BlueGrimRX8

Alright everyone, I want to give everyone in FL credit for the organization of the upcoming Orlando Meet. It is going to be one of the best meets I have ever attended and I have attended many with the club I belonged to when I owned the cougar, if you would like to check out the organization that we have go HERE or ask Pinhy about it he was a member as well.

With that said and also with the many prizes and the amount of money we are getting donated to our FIRST EVER MEET! I think we need to think about a little more organization. Back when we first started the FL part of the cougar club with 5 people we all sat down and decided that we needed and executive board to help organize and handle all of the money, meets, sponsors, and donations. We ended up electing "officers" (President, Treasurer, and Media/Sponsor consultant) I was the Treasurer) This is needed so we don't have 3 people calling the same place asking for the same things. I think that we have some very responsible people in this club to handle things like this. I know that this is the SE forum and I would like to contact the Admin of this board and maybe get a FL section, we did this in the Cougar club and it turned out GREAT!
I just want to throw out these ideas to everyone to see what type of response I get, and see if people would be interested in something like this. And I think after the meet is a good idea to start something up like this, this way people have a chance to meet most of the people that will be involved in the club a great deal. At first glance I would like to suggest a couple people for the positions, I think its obvious that Razpewton is skilled and involved enough to be the Media/Sponsor Consultant, I would be interested in President or Treasurer, and Pinhy would also be interested in a position. Both me and Raz are in Jax so that helps, and I am good friends with Pinhy so communication would not be a problem. Now I know that none of you guys know us personally yet, thats why I wanted to suggest this before the meet so we could meet some of the people while we are at the meet to see if this is a good idea. If there are others that think this is a good idea and would be interested in a Position and want that to be voiced so that we can all meet you at the Orlando meet, then speak up.

Here are some of the things that we followed in finding a President of the RX-8 Club:
The President must:
- currently own and plan on keeping an RX-8 throughout his/her term
- discuss and coordinate monthly meets with members in different cities
- attend the majority of meets
- participate on the message boards regularly
- assume rx8club.com moderator responsibilities for the FL forums
- not engage in any disputes openly on the forums or at meets, all disagreements should be handled privately and maturely
- not engage in any illegal activities
- promote club unity at all times
- mediate disputes between members
- coordinate special events
- have at least one Rx8club.com decal on their vehicle
- attempt to recruit new members
- reply to emails and club inquiries
- be capable of fulfilling all these responsibilities for at least one year

Treasurer
-handle all donations and the club account
-provide the club with a detailed financial statement each month with the account number blacked out
-coordinate with the president and sponsor consultant to verify all transactions and prize giveaways
-be able to financially handle larger transactions (i.e. purchase of shirts before they are sold, similar to the way Raz handled the shirt transaction)
-be able to represent the club professionally with sponsors

Media/Sponsor Consultant
-Handle all transactions between the club and sponsors
-Create, design and update the club site Mazdanow.com

Again this is just an idea that I wanted to throw out to the club to see if there is interest. It is only my experience from a club that was very organized and had many sponsors over the 4 years I was a part of it, and I want to see this club grow in the same way that one did!

Sorry for the length of this post but I wanted to get this idea out before the meet.

Responses are needed, voice your opinion!!!!!

tgray_n_tbay

Sounds like a plan. Looking forward to meeting yuz in Orlando.

guy321

What position can you create for me. I want to be responsible for lazyness, goofing off, and procrastination.

ttrx7pete

you know, there already is the MRCCFL... which is well organized.

Potent

I do agree that maybe we need to designate a few people to take charge of event coordinations. However I think a PRESIDENT might be a bit much. A better plan might be to just appoint 4-5 coordinators that take care of that kind of stuff as a unity. Thats how we pretty much did this meet and it seemed to work out very well. The pressure of being a president tends to be too much on some people. If we just appointed like 5 people that all enjoy taking part in meets and helping organize them, then we also have the luxury of not having all of it on one person. This is a club, and I for one love taking part in it. To appoint a president might make some feel left behind. Well its just my opinion but I think an event staff would be a better idea. (If we go that route I want in!!)

Thanks,
Will
(potent)

BlueGrimRX8

Great suggestion Potent I agree with that idea too, thats why I wanted to get the idea out there, maybe appointing a board per say would be a bit much, and vent coordination would be a better idea. We will need to appoint someone to handle the funds for this reason though:

I am recieving a check from my dealership for $300 this is to sponsor the club, not just this one event, so what I had in mind for this is to take $100 of that and give it to Raz for the shirts, this will bring the price of the shirts down to $5, then take $100 of it and purchase couple door prizes ( to be announced soon) for this meet, and then take the last $100 of it and create an account for the club to have some funds for the next big meet.

Now the $5 for the shirts includes $4 to pay back Raz for his purchase and $1 to go towards the club account. This way if we decide to have a big meet later in the year we will have some funds to work off of for shirts, tents, banners, etc...

Please let me know if you believe this is a good idea, if you want to just have event coordinators then I will gladly handle the funds for the club, if you would like to check my credibility, please go to the FL Cougar club via the link above in my first post and ask anyone there, or check out the transaction feedback section of the same site, or you can check my ebay history(user name: jcgrim) or feel free to give me a call at 386-344-0675. Each time we have a large meet we can do a little thing like the shirts to help raise a little money for the next meet. I will be glad to provide financial statments as often as you want. We are not talking $1000's of dollars here just a few hundred if that.....What do you think.
Sorry asking for all the opinions but I think it is the only fair way, to be open and honest with everyone, becuase it is our money and our club!

guy321

We need a President, who will declare war on Iraq to secure fuel for our 8's?

Morgan

hey now...don't be giving everybody in FL credit for it...it was MY idea lol!!! I organized it ding dong...of course, i had a lot of help from 3 or 4 people...I do like your idea though.

epitrochoid

Sounds like a great plan!

Why not just open it up to the entire SE Region, then we could get some huge meets!

BlueGrimRX8

Being that the SE is so big and the majority of people would not make it to meets down in FLorida it would be very hard to organize something like this for the entire region. Especially since the majority of donations are coming from Florida dealerships...

Driven it definitly was your idea and you deserve the credit for that and everyone in FL deserves the credit for getting all the donations and sponsors.

Agent of Chaos

Good suggestion Grimm and nice feedback so far.
Seeing how well this coming meet has been rounded up, I think adding that much more organization to future meets will put FL on the Map for RX-8 clubs.
Potent may be onto something too. If we just want to do this organization for future meets, it would be good to have a committee instead of a full fledge governmental hierarchy.
I would suggest a small core group and then as meets are requested or suggested through the message boards and/or e-mail. That small group would then start to recruit volunteers to help with the planning and preparation.....
You know as I'm writing this, it's sounding more like what happened with the upcoming Orlando meet.
But as always things can be improved upon. Taking Grims suggestion of a group treasury would help with future financial investments that need to be made (such as reserving a park or parking lot). Also that would help with acquiring future door prizes and souvenirs.

Anyway...pardon my ramblings...
This idea sounds like it can be a good for all. After this meet we need to see what we can get rolling with it and start planning our next meet that will be bigger and better....

Laterz,
Gary

Potent

I completely agree that one person should handle the funds as you suggested just to avoid potential problems. Since you seem to have experience in this I don't see why anyone would have a problem with appointing you the title. As far as the rest of the "event staff" would go, anyone who shows interest would need to really take ownership and have solid suggestions on a consistent basis. Razpewton has been a blessing though this Orlando meet with keep everyone on the same page and would definately like to see him on the staff for future events. I personally am interested in planning meets and I have no problem going the extra mile to try and get things to work out for the better of the club.
<quote>
hey now...don't be giving everybody in FL credit for it...it was MY idea lol!!! I organized it ding dong...of course, i had a lot of help from 3 or 4 people...I do like your idea though.
</quote>
Morgan I wasn't trying to NOT give you credit for the meet but in actuality the only thing that is still your idea is the date. Everyones input molded this meet into what it is. The club deserves credit for this meet not one person. (no offense)

Im game for whatever happens with future meets and plan on attending most of, if not all of them.

Will
(potent)

Razpewton

I agree with everyone, whereas I feel the need to organize and desire to belong to something I'm really interested in. I'm still sorting through all our options pertaining to whether or not we join an existing organization or form one of our own, but concur that an event staff or BOD would be sufficient, at least interim.

I suggest we all have a discussion after we've had lunch on the 24th and have had time to ponder everything. Right now my focus is on that event and all the fun I plan on having.

I certainly understand BlueGrims concern about an account as this event has generated additional funds. I personally don't like possessing money that technically doesn't belong to me, and would much rather have an entitity or ambassador of accountment to which I can turn over any excess funds. Fortunately, at this point in time, we are talking relatively insignificant sums.

Even though I have yet to meet him, I trust him implicitely and have no reservations about his honor or integrity. With this in mind, I suggest we appoint BlueGrim (James something) to oversee and monitor any financial dealings until such a time we can duly elect members to hold certain positions of responsibility, at which time I will nominate him as Treasurer (this is how IBM started). After I pay Mrs. Visa back for the shirts, I will turn over any additional funds (about $60 or thereabouts) to James [something], to be held in reserve until out next function.

All in favor say "Goony Goo Goo"

Those Opposed, declared your articles of Opposition and go to your room.:D

Razpewton

You guys are confusing me....I had to transplant this post from one thread to the other. :D :D

But I agree with everyone....

English

I'm more worried about the weather this weekend than what is gonna happen a couple of months from now.....with that in mind....anyone know what the weather will be in O-town this weekend???

Pinhy

i think we all just need to think about what we want out of this organization, and how it would benefit everyone to grow into something that is bigger than just a couple threads within a SE Forum folder.

We can start talking about it Sat and then we can use the week after to get everything settled. With May 1 being the start day for whatever we decide.

I do like the idea of forming a FL RX8 chapter all to itself though. Maybe we could call it "New Edge Mazda Owners" or NEMO for short!! hahaha

BlueGrimRX8

The reason for the post is that it has been discussed between myself, Pinhy, Agent of Chaos and Raz during many phone conversations. That this club has the potential to grow into something very large, and the biggest thing is keeping the sponsors happy, that means keeping them in the loop inviting them, giving them recognition and then thanking them when the event is over. There is a lot more to think about when you start bringing in people with money and prizes to donate, becuase it only takes one time to screw something up and then you will be left with no sponsors. And I know we all want to avoid that. Becuase it seems that there is a lot of interest in this club by MANY sponsors.

I just wanted to have the idea out there for people to think about over the weekend as we are having and AWESOME time at the meet. I don't want this to be something that hinders the meet in any way, just wanted the idea to be out there. Then we can discuss it more when we all return from the weekend after seeing how great a meet and how well organized it is.

James

Oh yeah, Pinhy, I think we need to think about NEMO, although I am sure the females of the club would like that name. LOL

JerryLH3

I find it odd that this comment went ignored.

I guess this is a good place to ask why the RX-8 community hasn't seemed to take an interest in the already established Mazda Rotary Car Club of Florida? The members of our group own all types of rotary powered cars - RX-2s, RX-3s, RX-4s, Cosmos, all generations of RX-7s and even a REPU. And I'm sure one of our members has an R100 they're not telling us about.

We've had a few RX-8 owners join the club recently, but I've yet to see that many new rotary owners intermingle with the older rotary owners. Do you feel our community does not serve your purpose? Is there something we should be doing to try to attract you to our club? Is part of the problem that many RX-8 owners don't know of the vast 30+ years of rotary history before the RX-8?

This post mostly comes out of slight frustration I've dealt with during events in the past few months. I've posted about our Tampa area meets and nobody came. No RX-8 owners were present at the Rotary only autocross. However, I believe the turnout (RX-8 turnout) at our event in South Florida was good in January for the SpeedSource tour and BBQ.

Don't let this be a knock on your endeavors. I'm always glad to see people getting together and having a good time. I'm just searching for answers as to why MRCCFL hasn't flourished in the wake of the reintroduction of the rotary in North America.

Morgan

hmm..i don't care what goes down as long as it doesn't inhibit me doing more meets...i dont really want to have to run it by a prez. or anything like that...just my 2 cents..

Agent of Chaos

JerryLH3,

Please don't take offense, as these are my reasons for not pursuing the MRCCFL as of yet.
First being when looking through the web site, the information is interesting but not all too current. I.E. the calendar lacks years for calendar events except for one which is 2003. What this tells me is that these are all last year’s event, even though that may not be the case. The one link on the calendar takes me to a 403 error message, which is off putting right there.
Being that I'm a recent RX8 owner, I've just started looking at the boards and events. So the most recent events were before I purchased the 8 and was introduced to the boards. The events that are in not too distant future are on the West coast of Florida and I'm on the Northeast coast. A little long distance for a quick day trip and it's hard to plan an extended weekend trip right now.
I have seen a couple posts on the boards about recent BBQs and such, but I would expect those to also be listed on the website if they were sanctioned events.
As I said, I'm a recent owner, so joining a group with annual membership dues is a little "overwhelming" (for lack of a better word) considering the above personal observances I've listed above.
It's not that I refuse to join or acknowledge the MRCCFL, it's just I don't have enough information and the web site isn't providing that extra information. Again, I'm a recent owner, so I haven't had the time to do that further research into it yet.
** That yet does mean that I have intentions to further research into the MRCCFL as I settle further into the seats of my RX-8.**
Again this is my personal opinion, and why I personally haven't responded to the calls for RX8 representation.

PS. sorry if anyone considers this thread-jacking.

Rotor4Play

1st. let me say I was very happy with the turn out at the Orlando get together. I personally thinks it's great to see you guys trying to organize the RX-8 community. We (the MRCCFL) have been trying to do just that for several years. Florida being such a large area (for perspective the entire state of New Jersey is smaller than Marion county (Ocala area) of Florida) so it's not easy to have a large group get together on a regular basis (monthly ?) We have regions but even that is a vast area to cover. We are open to new mwmbers as well as ideas to make this work. We orignally started out as an RX-7 club only but felt this left out so much of the rotory community. That is why we decided to go with the MAZDA ROTORY Car Club of FLA instead. Just try and keep up with all the activity of the Rotory community There are web sites for every RX and generation so we agree a central area of information on events is a must to have a good turn out. There were allot of people that would have been at the Orlando meet if they had know about it (scary since the turnout was nice) . Lets keep bouncing the idaes around as I would love to see Fla have a good representation of the ROTARY community. MRCCFL has never limited it's get togethers to members only and has provided some really nice perks for those that spent money for the dues. I personely have been to Two sebrings (free) and one Rolex event that the dues have more than been compensated. Just my $.02 Jack Charter Member MRCCFL

Morgan

I still don't care as long as I can coordinate events still....

epitrochoid

yeah, there's really no reason we shouldnt just join in with MRCCFL. they're pretty established and have similar goals.

Rotor4Play

There's people in these area's with things going on. I've been to 3 or 4 BBQ's in the Jax and G'ville area and even one of the Tampa weekly meets and have until now only met 2 RX8 owners. Be active in your area and the big meets will be great when the regions start competing to see who has the most people from there area.................possibilities are endless. Jack

greese

I found it odd this went ignored too. I would like to be involved with the MRCCFL but i found the website a little out of date and it didn't seem to have much info there. Maybe I just wasn't looking hard enough. I would have loved to have gone to the Tampa meet you had but I found out about it the day after it happened. I'm all for it, just point me in the right direction.

greese