2008 AGM Minutes

[Purple AK]

Minutes of AGM at Stoneleigh


4th May 2008

Those Present: -

John Cooke
Tony Merrick
Peter Jones
Marion Jones
Russell Derbyshire
Julie Butteriss
James Norris
Chris Barnes

Apologies for absence were received from:-
Glen Pullen & Rob Stanley

Meeting opened at 14:05


John Cooke officially stood down as Chairman and handed the meeting over to Tony Merrick as the new Chairman. Tony thanked John for his work with the Club over the past years and opened the meeting, thanking everyone for their attendance.


Accounts.

Russell Derbyshire gave an overview of the Club Accounts for 2007

This showed,
The Total Income for 2007 was £24548. This was down by 23% (£7140) on 2006. This was solely due to a 30% (£8244) reduction in membership fees. Advertising income was up 26% (£1228) directly proportionate to 5 magazines being produced in 2007 against 4 in 2006. Other sources of income, Merchandise, Magazines, Events and Bank Interest, were marginally down, But only by £120 overall.

Total Expenditure for 2007 was £31541. This was 17% (£6280) down on 2006. Mainly due to there being only 5 magazines in 2007 against 4 magazines and 2 calendars in 2006 with a subsequent reduction in printing and postage costs of £5817, and a £1007 reduction in Show Expenses. Most other expenses were static or slightly reduced apart from a £1591 spend on new Merchandise.

The Profit and Loss Summery for 2007 showed a loss of £6993 against a loss of £6138 for 2006.

The Reserves Balance for 2007 showed the opening balance for the Current Account as £2333.57 and the High Interest Account as £5765.97. The closing balances were £635.24 and £415.96 respectively. This gave a total reserve remaining of £1051.20. A reduction of £7048.34
Russell Highlighted that there was Zero flexibility for overspend in 2008. And Tony promised the Floor that there would be No overspend at all in 2008 as the Committee had already agreed to print a maximum of 4 magazines, or less in 2008, as funds provided. It was also noted that the number of copies printed would be reduced inline with the membership numbers at the time of issue in order to save costs.

Questions were raised from the Floor as to ways of increasing Membership/Income.

It was suggested that it is still not easy for people to join, and that the link on the Website needed to clearer.
It was suggested that members be offered the option of setting up a Direct Debit/Standing Order for renewal as some tend to forget.
It was suggested that the Website be owned by the Club and that some areas of it be restricted to Members only as at present there is no incentive for people to join the Club as all the information is there for all to see. Tony agreed to talk to Robert to see if it was possible, and how much it would cost.
It was suggested that Back Issues of the Magazine be uploaded onto the website so that prospective members could see what they were likely to get by joining.
The Accounts were accepted with No objections.

Tony introduced Julie Butteriss, Chris Barnes, Rob Stanley and James Norris as new Committee Members.

James apologized to the Floor for failing to organize the Rolling Road at the Show, but Health and Safety and Noise Abatement issues had not allowed it to happen. It was agreed the Show Organizers should be contacted to ask why Westfield were still allowed their Slalom Course, whilst we were refused.
John Cooke offered the Club the opportunity to stage a Rolling Road event at his new Peterborough Show.

Voting was started for the committee members who had elected to stand: -
Tony Merrick was voted in as Chairman
Russell Derbyshire was voted in as Treasurer
Peter Jones was voted in as Magazine Editor
Marion Jones was voted in as Membership Secretary
Glen Pullen was voted in as Magazine Distribution
Chris Barnes was voted in as Club Secretary/Area Rep Liaison
Robert Stanley was voted in as Webmaster
Julie Butteriss was voted in as Regalia Buyer
James Norris was voted in as Events Coordinator

It was agreed that as Membership Fees should be increased to £28 as of, 01st July 2008.

Chris noted that 56 Proxy Voting Forms had been returned. 55 “For”, 0 “Against” and 1 spoiled paper. Therefore, all Resolutions were carried unanimously.


Any Other Business: -

It was agreed that Area Reps should be asked to promote the Club as far as possible in order to try and boost membership. Tony said that non members should be included in events and encouraged to participate as possibly they may wish to join or rejoin the club..
It was decided that the Club needs to find an Area Rep for Wales.

Meeting closed at 15:05

[andicole0]

Thanks for that Chris, very interesting.

Andi.

[magnum]

Crickey. Unless I'm overlooking some good news here, it looks like there's a situation that needs to be addressed, otherwise there's a bit of fiscal hemoraging going on! What is the membership currently standing at? Is this a precidented problem, is there usually a 30% reduction in membership fees and does this rebuild itself rapidly during the show season?

Renewals were being chased in the last issue of ST, what has been achieved? What's the 'critical mass'?

I hope I'm worrying unnecessarily, but if this was soley a commercial operation, it wouldn't look sustainable... Please can someone point out the good bit?!

[Dixie]

I live in Shepton Mallet which is mid Somerset and between several club area's.

I have been to the Sherbourne Classic car show with the South West guys, had a good time, but sadly the monthly meets at the Ley arms in Exeter is too far to attend, and I regularly get E-mails telling me what is going on, but more importantly it is put on the Forum for all to see.

I went to Wells today shopping, to my surprise there were 8 very nice Cobra's in the market place, apparently the Bristol group had organised a run out to Wells and back through Cheddar. Now Wells is 4 miles from at least 2 Cobra's, mine and JamieM's, but we knew nothing about any run or meet. It seems that unless you are lucky enough to be on the private E-Mail list for a select number of favoured people, you don't get to hear about what is happening, to be fair to the area rep, he has E-mailed before to invite me to the show at Wroughton, but sadly not this time. Now for those who will say "Why don't you organise something" I have tried exactly that on more than one occasion, but because the people in this area do not use the club forum they do not see what others have tried to organise.

Makes me want to organise a "Splinter" group, but that will not do anyone any good, plus will not help potential new comers and new members. If there are going to be difined area's, should the area Reps use this Forum to let others know what is happening within the Club, after all the site is there for all to see and use. I cannot believe that this area is the only one suffering from this.

I am fortunate to have the South West group not a million miles away, so if all else fails I am usually informed of what is happening there.

Just the ramblings of a slighly upset individual.

[TINKA]

At the end of the day it is up to each rep to run their area how they see fit and you to ask if you want to be kept informed of what is going on, you cant expect the reps to chase everyone just incase they are interested in one particular meet when otherwise they never hear anything from them, as well as that all the contact info is in Snake Torque.

I can only speak for how the East Midlands Area is run but I am sure other people run their areas in the same way, but we have a mailing list of people who are interested in what we are doing, people only have to ask to be put on it, before you ask everyone is blind copied so no one can see anyone else on the list. We also mail out the monthly news letter for those without an internet connection, because half the people who attend our meet do not go on this site.

[stu e]

With next years membership fees going up, what can we expect to get for our money in 09?
Having been a member for several years, i have gone from 6 copies of Snake Torque to probably 4 this year.
Just weighing up whether or not to re-join next year.
Stu

[Purple AK]

Originally Posted by stu e

With next years membership fees going up, what can we expect to get for our money in 09?
Having been a member for several years, i have gone from 6 copies of Snake Torque to probably 4 this year.
Just weighing up whether or not to re-join next year.
Stu

Hi Stu. And please don't take this personally But yours and other peoples thinking is exactly why there is only the money for 4 issues of Snake Torque this year! The Club has used up a surplus of £20k in the previous two years giving you 6 issues. The more people who decide not to rejoin will only make things worse Stick with it

[Purple AK]

Originally Posted by Dixie

I live in Shepton Mallet which is mid Somerset and between several club area's.

I have been to the Sherbourne Classic car show with the South West guys, had a good time, but sadly the monthly meets at the Ley arms in Exeter is too far to attend, and I regularly get E-mails telling me what is going on, but more importantly it is put on the Forum for all to see.

I went to Wells today shopping, to my surprise there were 8 very nice Cobra's in the market place, apparently the Bristol group had organised a run out to Wells and back through Cheddar. Now Wells is 4 miles from at least 2 Cobra's, mine and JamieM's, but we knew nothing about any run or meet. It seems that unless you are lucky enough to be on the private E-Mail list for a select number of favoured people, you don't get to hear about what is happening, to be fair to the area rep, he has E-mailed before to invite me to the show at Wroughton, but sadly not this time. Now for those who will say "Why don't you organise something" I have tried exactly that on more than one occasion, but because the people in this area do not use the club forum they do not see what others have tried to organise.

Makes me want to organise a "Splinter" group, but that will not do anyone any good, plus will not help potential new comers and new members. If there are going to be difined area's, should the area Reps use this Forum to let others know what is happening within the Club, after all the site is there for all to see and use. I cannot believe that this area is the only one suffering from this.

I am fortunate to have the South West group not a million miles away, so if all else fails I am usually informed of what is happening there.

Just the ramblings of a slighly upset individual.

Hi Dixie. Sorry you missed an event. Your not alone believe me! I missed an event a few weeks ago for exactly the same reason. Please see an email I sent to every Area Rep on 25th August
"Hi Guys.
I'm sure most of you are aware that Rob has added an "Events" listing to the home page of the Website. This links with entries in the calendar so keeps any Meets or Shows in peoples minds. Can I ask you to add your local meets and any local events to the calendar. It might just encourage a few more people along if they can see whats on offer in their area, and it will remind the forgetful ones.
Thanks and Regards
Chris"
Short of ringing them all once a week! What more can I do?
Regards Chris

[stu e]

Originally Posted by Purple AK

Hi Stu. And please don't take this personally But yours and other peoples thinking is exactly why there is only the money for 4 issues of Snake Torque this year! The Club has used up a surplus of £20k in the previous two years giving you 6 issues. The more people who decide not to rejoin will only make things worse Stick with it

Hi Chris
I'm certainly not taking it personally. I'd just like to know what i'm likely to get next year.
I first joined this club some 14 years ago, and we had 6 copies of ST the insurance discount,windscreen sticker. I parked the car up for a few years and then rejoined mid year and was told at the time, my membership would run from then, after a year or so it changed to having to renew in January, so i lost 6 months there.
I appreciate that the fewer the members the higher the cost of ST per copy, but is there a mountain of old copies somewhere?
Stu

[Dixie]

It seems that my area rep did send out an E-mail about this run to Wells, others in the area did recieve it, but not me although it was at a time when I was setting up a wireless router for my new conservatory, so it may have been lost.

Why would it be so difficult for the reps to put what is happening on the Forum, it would also help those who are not in the club yet and those looking to purchase a Cobra. I know that when I brought my Viper I used this site as a valuable source of information, no one knew me, I didn't know anyone, so I would not have been on anyones favourite list!! so couldn't have possibly known what was happening outside the Forum.

My case in point.

Mark