Fencing.Net - Your Guide to Fencing & Fencing Equipment

MyrddinsPrecint · 06-30-2008, 06:42 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Cardinalred

In having no member dues, we're always looking for ways of bringing in much needed money. The other side of the coin however, is that any tournament we compete in, each competing member pays for our of their own pockets. Most entry fees are a manageable $15-$30 range, and we carpool to events to help spread the cost of gas fairly and keep those costs down as well. Am I reading right that other clubs are paying such things from club funds?

Many colleges teams don't go to USFA events, don't go to many, or see it as an optional excursion outside of the normal season. The tournaments that the teams are paying for are usually college only events, and often these involve one lump sum for the team rather than per individual.

Here's what I learned as a college club president and vice president, and someone who talked to lots of other schools about their financial state:

Charge dues. Charge a LOT for dues. Smith used to charge $50 a year. We hiked it to $100 while I was there. That's only HALF of what UMass was charging. Fencing costs money, and if you're not at a college, it costs more than $25 a year. You get what you pay for.

A friend at a public university challenged me on this one-- he swore that he couldn't expect people to pay that much money and keep the group the size it was. I explained to him that given generous financial aid, we had just as many people who couldn't afford dues at Smith as he did at his state school.

The secret? You don't charge everyone the same amount necessarily. You compromise. You might get 4 $25 checks at various points over the entire year. You might have the person only give you half of the total dues amount, but be the fundraising chair. What you will get (sometimes) is little miss rich princess give you the money straight up when asked, and then stop showing up two weeks later. You wouldn't have gotten it if you didn't ask.

Cardinalred · 07-01-2008, 12:41 AM

I dunno guy, I mean I personally as a club officer will simply vote down any measure to start charging dues now. The fact that we don't have them is a selling point, and so far it's been our most successful. It's not that I don't see where you're coming from, and I hope you don't take me as bashing your idea...it's just not one that, as a club, we're prepared to do.

egillette · 07-01-2008, 01:07 AM

I'm not sure how you'd run a college club without charging some sort of dues. My club (we're a big, state university, admittedly) has a pretty sweet deal when it comes to yearly equipment purchases, because we've learned to play our student council's games.
Safety and name recognition are always good selling points with regards to the student governing bodies, but often I find its good to offer safety as an incentive to paying dues also. Tell all your new kids, all of this equipment is expensive, and we need to be able to replace anything that breaks quickly, so nobody gets hurt and nobody has to sit around during practice because we're short safe gear. That being said, we also offer a little incentive to our members, both to pay up, and to take care of club equipment: any dues remaining at the end of the year will go towards everyone's team entry fees in our last big event of the season. Other than that end of the year event, folks are responsible for their own entry fees, and we carpool and split gas, etc.

MyrddinsPrecint · 07-01-2008, 06:54 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Cardinalred

I dunno guy, I mean I personally as a club officer will simply vote down any measure to start charging dues now. The fact that we don't have them is a selling point, and so far it's been our most successful. It's not that I don't see where you're coming from, and I hope you don't take me as bashing your idea...it's just not one that, as a club, we're prepared to do.

Let me be very specific as to where I'm coming from-- I'm coming from a fiscally responsible club (well... I mean... mostly) who can pay a full time coach, who can pay for transportation to and from tournaments, who can pay for tournaments, and who can get more gear when what we have breaks.

The club teams that don't collect dues can't do all of these things, unless they're getting a lot of money elsewhere.

IF you're not charging dues, but are charging other things, you're charging dues, you're just hiding them.

Cardinalred · 07-01-2008, 09:48 AM

We bring in enough to maintain the club's equipment from what we make with the beginner's class. As for our own personal gear that we use for tournaments, as well as transportation to tournaments and entry fees and whatnot, those are all out of our own pockets and not out of club funds. That has been what we found to be a fair way of handling such costs. Again, our club is pretty much one in which "Hey, you like to fence? Me too. We'll meet here each week and fence!" and the University gives us the place to do it on the condition that we open it up to the community...which we're happy to do because, well, we're dorks and we like to share our dorkdom with anyone that'll stand still long enough and let us jabber on about fencing. The going to tournaments and the competitive side of our club is all...how to say it...extra curricular if you will, and on our own dime. If you wish to look at that as hidden or an alternative to dues, then that's fair enough.

MyrddinsPrecint · 07-01-2008, 10:30 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Cardinalred

We bring in enough to maintain the club's equipment from what we make with the beginner's class. As for our own personal gear that we use for tournaments, as well as transportation to tournaments and entry fees and whatnot, those are all out of our own pockets and not out of club funds. That has been what we found to be a fair way of handling such costs. Again, our club is pretty much one in which "Hey, you like to fence? Me too. We'll meet here each week and fence!" and the University gives us the place to do it on the condition that we open it up to the community...which we're happy to do because, well, we're dorks and we like to share our dorkdom with anyone that'll stand still long enough and let us jabber on about fencing. The going to tournaments and the competitive side of our club is all...how to say it...extra curricular if you will, and on our own dime. If you wish to look at that as hidden or an alternative to dues, then that's fair enough.

The other question I would then ask is what happens if someone would like to fence but doesn't have a lot of money?

Under Smith's system, we can help those individuals out. Is there a way for those without a whole lot of money to be competitive in your club?

Cardinalred · 07-01-2008, 03:54 PM

If a club member wishes to compete with us and doesn't have the necessary financial means with which to purchase the equipment, then the rest of the club will help out where we're able. The club has sets of electric equipment including weapons and lame's that're all maintained and available to use. As for anything else, we regular members usually have enough to where if needed, someone's welcome to borrow some of our own gear. In short: If someone wishes to compete with us and doesn't have the means of doing so on their own, we find a way to make it happen for them even if some of us regular members are paying a bit out of pocket. Again, if you wish to view that as a substitute for dues then that's fair.

Also, we're not a college TEAM...at least, not in the NCAA sense. We are in fact working on becoming a USFA club, however.

Still, bringing in a little more money than we're getting right now would be nice to ease in helping out. That's all I'm trying to find here, are some ideas to increase income.

Wafath · 07-01-2008, 04:41 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Cardinalred

Still, bringing in a little more money than we're getting right now would be nice to ease in helping out. That's all I'm trying to find here, are some ideas to increase income.

A few comments:

I have heard of successful programs using many schemes for funding: Dues, class fees, SGA, per-event fee, fund-raisers, hosting, etc. Most programs that do a lot of competitions use a broad spectrum, and get a little bit from each. Most programs that stay cohesive find a balance of the above that works for their culture.

I suspect you could add *some* dues to your costs without really dropping membership. We tend to ask for dues a month into the semester because that is what our club is comfortable with. MP has a different culture.

As far as fund-raisers, ask around campus. There are constantly groups looking for 10-20 warm bodies to hand out things at events or put up fliers. But ask your club first if they are willing to commit to something like that. Some of your members would rather pay $100 in dues than loose a few hours on a few weekends.

People whine about spending money, but you will find that if it is something they want to do, they will spend it.

W

MyrddinsPrecint · 07-01-2008, 08:47 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Cardinalred

Also, we're not a college TEAM...at least, not in the NCAA sense. We are in fact working on becoming a USFA club, however.

Just about all of the college teams who have to find a way to get money for their team are not NCAA teams. NCAA teams may fundraise-- either for themselves or a cause-- but they don't have to make it a major concern (at least not in any situation that I'm aware of).

We usually call ourselves "club teams"..... because we're still teams....

Cardinalred · 07-02-2008, 12:09 AM

I'm merely distinguishing that we are not an NCAA team. We're a team for sure, but we're not a member of NCAA Big East Fencing.

Wafath · 07-02-2008, 10:22 AM

The only NCAA conference that has fencing is Ivy League. There are a number of fencing conferences throughout the country, most of them have a mixture of club & varsity teams. See: http://www.fencing.net/wiki/US_Inter...ng_Conferences for the best current collection of info on this.

W

Delta · 07-02-2008, 01:25 PM

I was just going to add/support playing the student government/council/whatever you have on campus.
Many times, because fencing is a somewhat "obscure" sport in certain areas of the country, you could play the "oh, we're educating people about a sport with a long history, building community, contributions to the greater good" etc. etc. etc. In order to get the head-start, going to elementary schools, local community centers and doing demos, explaining the history, letting people play glove tag, wacky wackers can build the foundation of the two prong attack. 1) building community service 2) starting your own club!

Often times schools have a burearcracy where they split their budget into groups. The more versatile and various your approach and showing off the benefits of your club (not just for your own members), the more likely you'll be able to get at least one grant, if not two or more.

Cardinalred · 07-02-2008, 10:27 PM

Big East has fencing as we've looked into it before...

MyrddinsPrecint · 07-03-2008, 01:20 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Cardinalred

Big East has fencing as we've looked into it before...

You're missing the distinction.

There are lots of Big East schools with fencing, but when the fencing schedule gets made, they don't set up the schedule the same way Basketball or Football do.

Now that I'm looking at it...... There actually aren't many fencing schools in the Big East anyway...... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_East_Conference

Notre Dame. Rutgers is now club.... anywhere I'm missing??

Cardinalred · 07-03-2008, 06:41 PM

Syracuse and WVU both HAD fencing. To be honest, I'm not sure if they still do have competitive teams or if they're just collegiate clubs now like ours. (again, by teams I'm referring to in the NCAA sense of the word)

MyrddinsPrecint · 07-04-2008, 09:53 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Cardinalred

Syracuse and WVU both HAD fencing. To be honest, I'm not sure if they still do have competitive teams or if they're just collegiate clubs now like ours. (again, by teams I'm referring to in the NCAA sense of the word)

Syracuse -the town- has fencing. The USFA has a club listed for WVU, but they don't have a website, and they don't go to USACFCs.

Cardinalred · 07-04-2008, 10:24 AM

Now that we've ridden that detour to the end, let's get back on the topic of how else to bring in income...Whether Big East has NCAA fencing or not isn't relevant as either way, we're not a part of it and have only fenced with one other Big East school. (We actually have quite a good relationship with the Bearcats too, I feel)

MyrddinsPrecint · 07-04-2008, 11:35 PM

A risque calander isn't a good fundraiser.

Well run USFA tournaments can be, but aren't always.