Region dues

[tnord]

And paying that hurts me quite a bit each year. Oh well.

agreed. i let it all lapse this year. even if i come back for one race, i'm not paying the region dues, or the nat'l dues if i can avoid it.

[tom_sprecher]

Believe it or not most racing regions barely break even every year. Or they bounce from gain to loss but it washes out. Part of the revenue is regional dues, not much, but still a part. This is a big help to large or jumbo regions and a disadvantage to small regionals who are trying to grow into a racing region.

Anyone who thinks the entry fees and dues are too high should find another sport. For the most part if it could be done for less it would be. We try to put on a good show at the lowest cost to everyone involved.

If you are concerned, ask to see your region's P&L and balance sheets. IIRC, they are open for any member to review.

[gran racing]

Anyone who thinks the entry fees and dues are too high should find another sport.

Nice. Interesting how you automatically correlate all of this into people thinking regions are making large sums of money. You know what, I'm still disappointed at the costs of various entry fees but at the same time don't blame the regions - the tracks among many other expenses are most often the cause of this. Why not suggest people do something about it such as the NER is doing with the Palmer track? Other regions are also doing great things. I suppose we should send them packing instead.

If my current region were to start charging $150 for regional dues when the next highest was $25, you better believe I'd strongly consider calling another my home region.

[tnord]

Believe it or not most racing regions barely break even every year. Or they bounce from gain to loss but it washes out. Part of the revenue is regional dues, not much, but still a part. This is a big help to large or jumbo regions and a disadvantage to small regionals who are trying to grow into a racing region.

Anyone who thinks the entry fees and dues are too high should find another sport. For the most part if it could be done for less it would be. We try to put on a good show at the lowest cost to everyone involved.

If you are concerned, ask to see your region's P&L and balance sheets. IIRC, they are open for any member to review.

could regions stand to do better by lowering the number of events?
could they negotiate better contracts with the tracks?
could they market themselves better?
could they avoid thousands in expense by sending fewer to convention?
could they save money by changing insurance companies on the solo trucks?
etc etc.

saying that a bunch of volunteers are doing something as effeciently as possible in their spare time is um......."not accurate."

[jumbojimbo]

My regional dues are $20. About 5 gallons of gas. I can't even get to a the nearest racetrack without burning more gas than that. And I use twice that in tires at every Solo I go to.

You guys are being a bit race centric. Region dues have virtually nothing to do with the race (or solo or rally) program. No 300 member region is going to make a dent in the race budget by changing region dues.

The cost of putting on a race is a valid discussion, but don't confuse the question of regional dues by talking about race expense. It's high, we all know it.

Granted, you can argue that a small region shouldn't be putting on a race, especially if it is losing money doing it. In the old days a little region would make a healthy profit on its race and then use that money to support the rest of the regional program. But smart "business" from national in raising sanction fees and smart "business" from the tracks has squeezed that down to virtually nothing. Maybe it does make sense for the monster regions to suck up all the race dates. You see it happening already.

Region dues are generally used to cover the region member expenses. There are probably exceptions, especially in the big regions, but in the little regions membership dues don't even cover the cost of a member. Think about what it costs to send out a newsletter 10 times a year and you'll see how far $20 goes. I know in our region we lose money if a person joins and participates in no activites.

Granted, that little region might not need to send out a newsletter. But we tried that and participation suffered. You're not a region if you don't have communication and community. I'm a little new to road racing so I haven't lost my connection to the region yet. I still care about the Solo program and the Rallycross program.

Anyway, my point is that if your regional dues are too high, then you'll have to decide if the value you get from your region is enough. If it is not, then find another region with lower dues. If you feel like you are getting no value at all from your regional dues and you'd rather save that $20 then maybe you should look at who puts on the next race you attend. And think about whether they would be doing it if they weren't a part of a local region. And then decide if that's worth the cost of 4 beers or one table dance.

Wow, that came out a little stonger than I meant, but you get the idea.

jim

[gran racing]

Jim, I don't think anyone is complaining about $20 or $25, but $150 would be tougher to swallow which was the original question.

[tom_sprecher]

I'm sorry if I don't sugar coat my statements to make them more palatable to those who can’t stomach the truth but that’s just the way I am. I also grow tied of people reading something into my words and then trying to argue with me about what I wrote.

Case in point: how someone automatically correlated that in my statement of “Anyone who thinks the entry fees and dues are too high should find another sport” I automatically correlated that people are thinking regions are making large sums of money is read something into my words that I simply do not see and simply is not true.

It’s like this…

Racing is expensive. Either live with it or get involved with your region and try to find a way to make it cheaper. Actually, I defy you to do so. I know I have and the whole time thinking there has to be some gross mistakes being made by a motley crew of volunteers. This should be easy, right? Guess what? I was wrong! After sitting down and analyzing an annual budget that some small businesses would love to have I could not find anything worth changing. Nothing.

It's easy to sit behind a keyboard and make suggestions. Try stepping up and doing it yourself. Or at least make your suggestions useful with ideas on how to pay the bills.

Jim has a pretty good handle on what presents itself to racing regions. Some other suggestions have merit at first glance but lose much of it when you dig deeper.

• If you reduce the number of events you reduce revenue and increase risk to maintaining solvency since race dates usually never come back.
• Trying to negotiate better contracts with tracks sounds great but in reality there are so many other organizations that produce more revenue and can outspend you so you end up with what you have.
• Better marketing might work but unless you have a lot of extra cash it ends up being a waste of that precious resource because the cost of it is exponentially proportional to its effectiveness.
• I don’t know about other regions but we send our RE and one other person to the convention. Being a jumbo region I think we should at least do that.

And finally, from my experience in most cases, saying that a bunch of paid employees doing something as efficiently as possible while at work is um......."not accurate."

With a bunch of volunteers you actually get infinitely much more than you paid them for.

[tnord]

ya know what i get real tired of?

people that think if you don't volunteer your time, that you don't have the right to say anything negative. that's a big smelly pantload. if you participate in region activities and pay your money, you have just as much right to bitch as anyone else. does your input carry less weight than someone who participates and volunteers? probably, but that doesn't mean you have to bend over and take it.

Travis
-who has volunteered. who has made suggestions on how to improve. who has had his ideas shot down by the "old guard." who actually is a financial analyst overseeing billions of dollars in annual spend on a daily basis.