JowettTalk

Today I picked up a copy of classic car weekly, and on browsing through Id noticed several clubs putting up adverts for joining there club, clubs like the MG car club, and Reliant, Triumph Is this an avenue we should think about exploring? Or has it been explored? Any views?

I know for certain that we did it ? in the 80's as I drew up the advert. Can't remember which magazine it went in , maybe practical clossics and maybe in those days they put it in for free, again not sure. Now some of the classic magazines list all the one make clubs I don't think there would be much point in paying for a regular ad ( the MG and Jaguar clubs are much bigger and wealthier and have a huge potential membership to aim at compared with ours)

Thre will always be some Jowett owners who for whatever reason have no desire to join the JCC but apart from the aforementioned group (who are mostly aware of our existance) most owners will find us via club lists, internet etc if only to obtain spares and technical info that is /are not available on teh open market.

george

We are perhaps missing the essential point and the difference between advertising and marketing. The essential point is that we need to attract new members, otherwise the club will not be viable in about 10 years. Those new members in marketing terms will come from two sectors - the collectors and the enthusiasts. The sectors may well overlap and not everyone would fit into one or either sector, but it helps target the marketing plan and advertising campaign.

The collectors are driven by the looks, fashion, status and investment potential of the marque or a specific model. The enthusiasts are driven by the technology, history of the marque and joy of ownership. The approach to attracting from each sector needs to be different. Overlay onto that the need to focus on say two age groups the 18 to 30 and 55 to 70 year olds. What happens to the 31 to 54 year olds? Well there is another market which I think only the racing boys can attract.

The 18- 30s and the enthusiasts are best targetted via the Practical Classics type mags, a lively Internet forum and spontaneous club technical and social meets. The 55-70s we can reach via the Classic and Sports Car type mags, well organised concours events, shows and planned events in collaboration with other car clubs.

We must plan for a much higher turnover of club member, which should be viewed positively as it certainly can be through bringing new skills and ideas into the club. We should plan to cater for people with other Classic Cars, not just Jowetts, which also should be viewed positively by bringing their experiences of other clubs to ours.That positive view can be difficult to learn by people who have Jowetts in their blood, but engaging with these new members is vital to the club's survival.

If we continue to think that people will only come to the club when they need spares, then we will loose our fight to survive. We have a fantastic marque that ticks most of the boxes regarding, history, technology, design, looks and investment potential. We have to change a lot of the way we do things to reach these potential new members, to embrace them when they join the club and get everybody to market and advertise the marque and the club every month. Even though the cars are 60 or more years old does not mean the club should be run like it was 60 years ago.

Thanks Alan for raising the issue. Keep advertising. There should be a Jowett article in every Classic Car mag every month. Not just one a year. We can all help Noel and Jack by doing 'something amazing' with our Jowett and then getting the story published, even if it is in the local rag or a local car show it brings the marque to the attention of many potential members. Please put any published articles in your personal albums and I will transfer them to the TOPIC JowettGallery Press Cuttings Album.

I very much agree everything Kieth has said and would add that a feature or article in a publication is worth far more than a years worth; of small adverts ( full page might be different but we can't afford that!)

Not directly connected with publicity but indirectly usable to help project the image of the club would be to 'persuade' younger members like Alan to sit on the exec committee. They have a great deal of talent to offer and should , if they agree, be fully involved in the main 'leadership' of the club. ( I was NOrthern Section Secretary at the age of 20 and even then there were a great many members much older than me)

Having the club lead by a mixture of old and new talent would also be the best recipe for its continued vitality and long term prosperity

george

How many section (or executive) committee members are there under 50?

You are right George, we need to attract and encourage 'younger' members to help run and promote the club. This does not have to be done via 'commitee' as we should use the new media of communication such as email, private and public forums, Skype and Facebook. This is much more effective at getting things organised. People expect responses within hours these days, not weeks which may have been the norm when committees and snail mail ran things.

If you have an idea, discuss on the forum, support will come from far and wide in hours. Then develop the idea, perhaps with others in the club. If appropriate, run the plan past an officer of the club. Hopefully, officers will have been monitoring progress on the forum and used PMs to inject guidance not suitable for wider viewing.

No doubt there will be negative views to these ideas, such as loosing control, risk of damage to the club and just change

Such 'new' ways of doing things does not stop the 'old' way or harm it, particularly if the 'old' way works alongside the 'new' way. I was on the executive committee of the club in 1974 and have been there ever since. Is it time for some younger members on the exec? I think so.

To add to the articles of recent, Jack, has a page spread about the 90th aniversary Basingstoke in this weeks classic car weekly. Page 7 will try to get a scan up,

[quote="Keith Clements"]How many section (or executive) committee members are there under 50?

No doubt there will be negative views to these ideas, such as loosing control, risk of damage to the club and just change

I think that there is a danger of younger members being percieved as some sort of 'subgroup' or even a sort of separate 'section' with insufficient experience of running things and not enough knowledge of Jowetts. That is of course totally illogical and complete bullshit as they have at least as much knowledge and enthusiasm as had those of us involved in the sixties and seventies when the JCC was formed out of the Southern Jowett Car Club and sprouted sections throughout the land.

It is only by encouraging their full involvement including holding senior poitions on the exec committe that the long term future of the club will be secured.

To survive and prosper the club needs to attract ever more younger members and this is much more likely to happen if there is seen to be a goodly proportion of younger people running things. Taking the long term view it is not just the Amies and Alans that the club will need but also the next generation afterthem, i.e. their children!

As to losing control, damage to club and change etc this was exactly what the SJCC tried to prevent in the early sixties and look what came out of that they came unstuck and lost out to mainly younger people with fresh ideas. Fortunately, today we do not need to repeat the traumatic events of the sixties but I for one would like to see perhaps half the exec and sections comittee jobs being held by much younger members. This would hopefully provide a goodly period of overlap before some of the longer serving 'officials' retire due to age, ill health or just fall of their perches! ( and just in case anybody who doesn't know me thinks I am'' having a go'' at older members I am very much in that camp myself in my seventieth year)

george

George & Keith - Speaketh many, many wise words - I completly agree - any drive / ambition / project to acheive the said words has my full support.

Just a thought hot off the thinking organ! As the Leeds college vehicle restoration course is working on a Jav and by definition will have some relatively young students we could offer free associate membership to those on the full time 30 week course. This would not have any cost implicattions to the club as it could be a special form of associate membership with entitlement only to the online version of the Jowetteer together with both entitlement and encouragement to attend any club events during the epriod of ''temporary associate membership'' It may also be worth offering their students x% off first year full or associate membership after the 'free 30 weeks'

This would at no cost to us build up their interest in and knowledge ofJowett as a marque rather than just seeing 'their' javelin as the lump of metal they are practicing on! Hopefully some may wish to continue as associate or even full members and those who go to jo;bs in the restoration industry may spread the word about the cars and the club to a wider lot of enthusiasts.

george

George on your thoughts, it would be interesting to know the age range whove gone onto the course, I did hear a few members had signed up?

george, a super idee
a way to find friends of jowett...... plant the sead and you will get you pay....
peter

No comment or at least no more than the comments following, as the idea has already been discussed at length by the club exec and with the Chairman. But if you all speak to or email an officer of the club or your section rep or write to the Jowetteer (email Alan Brierley) then it might fly at the next vote. Otherwise come to the AGM and put your point across. The club is a democracy so your ideas and votes count. The next exec is on 9th March at 11am in Thringstone, so make sure an officer or section rep knows your views before then.

Note there are only two Executive Council meetings a year (the other is 21st September 2013) which is a big problem if you want to get ANYTHING done. I have been told by the Chairman that advertising may be discussed at the next exec and not before. What do you think? How can we make opportunities happen?

The college (or at least Michael Coman, the course leader) has become a member and enquiries have come from another course member, Stephen Weblin, to which Jack Moon and the Membership Sec promptly responded. I took it on myself as webmaster to allow Stephen and Michael access to the Gallery to assist in their interest in the car. Simon Wood is on the course so please talk with him to learn progress and promote the idea.

We can only do so much!

Ok - can I therefore suggest that the point being made is worded on what we want to acheive - then the same point can be broadacst to the sections / committee members by the members that broadly agree with the points being made in this thread and what I read is:

'In order to promote the future of the JCC the membership proposes that consideration is given to recuiting / co-opting a proportion of younger members to JCC committee'

Edit / add to as you wish - but unless the point / consideration is consistant then it will not get anywhere - next challenge is that we need find the members that are willing to fill the posts if they are made.

Has for not promoting the club through advertising - my veiw is that we have become very good at gaining the publicity free of charge whilst also building up a reasonable contact list of feature writers / editors etc - Just in the last 12 months we have enjoyed major features in the followng magazines:

Classic Car Weekly x 2
Practical Classics x 2
The Automobile
Classic Cars

Plus various other features elsewhere - just work with the contacts that we have - plus look at other areas of self promotion

Chris

Self promotion or promotion in other areas, as you say like having pieces for example the classic car of the year competition promoting the club through other means, as well as I heard someone at out sw agm about a member starting up road competition use with their jowett? Im not sure who the member was. Its getting the club in many different lights/aspects of the classic owning industry. Another example would be the club show case run by meguiars Im sure there are many fine machines perfectly concours standard restored vehicles in club to enter this kind of event. Sorry my post is maybe a bit garbled having trouble explaining what I mean.

Assuming George's comment 'no cost to the club' to be correct I would fully support this idea - even if only for a 1 year 'taster' period, but I am not so sure that we need to take up Chris's idea 'the membership proposes that consideration is given to recuiting / co-opting a proportion of younger members to JCC committee'.

If the benficiaries CHOSE to join the club as full members then, like any other member, they could put themselves forward as prospective committee members.

There may be a case to be made that the committee SHOULD have at least 1 Junior member.

More thoughts?