Pro-rata membership - helping clubs grow

Swimming Victoria recently announced a pro-rata membership which is available until 30^th June 2018. So what does this mean for your club? We sat down with Jenny Lawton, who is not only Executive Assistant here at SV but also Club Registrar at Essendon District Aquatic (EDA), to find out how the club is making it work.

According to Jenny, when the EDA Committee learnt of the pro-rata membership option, it decided that with upcoming social events, a Club Development Day, Junior Club Championships and the Presentation Night, promoting the pro-rata membership option would be a great way to boost membership numbers and get more people swimming.

“We targeted the Learn to Swim (LTS) swimmers, who we saw as a captive market of young swimmers, looking to develop” said Jenny. “A flyer promoting the membership discount and its benefits was produced and we also decided not to include a club fee, just charging the SV/SAL swimmer rate of $55. This was due to the fact that members will need to re-join as of the 1^st July” she said. To make it easier to track memberships and to assist new members joining, the club set up a new member category in ClubLane, called ‘Swimmer April – June 2018’.

This strategy, combined with the Australian Dolphins recent swimming success at the Commonwealth Games, has resulted in a lot of interest. “We have had many enquiries, including school swimmers that have recently competed in their school competitions. And with the School Sport Victoria Championships this week, we are hoping this will continue” said Jenny.

To date the club has signed up 16 new members on the pro-rata option.  “As a mid-sized club we are thrilled with the progress, especially given that it has been during the school holidays” said Jenny. “We are hoping to build on this once Term 2 commences and swimmers are back to school and in the water”.

Want to know more? Jenny is here to help and can be contacted on 9230 9411 or jenny.lawton@vic.swimming.org.au.