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This was in the News Letter but for those who missed.
I announced earlier that I would not run for president again, but now I think I must. Vance and I are friends and I hope we will always be, but we have some differences of opinion. You all know that I have been against opening membership to non BMW owners. This club was founded as a BMW club, and I do not see anything wrong with a brand specific club. I joined a BMW club and with few exceptions I would like to see it stay a BMW club.
We have lost some members in the past few years, but I would like for you to think for a moment about who you see when you go to a club meeting. With a few exceptions all the active participating members that we look forward all month to seeing again are there. I regret our lost members. I think they have missed out on a wonderful thing, but numbers are not what it is about. We do not need more members just for the sake of numbers; we need more participating members.
If I remember right, in the early 1990s when Barbara and I first joined the club, the membership was around 200 give or take a few, and we still had a strong club and a rally but even then our active core group was 30 or40 people, not much different from now. In the early 1990s Carlos Whilhite opened Dixie Sports Plus and started giving a free membership with each new bike sold. When Dixie Sports went out of business and Venture Motor Sports opened in Birmingham, they continued the free memberships. During this period of several years of free memberships our membership grew to almost 500. A few of these people joined the core group and many of the others continued to belong to the club for whatever reason. Let me ask you this did you join this club because it had 500 members or because you came to a meeting or the rally and met the wonderful people and saw how much fun we were having and you wanted to be a part of this great group?
I do not think this club faces imminent demise. I think as the testosterone level evens out the younger crowd will remember this group of old farts and all the fun we have and will migrate back.
You might hear that I have said that I don’t care about those that are not part of the core group; and yes I did say that, and it was a bad choice of words. I care primarily for the core group because they are the ones I see from month to month but I do care for the others because they are missing out on so much and who knows how much we are missing out because we do not know them.
This club has a history of greater good. Over the years we have given much to the Alabama Safety Center, the Alabama Head Injury Foundation, and many other charities. I believe we should and will continue this, because it is the right thing to do.
I, too, am proud of this club and believe we have a great and respected club with a wonderful reputation. Since Barbara and I have been members of this club, we have seen the numbers go up and down, some faces have changed over the years but the core remains a group of people we love and enjoy being with. I do not want to see this club change from the thing that has made it great, a club of fun, loving BMW riders.
I love you all and look forward to being your president for another year. With all of us working together we will work this out because that is what a family does; and this is my BMW family.
I announced earlier that I would not run for president again, but now I think I must. Vance and I are friends and I hope we will always be, but we have some differences of opinion. You all know that I have been against opening membership to non BMW owners. This club was founded as a BMW club, and I do not see anything wrong with a brand specific club. I joined a BMW club and with few exceptions I would like to see it stay a BMW club.
We have lost some members in the past few years, but I would like for you to think for a moment about who you see when you go to a club meeting. With a few exceptions all the active participating members that we look forward all month to seeing again are there. I regret our lost members. I think they have missed out on a wonderful thing, but numbers are not what it is about. We do not need more members just for the sake of numbers; we need more participating members.
If I remember right, in the early 1990s when Barbara and I first joined the club, the membership was around 200 give or take a few, and we still had a strong club and a rally but even then our active core group was 30 or40 people, not much different from now. In the early 1990s Carlos Whilhite opened Dixie Sports Plus and started giving a free membership with each new bike sold. When Dixie Sports went out of business and Venture Motor Sports opened in Birmingham, they continued the free memberships. During this period of several years of free memberships our membership grew to almost 500. A few of these people joined the core group and many of the others continued to belong to the club for whatever reason. Let me ask you this did you join this club because it had 500 members or because you came to a meeting or the rally and met the wonderful people and saw how much fun we were having and you wanted to be a part of this great group?
I do not think this club faces imminent demise. I think as the testosterone level evens out the younger crowd will remember this group of old farts and all the fun we have and will migrate back.
You might hear that I have said that I don’t care about those that are not part of the core group; and yes I did say that, and it was a bad choice of words. I care primarily for the core group because they are the ones I see from month to month but I do care for the others because they are missing out on so much and who knows how much we are missing out because we do not know them.
This club has a history of greater good. Over the years we have given much to the Alabama Safety Center, the Alabama Head Injury Foundation, and many other charities. I believe we should and will continue this, because it is the right thing to do.
I, too, am proud of this club and believe we have a great and respected club with a wonderful reputation. Since Barbara and I have been members of this club, we have seen the numbers go up and down, some faces have changed over the years but the core remains a group of people we love and enjoy being with. I do not want to see this club change from the thing that has made it great, a club of fun, loving BMW riders.
I love you all and look forward to being your president for another year. With all of us working together we will work this out because that is what a family does; and this is my BMW family.