others, sadly. I know of at least one.

[haggis]

Hi all, definitely a lot of drift here, but thank you all for your commments. I currently pay membership  by direct debit and receive a discount but would be happy to pay the normal fee or more. I agree with angelfire that investment in difficult to find parts would be better than selling the same parts every other supplier has. The club is very good value in my opinion we should make sure it has funds to keep our vehicles going into the future and this means investment from all of us, its members. Seriously how much difference would a 10% rise make to any of us, we are talking a fiver! 

Hag 

[ShaunW]

This thread inspired me to go and look at the membership rates again (I'm not currently a member) 

Have I missed something,  does the membership page just quote a price or does it list what you get for it?  I'm just viewing it on my phone not a big screen so not 100% about that. 

If not then a list of benefits would be nice. Do you get listed on a register? How much cheaper is the shop? Discount insurance deal with a broker? A sample old Courier pdf to download to tempt me. Do you get a nice club badge or sticker for the car? Valuation certificate? A free 100 point score rating from a senior member at a meeting to add a little bit of value to my car? (yanks are always awarding themselves certificates to give their cars kudos) 

It did look a bit like 44 quid for, I'm not sure what really. I think in this day and age you need to sell the dream a bit more. I'll be frank, the whole web site doesn't scream this is a club I simply must join. Event info is out of date, pictures are a bit amateur and the site looks like it was written in 2000 and never updated. It doesn't even work well on mobile devices, not everyone has a desktop pc these days. PayPal would have been good too for an impulse purchase, sending for a DD form is too much hassle. 

I'm GENUINELY not having a dig, you do your best. But to get to the point of the thread, if it had impressed me I'd have paid 75quid, as it was I browsed and moved on because I couldn't get excited about it. 

[Anglefire]

I’ve just looked at the website on my iPhone and it is reasonably responsive- a lot better than many to be fair 

event information is upto date so not sure where you are coming from there?

but I do agree that the member benefits are not obvious. 

[dougbgt6]

I went to the club AGM earlier in the year and some of the points Shaun makes were discussed.  If you put a query into your search engine you get loads of stuff back from USA clubs, Club Triumph and others, but nothing from TSSC. We are invisible, we need to be more "high profile" to attract new members.

To this end CoM have tasked one of our number to put searchable back issues of the Courier and all it's technical articles on line. The intention was to have this done this year.

Also plans are afoot to tidy up the web site, particularly the front page which is very....busy/crowded/confusing. 

(But have no fear, the forum is to remain the same on pain of Mr Lewis descending on the CoM from a great height.)

Interestingly I don't think anybody has mentioned the main reason for joining the club! Club valuation of your car. How much do you think your car should be insured for? Join, get a club valuation and be surprised  At the AGM Bern said "The insurance panel have never turned down a claim on a club valued car." 

Doug

[Badwolf]

Keep websites simple so you can find things easily. Graphics are ok to a point but slow down the site loading on old devices (or even new ones with rubbish web connections). I was always taught to set up sites considering the slowest devices/links and make it easy for the viewer to find what they want or they will press the 'back button' and go to another site. 10 seconds load time .. max. 

NB. Sorry, originally posted this on the wrong thread and can't delete it.