These are just topics and thoughts that should get your brains churning for the meet on Sunday.

Parts Discounts
1. I have been considering whether I should donate a shelf corporation to the club so that we can try and create vendor accounts to provide club members discounts on aftermarket parts. Eg. Greddy, HKS, etc. This may require a bricks and mortar location to help us but I think I can arrange that too. This would be a significant savings that would justify membership dues.

Dealers
2. How many dealers to involve? Is it better to make agreements with a couple of dealers in the different geographical areas? The Protégé Club for example only works with one dealer primarily.
3. We will create a dealer rating service of all dealers based on member’s first hand experience.

Specialty Shops
4. This is definitely a contentious area since almost all shops have produced unhappy members at some point. Should they all be given a clean slate and an opportunity to offer member’s discounts? Or should the club only endorse a couple of shops based on past experiences? But I don’t think any type of hearsay should be considered in determining worthiness. Only a member’s first hand account should have any bearing on endorsements.

Membership Dues
5. Should we have membership dues? I don’t personally see a reason for dues at the moment but as the club is able to offer more value to members it seems reasonable to have a membership fee to counter administrative costs. So what is a reasonable membership cost?

Attendance
6. We all have busy lives and getting together with conflicting schedules can be difficult but I feel there must be a commitment of some sort. For example mandatory attendance at least 2 events throughout the season to maintain membership.

Code of conduct
7. It goes without saying that members should conduct themselves in a respectful manner but the club will develop a code of conduct so that there are misunderstandings. The code will be most important in situations where a car maybe be wearing a club decal.


Please add to the list as it is clearly not comprehensive and only created to spark conversation.

 

7) organize a campaign to kick the liberals out of office...what?...wrong thread. :D

 

I like those ideas with discounts and such being a big incentive to join a club. Makes individuals feel a little more part of the "elite" as they say. I'll comment on each point.

Parts discounts:
1. Well, as I said above, this is a must for a thing like this (even if my car is currently a lease and I might not get much benefit out of that (until maybe I buy it!)

Dealers:
2. As many as possible! Seriously though, for the GTA, one willing dealer is all that's needed to get things going. Thinking far ahead though from a "growing the club" perspective, I see nicely done pamphlets being available at dealerships accross Ontario OR have it part of the paperwork to give to new 8 owners. This isn't only advertising the club, but makes some owners feel like they bought than more than just a car.....they bought an enthusiasts car (again, the whole "elite" theme).
3. I don't disagree but would keep it to positive comments in regards to this dealer or the other. The reason why I personally don't think negative comments to be productive (although useful as they may be) is that to grow a club such as this, you don't want to alienate anyone as they are ultimately integral to its growth.

Specialty shops:
4. I agree 100% with every word you wrote.

Membership dues:
5. No...and then yes. At first, I think the costs are minimal and us enthusiasts here probably don't mind spending $5 here to get little business cards printed, send emails full of pictures (or whatnot) to members or host a rudimentary website etc... Being small, this isn't a problem but as we grow (hopefully), then yes ($25?) would get you little cards, a decal maybe or subscription to a newletter of some sort reporting on events in the last XX months. There's also the fact that should a fee be needed at one point, definately not appropriate yet as we haven't fully established this whole thing (so in effect, you'd be paying into nothing).

Attendance:
6. I both like and dislike the attendance rule. I agree with it for people that want to be part of the group that "runs" the club as a commitment is DEFINATELY needed. If you can't come to 1 event every 6 months, then maybe you shouldn't be running it! Then again, someone who puts in a lot of effort (say someone who writes the newsletter (should there be one at some point) or some arduous task like that, no problem, they "paid" their dues. The reason why I dislike the idea in general terms is that if we really grow and there's some 8 owner somewhere in Timmins who really can't come to an event very often at all but still loves the car and likes to be part of something, then hey, why not (especially if there's an eventual fee....there's still benefit to being part of the club even if you can't get to events very often).

Code of conduct:
7. This is one of those things that evolve but there should eventually be standard rules for each event especially concerning safety. Common sense is unfortunately not always common and sports cars can be a hazard if someone goes crazy when people are around and things like that. Politically, can't condone speeding and lets face it, that's also a safety issue. (so we start with the simple ones and then evolve as a member does something really stupid we didn't tink about :D

That's my comments for now...I'm really interested in getting involved in something like this....everyone knows I need a hobby! And I love 8's

 

Not sure Mic....lets thing about it a little.

 

I guess writing this stuff while studying for an exam is not a good idea.
Do you have any substantive comments or are you just my personal spell checker? Why don't you thing about it and get back to me.

PS: If you are really bored I have 60 pages of papers that need to be edited and footnoted.

 

What exactly do you know about my age Mic? You know what happens when you assume stuff. Regardless, some comments about what I wrote in the first post would be great.

 

Glad to hear it.

 

Lawyers Spirit, I'm genuinely hoping that you're female, as it seems the sparks continue to fly between you and Mic. (by the way, thanks for getting this club thing going in case none of us have thanked you already!)

Quite looking forward to Sunday, if for no other reason than to observe the dynamic in person.

 

I guess this place is as good as any to post them samples of biz cards...They're huge oh my god...yes, yes they are, this way you can see how they will look like. If you really want to shrink them, save them onto your desktop and resize them to your pleasure. I'll re-post the other ones here in a sec.







It's an RX-8 in the background, but we can always have a montage of the RX-7s there as well. Just a thought.
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Gm Foods

 

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HAWAII DISPENSARY

 

Hellbreed, might as well as post your versions here as well. I'll email you later today so you can print them all, I would love to have a copy to see how they look like in print. Thanks!!!
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Chrysler proving grounds specifications

 

Possibilities of snow now for our meet! I'm depressed

 

If if does rain or snow (really snow!?) perhaps we really should seek out underground garages for a plan B area to hook up.
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NO2 VAPORIZER

 

Yea.. I was just now trying to find a thread saying that if there is rain and cool temps... count me out. Wet plus colder conditions, and a good hour plus drive... well I'll make the next meet.

 

Ya, if I see any kind of snow, I'm not going to risk sliding and getting a fender bender as I already put my summer tires on and I heard they are absolute crap in snow/slippery conditions.

 

As valued as wet sand inside a Speedo.

 

I'm more worried about you putting DVDs in my cd player.

 

Have had computer issues these past few days, just managed to get it up and going a little while ago so that I could print a few copies of the collection. I have 4 from yours and 4 of mine on a page. If you email me anything since the last one I can't get it as my email is crapped out on rogers side. I may be able to get it up and running in the morning if you did send anything new for a print.

See you all tomorrow!

 

Glad to hear that you're computer is back on track. I haven't emailed you anything since the last one I sent during the week, so no worries. See ya there.
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UHWH