Triangle Woodworkers Assoc (TWA) Membership

[SteveColes]

Last night I was invited by Fred Ford (fredf) president of TWA, to attend the board meeting so I can provide some input on their website. In addition to this I got to listen to the discussion on why their membership is decreasing.

In the interests of full disclosure, I was a member, but didn't renew my membership this year. I found out that quite a few members of this site who joined around the time I did, have also not renewed.

So I am interested in why? And I am sure that Fred would be interested.

So if you were, or still am a member, what is the membership of TWA decreasing. What do they have to attract and keep new members. For those have let membership lapse, what would need to happen to bring you.

Let's keep the discussion civil, but at the same time constructive criticism is welcome.

If some of you would like to provide feedback, but want to remain anonymous, send me a PM and I can post it for you without using your name.

BTW, Fred did not ask me to do this, but from the meeting, it was clear that they really need input from a more diverse goup.

Fred, I'm sorry I didn't tell you I was foing to do this.

[sediener]

I've never been to a meeting but plan to go and check it out.

Its not just a local problem for WW clubs...

WoodTalk Online had a discussion about this somewhere in the middle of their ramblings.
http://blip.tv/file/get/TheWoodWhisperer-WTO30853.mp3

They were saying that it's likely the internet and its readily available information (forums, podcasts, etc) are replacing WW clubs.

- Steve

[NC Scroller]

I am a current but not very active TWA member. I make roughly 1/2 the meets. There are threemain reasons I miss the ones I do miss. That being I am busy at home / work or the meeting is on a Friday, or I don't care for the topic. Time is the biggest killer for me.

There are two mains reasons I remain a member. That being I have a couple friends who are members and I really enjoy/support their Toys for Tots program. I wish I had time to be more involved there.

As for suggestions to improve:
- more hands on activity at meeting
- more group activities (ie. shop crawl)
- toys for tots workshops year round

[gator]

I have been a member for several years and am thinking of not renewing my membership this coming July. Why? For me it is a case of not getting anything for my money. I don't mean that though as to the quality of their meetings or presenters. It is simply a case of being too far away. I don't know how many of the members are outside a half hour drive range but with the price of gas and the getting home time after meetings I have found myself missing more and more meetings. The drive is 45 minutes to an hour each way and $15 worth of gas. When gas was cheaper, I would hit Raleigh (Woodcraft, Klingspor, and Harbor Freight) about once a month. Now its closer to every two to three months. Steve's observation is probably also valid. I can get my WW fix here and on other forums without the cost.

George

[JimmyC]

I joined up for the first year I was down here, and made about half the meetings. I got a friend to go with me, also, but, as I told Rick Cornell, my wife's dancing classes got scheduled on meeting nights and I have to stay home with the kids. If my wifes classes change, I may re-join. My friends wife has the same classes as mine, so he's in the same predicament, but he said that he wouldn't join again because he was looking for more ' hands on' type meetings.

I think that the meetings were worth it, but in the end time constraints from having young children won out. I can watch my girls on dance nights and still be on this website, THAT ROCKS !

Jimmy

[toolferone]

It's all about time for me. The kids come first.

[froglips]

I was a member for 2 years, let my membership lapse last year.

It came down to cost/benefit.

I didn't find the meetings worth the high cost in personal time for the travel involved.

For me, the decision to have members do the presentations was the straw for this camels back.

No offense to the idea or the members. It was just too costly to attend a meeting for information I can get mostly from this board and books/videos etc.

Sadly, what I lost was personal contacts and new freindships (in the non-digital sense).

Suggestions? Well, I find woodworking to be a tactile, visceral hobby. One I am involved in to get my hands dirty.

The meeting structure was very formal, in terms of sit and lecture. When I would attend, it would usually only be meetings I really wanted to learn more on the subject.

As many of us, I have a desk job where I sit all day long. Adding 2 hours of sitting time is less appealing.

I'd be much more drawn to a meeting where something was built or done.

Off the top of my head, breaking the meeting into numerous BOF (birds of a feather) tables. Powertool junkies, sharpening, HelpDesk, finishing, completed projects, etc.....

Much like the way we have forums on this list.

I think you see inklings of a change in some of the events springing up on this list. Shop Crawl, lunches, pony express, lumber runs.

Just my thoughts, I know Fred and the board work really hard and have done a lot on behalf of the membership.

Thanks,
Jim

[ebarr]

I am not a member, however I went to a few meetings to see if I wanted to join. I haven't joined yet, and am still undecided about it.

The first meeting I went to was way over my abilities so I didn't feel I got much out of it. The second was a demo by Tom on bandsaw boxes which was very good.

Maybe I need to give it another chance.

[DavidF]

I considered joining the TWA when I first moved to NC, but initially it was the distance to home (50 miles) that put me off, but I have been a member of other clubs here and in the UK and they do seem to have a natural decay as members disappear. I have seen it with other organizations as well; book clubs etc. Making a commitment to any regular meeting is really difficult for many people and finding excuses is really easy; cold, weather, gas prices, and many other things and I don't blame them for that. In addition, it is often one persons mission to run the club and when they want to do less of the organizing it shows the level of commitment from the other members when other officers are asked for and the show of hands volunteering is next to nothing. People generally want their entertainment for little or no effort and clubs actually take a lot of running and it takes members to volunteer to do talks or demo at meetings. Also, members want professional speakers and artists at these things, but want the annual club fees to be kept low and the two are not compatible. Artisans are in this for the money and want paying for their time and gas money, so therefore when this is unaffordable the members are asked to actually DO something and then apathy runs riot.

I love being part of the North Carolina Woodworker because I can interact with people on my own terms when I want to, I am not made to feel guilty if I don't participate (well sometimes. When you are one of only 5 in a cold meeting room on a Tuesday night nothing iand s going on then the next month you might think that it is not worth going and the other 5 are doing the same - I speak from experience here and am probably as guilty as the next person on all of the above. just my 2d

[junquecol]

Sorry I wasn't at Fred's to hear what you had to say. TWA is trying to make the best in wood working available to all. We have used nationally known speakers and local talent as well. It costs a couple of grand to have an "out of town, nationally known speaker" to do a program and workshop. To keep our operating budget in line, we are using more "local talent." I'm even doing a program- wait that may be the problem. I haven't done a program in a couple of years. Now I know why membership is down - HA, HA! I have another organization that meets the same night, so this makes for conflicts a couple times a year, when I have to be there. Most woodworkers I meet at the woodworking stores haven't heard of TWA, even though we have literature on display. In August, Jeff Mills will be our speaker at the kick off banquet for Toys For Tots. Some of you may know him. We do a survey of membership to see what programs they desire to have and then develope programs based on survey. Would it help if programs and reminders of programs were posted here at NC Woodworker? With Steve getting discounts for NC Woodworker members, this negated one of the benefits of membership in TWA. In March, Gus Steferac will be talking about scroll sawing. (Which I know absolutely nothing about.) Gus is the Apolo sprayer guy at the Woodworking shows. He has taught at Highland Hardware also. Can't remember the April program, but I will be doing a program on the table saw in May. By the way, Steve , why didn't you renew your membership? Thanks for posting about TWA. I wonder if we had to pay dues for being a member of NC Woodworker, how many would be here. Bruce

[DaveO]

I joined TWA shortly after I found this site and had made some woodworking friends in the area. I was extremely impressed with the first few meetings I attended. I got the experience of meeting Garrett Hack, Jeff Jewitt and Frank Klausz, even had dinner with them. I haven't renewed my membership for several reason. First, after those glorious speakers the quality seemed to go down hill. The presenters were very knowledgeable but the presentations didn't have the professionalism of hired professional speakers. Second, I had a real problem actually hearing the programs. I don't hear very well and probably should look into a hearing aide, but I was one of the youngest members of the group and if I can't hear the program I really wonder if anyone else can too.
Third, was the meeting times. With a young child leaving my wife to deal with the responsibilities of the evening ritual by herself was a burden too great, even if it was only once a month.
Finally, the age group. As I mentioned before, to my knowledge, I was the second youngest member with Froglips (Jim) being first. It just wasn't my crowd. Now I know there are a lot of members greatly my senior on this site that I converse with as they were my college buddies, but that is a different world all together. It's a Catch 22, if TWA doesn't find and recruit younger members, their membership will soon fade away. But without younger members to attract others they will have a hard time finding them.
I would really like to see TWA continue and perpetuate, but at this time in my life TWA as it is, isn't for me.
I think that if they could affiliate with this site more, they would get more exposure and have a greater hope of attracting younger members and continue to prosper with the next generation of woodworkers.
Respectfully submitted,
Dave

[Jonz]

I joined around the same time as Dave and Steve did and let mine lapse. I'd echo a few of Dave's points. I was loving the Garrett Hack, Frank Klausz and some of the other speakers. It was a great bargain IMO. I did the workshop with Hack at Tom's shop and much to my dismay had to miss the Klausz workshop, but would have been thrilled to hand over the $$ for that one as well if I could have attended.

As Dave said, even in my early 40's I'm a good bit younger than the majority of the members. I joined on a trial basis to begin with as meetings and clubs are not really my thing. I also tend to be pretty quiet in crowds of strangers, I'm not going to stand up at the front of the room and show my birdhouse, nor am I going to walk around and introduce myself to everyone. Now that's my problem and it's no one else's responsibility to roll out the red carpet to introduce themselves to me, but either way after attending 5-6 meetings and a couple of workshops, I don't think more than a couple of people ever spoke to me other than people that I knew from this board (who were and are always very cool people, of course we know that). So when there was a topic that I wasn't really interested in or was on the fence about, I would pretty much always bail on the meeting, because I didn't feel like I would want to go just hang out even if I wasn't interested in the topic.

I guess in retrospect I kind of felt like as a new member coming in, there was never really any time or place to get to know anyone. It was always sitting and doing the standard meeting stuff, then listening to a speaker etc, then everyone folds up their chair and is out the door for the most part. Not really conducive to getting to know folks and feeling a part of the crowd.

I personally hate that formal meeting format, even though I know it's useful. I feel like I'm in school again studying parliamentary procedure.You need some time outside going over the minutes and the budget from the last meeting and a presentation to just be human and hang out. I know a lot of folks would have dinner before meetings but that's not what I mean. Maybe skip a presentation every 6 months and instead do a TWA potluck dinner/meet and greet/new member drive. I gar-awn-tee you throw some food into the mix and you'll get some folk's attention. This site and TWA should share a LOT of members to be honest, they are natural partners.

Years ago a group of us from Woodnet got together at the Raleigh Woodcraft and hung out for part of the day, started at the store, then to Tom's shop, then went and had some BBQ. Several of those folks are here on this board now. It was enjoyable IMO. I drove David Gillie around, I promise you it doesn't get much more fun than hanging with that dude.

I know it's impossible to make everyone happy with topics. I'm doing the "reacquainted offer" and will probably rejoin, but unless a topic is one I'm pretty interested in I won't attend the meetings. Just not enjoyable to me as it is. As I said before I gave it a shot but formal meetings are not really my thing.

[rcorne01]

Thanks for priming the pump, Steve! I have been a member of TWA for almost 7 years now. A mere youngster by the standards of some folks there, even at 52! It has provided me the chance to meet a number of you from this site as well as some others. Let me start out by saying, of the posts so far, I can see nothing I disagree with.

The top 3 challenges I see the club facing:

Hands on experiences:
Personally, I really enjoyed the hands on, weekend workshops that are an extension of the meeting lecture. However, over the years, either my interests changed or the number of workshops decreased. I am not sure which has the greater net effect. But the net effect is I have not attended as many in the last couple of years. Another crucial part of that is workshop availability. Thanks to Tom, we have been able to use his wonderful shop and whenever I see a workshop advertised there, I immediately consider attending just to enjoy the experience and how welcome he makes us feel. But how many shops like that exist?

Speaker Quality:
As has been mentioned earlier, we HAVE had to rely upon club members to take on more programs. The costs for a national speaker are quite high. I also enjoyed them Someone like Lon Schleining (sp?) I would pay to hear anytime he came. Frank Klausz, on the otherhand, I am quite ambivalent about due to my personal experience with him. I would NEVER pay to go to one of his workshops - ever. After listening to him tell participants in a dovetail workshop that a number of them had no business being there (lack of skills for some of the tasks)- he turned me off. I also recall a local speaker standing up in front of the club, and start out by saying he was going to let US direct what he was going to speak about! Say what???

On the other hand - I have thoroughly enjoyed several of our "professional" speakers, though the subject was something I was not really interested in DOING, but seeing how someone who was good at the skill produced wonderful projects WAS interesting. IE - carving, wood bending, even turning. At this point in my life, I am not interested in pursuing those - but boy, Paul Rolfe produces some great stuff! Bill Anderson actually "converted" me to pursue learning how to hand plane. When I can make the time, I am going to bug him again for a refresher. Tom's presentation on band saw boxes was spot on! He convinced me that even I could do one. Which I did - and BTW, Tom - the box I did and gave as a present to my 23 year old niece garnered a "...that was wicked awesome!" from her.

Socializing:
Again - the meeting format is not very conducive for that. I try to catch a number of folks as I am able, but handling membership, usually means I am grabbed each meeting to deal with those issues. I had started the pre-meeting meals at Buffalo Brothers, and at times we had 15 people or so there. Most from THIS forum! It was enjoyable as I got to hear some of the enthusiasm of the younger guys. And much to my relief, discovered "Froglips" really did NOT have them! The club is also trying to schedule some more "socials" in addition to the Toys for Tots themed meetings. Hopefully that will work out well. As someone else said - "throw some food at them"!

Next Steps
Discussions taking place within the club leadership recognize these issues, and solutions are being sought. It is important to hear feedback as posted so far. That is part of the process. The other part of the equation is what can be done? A tongue-in-cheek definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. In many cases the same leaders have been in place for several years. Not by design, but by necessity as it is difficult to recruit new ones! While comments such as "not meeting my needs" and "too many older members" identify the issues - what WOULD meet your needs. It is tough for 60 year olds to come up with topics, themes, etc that interest those half their age. What/how could we address that? Give us some ideas. Sorry cost of transportation, and the fact you have lives outside of woodworking (heretics all!) - those are beyond our abilities to fix.

Personally...
I was wondering if a different meeting might hold some interest. Perhaps start a little earlier, at 7? Have a general meeting for the entire group, and then break up into discussion/special interest groups, smaller in size. Similar to an earlier comment. What about having "splinter groups", according to special interests (pen turning, finishing, beginning skill development, scroll sawing, etc) that met during the month at different times, and then have the general meeting as is currently done? When I think of that scenario, I find it coming closer to what I would like to get out of a club. However, it immediately raises questions about getting people to come back together for the overall meetings. Getting them to "host" these get togethers. A small group COULD meet at another's house, and as part of the meeting go out to a small shop and do some hands on exercises. Thoughts? Give us some ideas, please. Let's face it - this hobby (obsession? ) is not dying - in the Triangle area alone, we have two woodworking supply stores in addition to the BORG, Lowes, HF, and others. Sometimes it is nice to have a brick-and-mortar gathering place in addition to a web forum.

Rick

[Douglas Robinson]

Chris Jones hit it on the head. I joined for the first year I was here and let it lapse for exactly the reasons he stated. At my first meeting I asked "is the the TWA meeting?" All I got was a "yes." No one made any attempt to introduce themselves. People seemed much older an all new each other. Finally, at my last meeting the speaker (who I will not mention) seemed like the Carny hypnotist from "the Natural." I swear he was trying to put me to sleep!

Doug

[prolfe]

The dilemma with the membership problem of TWA is not unique. Carving clubs and turning clubs experience the same struggles with membership. One thing that carving clubs do to stay alive is to participate in shows. Turning clubs have their symposiums. At these shows, people get to socialize, get to share their work, and get inspired by seeing the work that their friends are actually doing.

On April 26, there will be a Woodworking Showcase held at the Klingspor store in Raleigh. I hope that this show will act as a vehicle for TWA and North Carolina Woodworker members alike to strengthen their bonds with one another, meet new friends and to get inspired to get into their shop and create their next masterpiece.