Is your Club Size Diminishing and your Membership Ageing?

[Bush Walker]

Many bushwalking Clubs are finding that their size is getting smaller and their membership becoming older. This impacts on the availability of office bearers and may even change the nature of the walks being offered. Fortunately some Clubs have found solutions to these dual problems. How has your Club tackled these problems?

[flatfoot]

I had to answer no, since the club size seems to be stable / slightly growing. The membership seems to be aging since there are not many young members joining.

There are few members below the age of 40 in my club. I'd say the average age would be in the 50-60 range.

[Aushiker]

Hi

I answered yes but that is more reflective of my experience when I left Perth Bushwalkers Club. The dying lack of interest in backpacking killed my Club membership for me.

Andrew

[pazzar]

It's a no from me. The university walking club in Hobart is constantly stable. We have a lot of international students, so when one group leaves, another group comes in. We are always getting people joining up. Our biggest challenge is transport - which means we don't do as many trips as we would like (nearly all of our walks are led by me, and rarely do we have more than one car load for this reason). I'm sure if we had more walks - especially easier walks on offer, we would see more growth. The biggest misconception with our club is that we are not a club just for university students, we see ourselves as a club for young people, or people who enjoy the company of young people. We don't want to limit ourselves to just students.

Jared

[FatCanyoner]

I walk with a uni club (Sydney Uni Bushwalkers), so my experiences are a little different. The club did have some decline a few years ago (impact of VSU etc) but I would say it is currently the largest and most active it has been in at least five years. We have two entities, one for students and one for everyone else, and because of that ex students / other random people probably make up more than half the membership, most of the trip leaders, and about 60% of the participants on most trips. Our one challenge with the student population is that a lot of people join, do one or two trips, then not much else.
Before I joined SUBW I was a member of a number of other conservation organisations with bushwalking programs (the largest number I did with the National Parks Association of NSW). These organisations, like most bushwalking clubs around Sydney, seemed to have a much older demographic. This meant that as someone in my mid twenties I was usually the youngest by 20+ years. While it was great learning from experienced people, it is a little annoying for the age gap to always be there. These clubs also had a culture where trips were organised a long way in advance and run exactly as planned. I personally prefer to do things with shorter notice and my trips almost always involve detours and route changes to explore something new that catches our fancy. I think the challenge for most clubs is to get a critical mass of younger members doing trips so that when new people come in that don't feel out of place.

[Bush Walker]

I had to answer no, since the club size seems to be stable / slightly growing. The membership seems to be aging since there are not many young members joining.

There are few members below the age of 40 in my club. I'd say the average age would be in the 50-60 range.

Hi Flatfoot.

I think your experience would be very common in bushwalking Clubs.
Why do you think membership is stable?
As you are not gaining younger members, does that mean that you are getting an equal number of "older" members to replace those older members retiring from the club.
Has you club discussed possible solutions?

[Bush Walker]

I
Before I joined SUBW I was a member of a number of other conservation organisations with bushwalking programs (the largest number I did with the National Parks Association of NSW). These organisations, like most bushwalking clubs around Sydney, seemed to have a much older demographic. This meant that as someone in my mid twenties I was usually the youngest by 20+ years. While it was great learning from experienced people, it is a little annoying for the age gap to always be there. These clubs also had a culture where trips were organised a long way in advance and run exactly as planned. I personally prefer to do things with shorter notice and my trips almost always involve detours and route changes to explore something new that catches our fancy. I think the challenge for most clubs is to get a critical mass of younger members doing trips so that when new people come in that don't feel out of place.

Hi Fatcanyoner

I suspect that your feelings are very common amongst younger walkers and that many Clubs do little to cater for the different needs of younger members, if they are lucky enough to have any.

You mentioned that a lack of flexibility is a big "turn off" and that there was a need to get a critical mass of younger members.

Within the context of a Club, which usually advertises its events a long way ahead, how do you think this lack of flexibility could be overcome?
Do you have any ideas for developing a critical mass within a Club environment?

[Bush Walker]

It's a no from me. I'm sure if we had more walks - especially easier walks on offer, we would see more growth. The biggest misconception with our club is that we are not a club just for university students, we see ourselves as a club for young people, or people who enjoy the company of young people. We don't want to limit ourselves to just students. Jared

Hi Jared

Some ideas:

Has your Club tried to publicise itself outside the university environment?
How do you advertise your Club's activities?
Have your tried using social networking (Twitter, Facebook etc) to see if this is effective in attracting non-university members?
What's stopping you offering more easier walks?

[Bush Walker]

Hi

I answered yes but that is more reflective of my experience when I left Perth Bushwalkers Club. The dying lack of interest in backpacking killed my Club membership for me.

Andrew

Hi Andrew

Why do you think your Club had a lack of interest in backpacking?

[wayno]

yup. most clubs outside of the universities in NZ are going that way getting older and smaller, some are putting exhorbitant joining fees on their clubs to avoid a problem where a group of new people can join, and take over the club by voting out the executive and all it's assets because the current membership has become so small...
advent of student fees and more people having to work weekends, rising cost of living have probably all contributed, plus a greater variety of outdoor sportsa nd events competing for peoples attentions... there a lot of other new and novel things to do that interest people more...

[flatfoot]

I had to answer no, since the club size seems to be stable / slightly growing. The membership seems to be aging since there are not many young members joining.

There are few members below the age of 40 in my club. I'd say the average age would be in the 50-60 range.

Hi Flatfoot.

I think your experience would be very common in bushwalking Clubs.
Why do you think membership is stable?
As you are not gaining younger members, does that mean that you are getting an equal number of "older" members to replace those older members retiring from the club.
Has you club discussed possible solutions?

I think the stability comes from empty nesters having more time on their hands. That is where most of the new membership is coming from I think.

I think it's a problem the club is aware of, however I'm not aware of any detailed discussions on solutions.

[Bush Walker]

I think the stability comes from empty nesters having more time on their hands. That is where most of the new membership is coming from I think.
I think it's a problem the club is aware of, however I'm not aware of any detailed discussions on solutions.

That would explain could explain why club numbers are stable but the age profile is not changing.

What about try an "advertising campaign" to specifically target younger bushwalkers by meeting more of their needs. Any ideas?

[Bush Walker]

yup. most clubs outside of the universities in NZ are going that way getting older and smaller, some are putting exhorbitant joining fees on their clubs to avoid a problem where a group of new people can join, and take over the club by voting out the executive and all it's assets because the current membership has become so small...
advent of student fees and more people having to work weekends, rising cost of living have probably all contributed, plus a greater variety of outdoor sportsa nd events competing for peoples attentions... there a lot of other new and novel things to do that interest people more...

Thanks Wayno for your ideas.

Your idea about more people working weekends can easily be verified by census data, and would be an obvious explanation if proven true. Money is definitely tight, but memberships are often very low eg around $50, which would seem to be only a small disincentive to join.

As for lots of new and novel things to do; couldn't agree more. One example might be using Facebook to meet up with friends online without actually meeting face-to-face in a Club.

Is there a message here for clubs wishing to attract more members? Go online with a Facebook page!!! What do you think?

[pazzar]

It's a no from me. I'm sure if we had more walks - especially easier walks on offer, we would see more growth. The biggest misconception with our club is that we are not a club just for university students, we see ourselves as a club for young people, or people who enjoy the company of young people. We don't want to limit ourselves to just students. Jared

Hi Jared

Some ideas:

Has your Club tried to publicise itself outside the university environment?
How do you advertise your Club's activities?
Have your tried using social networking (Twitter, Facebook etc) to see if this is effective in attracting non-university members?
What's stopping you offering more easier walks?

.
We do most of our advertising both by an email list, and via facebook. We have seen growth especially through Facebook, and even through this forum we have had some members join. The Hobart Walking Club has also been very helpful directing some younger people towards us. We are working on establishing a stronger connection to try and boost the number of young people walking in the Hobart area.

The biggest thing stopping us from doing easier walks is firstly the lack of trip leaders. We have a number of people who are happy to lead trips, but very few have cars.. Like I said before, I am one of only a few people who are actively able to lead trips. I guess my agenda gets in the way of easier walks, but as I only have limited time to do the walks, I still want to do the walks I want to do, and as I do more walks, the more challenging they seem to become.

[FatCanyoner]

I joined my club because of the flexible way trips were run. Due to the kind of work I do I find it very hard to plan trips more than a few weeks in advance, unless I am taking a full week off work to do it. This includes weekends. With most clubs, quarterly newsletters seem to have the details, so you need to lock in months in advance if you want a place. This rarely worked for me. A lot of younger people find the whole 'put it in your diary' thing old fashioned, with most planning done last minute.
SUBW advertises some stuff on facebook, and most on the website, but what makes it work is the email list. I can flick out an email just days before a trip and find half a dozen people keen to join me. I usually try to give more notice than that, but about two weeks is usually the most, unless it is a massive trip.
As for what can be done to develop a critical mass of young people in other clubs, I'm not sure. I think you need a couple really keen young ones to seed things with. You need to have younger members leading trips, so it isn't just a culture of the oldiest running everything. I'd suggest checking in with the Sydney Bushwalkers who have reportedly managed to massively boost their younger membership in the last couple years (check out their flash new website etc to see what they are doing). They now have 100 - 200 members under 40, which is pretty enviable I believe.

[Bush Walker]

We do most of our advertising both by an email list, and via facebook. We have seen growth especially through Facebook, and even through this forum we have had some members join. The Hobart Walking Club has also been very helpful directing some younger people towards us. We are working on establishing a stronger connection to try and boost the number of young people walking in the Hobart area.

The biggest thing stopping us from doing easier walks is firstly the lack of trip leaders. We have a number of people who are happy to lead trips, but very few have cars.. Like I said before, I am one of only a few people who are actively able to lead trips. I guess my agenda gets in the way of easier walks, but as I only have limited time to do the walks, I still want to do the walks I want to do, and as I do more walks, the more challenging they seem to become.

Facebook seems to have some promise as a way of attracting younger members! Is it only younger members you are attracting using Facebook? Are you able to tell which is more effective? Facebook or email list.

Is the lack of leaders for the easy walks due to a lack of volunteers with sufficient skills? Are there those who would like to lead and would be willing to learn from a club mentor or perhaps attend a short course?

[pazzar]

Facebook seems to have some promise as a way of attracting younger members! Is it only younger members you are attracting using Facebook? Are you able to tell which is more effective? Facebook or email list.

Is the lack of leaders for the easy walks due to a lack of volunteers with sufficient skills? Are there those who would like to lead and would be willing to learn from a club mentor or perhaps attend a short course?

I think it's probably half and half with the facebook/email responses. I think facebook is great for planning spontaneous walks, but is not always as effective as sending out an email giving 2 or 3 weeks notice.

I think we have plenty of potential leaders within our group, but like I said, very few have transport. I think some short training courses are a good idea for any club though.

[Bush Walker]

I joined my club because of the flexible way trips were run. Due to the kind of work I do I find it very hard to plan trips more than a few weeks in advance, unless I am taking a full week off work to do it. This includes weekends. With most clubs, quarterly newsletters seem to have the details, so you need to lock in months in advance if you want a place. This rarely worked for me. A lot of younger people find the whole 'put it in your diary' thing old fashioned, with most planning done last minute.
SUBW advertises some stuff on facebook, and most on the website, but what makes it work is the email list. I can flick out an email just days before a trip and find half a dozen people keen to join me. I usually try to give more notice than that, but about two weeks is usually the most, unless it is a massive trip.
As for what can be done to develop a critical mass of young people in other clubs, I'm not sure. I think you need a couple really keen young ones to seed things with. You need to have younger members leading trips, so it isn't just a culture of the oldiest running everything. I'd suggest checking in with the Sydney Bushwalkers who have reportedly managed to massively boost their younger membership in the last couple years (check out their flash new website etc to see what they are doing). They now have 100 - 200 members under 40, which is pretty enviable I believe.

Thanks for your reply FatCanyoner

I understand your inability to lock in months in advance, but in most cases it is possible to cancel only a few days out from the walk, which in some ways meets your needs for flexibility.
I agree with the need for having younger people leading walks, but sometimes the issues you raise about last minute planning being the norm, would make this difficult in a structured program.

Have you used Twitter as an alternative to email when seeking walking partners? This might be even more effective. What do you think?

Thanks for the heads up re Sydney Bushwalkers.

[Bush Walker]

Facebook seems to have some promise as a way of attracting younger members! Is it only younger members you are attracting using Facebook? Are you able to tell which is more effective? Facebook or email list. Is the lack of leaders for the easy walks due to a lack of volunteers with sufficient skills? Are there those who would like to lead and would be willing to learn from a club mentor or perhaps attend a short course?

I think it's probably half and half with the facebook/email responses. I think facebook is great for planning spontaneous walks, but is not always as effective as sending out an email giving 2 or 3 weeks notice.

I think we have plenty of potential leaders within our group, but like I said, very few have transport. I think some short training courses are a good idea for any club though.

What about using public transport of shuttle buses? I've done quite a few walks in Tassie using public (shuttle) buses or been dropped off by one of the many expedition companies.

Maybe someone can give the contact details for organisations that run short leadership courses in Tasmania?

[Genesis]

Good morning,

Contrary to the topic, I am looking to join a club! . Anyone here from the north West Tassie Walking club?
I am wanting to join but find it difficult to get the the meetings due to transport issues. I live in Wynyard
and looking for fellow Wynyardites to pool with. Please let me know here or PM me.

Genesis

[Bush Walker]

Anyone had any success in forming links with local youth clubs as a way of gaining new members?

[South_Aussie_Hiker]

Don't take this the wrong way, but I think bushwalk.com and electronic media in general may be partly responsible for this.

Twenty years ago, if you wanted to do the Western Arthurs, you joined a bushwalking club to get access to the information and experienced people required to complete the trip - and stayed a member for those benefits.

With internet sites like this, the whole reason people join a bushwalking club in the first place has been removed. You can get great information on any walk you like, including photos and track notes. You can also plot stuff out accurately on google earth etc., download it to your handheld GPS and walk it safely with very minimal experience. And when it turns pear shaped, you just set off an Epirb. The improvement in gear/equipment technology means people (rightly or wrongly) need to invest less time in learning the ropes from experienced people and rely more heavily on their gear.

I'm not saying there aren't other great reasons to join a club, because there are, it's just that the information is available elsewhere and good equipment has somewhat overcome the need for hardened walking experience.

I guarantee if this site was closed tomorrow (please, please don't do it!) and the information/training was only available through clubs, there would be a resurgence in membership.

It also explains why the general club demographic is ageing... younger people are more likely to google something for information than go to club meetings.

Same is happening to lots of other clubs... for example car clubs. These days, if you want to do some serious mods to your car - just google it - no need to join a club.

[pazzar]

Anyone had any success in forming links with local youth clubs as a way of gaining new members?

I think the biggest issue with this is insurance. I know with the our club we cant take people younger than 16, and if they are under 18 they must have signed permission. It's sad how over-regulated we have become over the past 15 years or so. Back when I was a kid you could do anything without fear of legal action.

[Aushiker]

Why do you think your Club had a lack of interest in backpacking?

Combination of reasons I suspect.

Context: I was leading up to my pulling the pin on the Club single and leading weekend and longer backpacks at least once a month around eight to ten times a year for a couple of years. During that time there was a core group of us that would pretty much do all of these walks. This core group plus the extras that would come now and then gave us a solid group of around eight members on each walk.

Over time that core group went in different directions (some found new partners who didn't walk or had other interests; some moved interstate etc). With that lost of a core group (plus on a personal note I also got back into relationship) leaders such as myself started to loose interest so there was less in the way of backpacks on offer. With only a few, if any other leaders taking them and little interest from the wider Club membership (around 300 IIRC) they just dropped off.

Also I suspect the demographic of the Club was such that people's lives changed (fairly high number of single middle aged people) and so there availability also changed over time. Being able to go away for the weekend for example gets harder in relationships/other demands on time etc.

Bottom line was probably lack of leadership but. I did lead a walk for the Club a year or so ago (long term commitment), a walk of the Cape to Cape Track (seven or eight days) and that drag a few of the old hands out of the wood works but really it was still a small group with not that much interest in doing a lot more backpacks, just the odd "iconic" one here and there.

I believe the Club still offers day walks every weekend pretty much all year round and gets numbers of around 15 to 20 on a walk. This is down from the hey-day where three day walks would be on offer every weekend (easy, medium, hard) plus at least one backpack a month if not more.

Andrew

[photohiker]

For a club to have a broad demographic they need to actively work on it all the time, not just when they realise all the members are above a certain age. Once the demographic of a club gets to the point that they 'notice' that there are younger people out there, and they are not joining the club, then the chances of getting them to join is almost nil.

On top of that, clubs simply are not attracting young people like they used to, and it isn't just bushwalking. Case in point, I used to be a member of Rotaract, which is a young adult community club sponsored by Rotary. Here in Adelaide, there were clubs all over the place, around the city and in the regional centres. Today, there are apparently no Rotaract clubs in SA at all, and only a couple of dozen in the whole of Australia.

For an existing club wanting to attract younger members, creating a separate youth club might be a good strategy of getting around the problem.

[photohiker]

I guarantee if this site was closed tomorrow (please, please don't do it!) and the information/training was only available through clubs, there would be a resurgence in membership.

I guarantee you are mistaken. Membership of online groups and/or face to face clubs is not an either/or situation. If this site evaporated overnight, people would still find the information they seek at other sites, and probably the vacuum would be filled by another site anyway. You're chasing the wrong shadow. Access to information on the internet may present a problem for club membership, but the genie is well and truly out of the bottle and you can't put it back.

The internet has also come at a time when people are more time poor than ever before. They can now improve their knowledge (as they might at a formal club meeting) at their leisure and at a time suitable to them alone. The level of detail available online exceeds anything available at a club meeting because it is generally an authoritive collection assembled from multiple sources. See the Larapinta Trail website for an excellent example.

On top of all this, are you suggesting that interest in bushwalking is waning? From what I've seen, it seems to be growing while the clubs are slowly losing relevance in the modern age.

[walkinTas]

...clubs simply are not attracting young people like they used to, and it isn't just bushwalking. Case in point, I used to be a member of Rotaract,... Today, there are apparently no Rotaract clubs in SA at all, ...

It is true that club membership has declined in many of the traditional social and charity organisations. Club membership in facebook and the like has soared. So I'll just be flippant and say "Welcome to the 21st Century". It follows a recognised social trend of the individual thinking more about ME and less about OTHERS - the self-centred generation.

[Bush Walker]

...clubs simply are not attracting young people like they used to, and it isn't just bushwalking. Case in point, I used to be a member of Rotaract,... Today, there are apparently no Rotaract clubs in SA at all, ...

It is true that club membership has declined in many of the traditional social and charity organisations. Club membership in facebook and the like has soared. So I'll just be flippant and say "Welcome to the 21st Century". It follows a recognised social trend of the individual thinking more about ME and less about OTHERS - the self-centred generation.

Yes the decline of many community organisations is undeniable. However I don't think we should accept defeat and assume that declining membership and ageing profiles are unavoidable. There are many organisations that are tackling this problem successfully by addressing the needs of younger people and adopting their communication methods.

[Bush Walker]

Thank you for the excellent discussion today. I'll have more time when I get home to digest the points you have all been making.

[FatCanyoner]

Bushwalker,
I'm firmly of the view that email provides the best way to organise trips, especially with a younger audience. Facebook is good, but email is the only thing that every member is guaranteed to see. Twitter is fairly irrelevant as most people with accounts rarely check it. It is worth having these things as well, to maximise the club's reach, but they are not solutions in themselves.
As far as the timing and need to plan things well in advance, I have actually found that for day / weekend trips, I actually get the most interest if notice is between one and three weeks. Beyond that people don't want to lock things in, then forget about trips being on. Admittedly this is with a club that has the bulk of its members between 18 and 40 years old.
For me, I hate to sign up for a trip unless I am a definite. I have only ever dropped out of a couple trips, always for serious work / family reasons, but I hate doing it. If people drop out last minute on my trips (more than once) I put them at the bottom of the list for future trips. This is because with a uni club transport is always a difficulty and there is a lot more logistical organising required. People who drop out can make a trip unviable. They also cost spaced that other keep people could use.
I am still a member of a few other organisations with bushwalking programs that are heavily structured. While I like what they do, I haven't been on a walk with either of them in about two years. The quarterly walks program simply doesn't work for me. I do trawl the programs looking for good trip ideas, which I then run at more convenient times.
As for the broader debate about the decline of clubs, this is a real issue. Political parties, youth organisations, charities, social clubs, sporting clubs, everyone is seeing a decline in membership and added difficulties. I don't think there is a simple solution. Younger people don't want to sit around at meetings. Even though I am an active member of my walking club, I would never go to more than one or two formal meetings a year. What gets younger members on trips isn't a crusty monthly meeting (we can share info / photos / trip reports online), what works is running interesting and appropriate easier trips where people can learn the skills and meet people. Many of them then continue to come back and you have momentum build up.