Membership Dues Summary

[MoparBoyy]

#176121

I would like to hear what the international regions have to say, as it does not effect most regions, it does effect national who are already running on a shoe string budget. I dont know how much I like having a price for US regions and a second price for international regions.

Unfortunately I would suggest that the international regions just get a little less per member. But I would really like to hear what those it effects say before voting.

[Shannon Whitehead]

#176190

Maurice, thank you for this information. Has there been any discussion regarding a digital quarterly? Some members may prefer a digital issue, and it would help contain costs. Thank you.

[Shannon Whitehead]

#176327

C.J said:
Maurice, thank you for this information. Has there been any discussion regarding a digital quarterly? Some members may prefer a digital issue, and it would help contain costs. Thank you.

That suggestion comes up every so often. Here are some of the issues with switching to digital:

1) Unless you switch EVERYONE to digital, you don’t necessarily contain costs because cost per issue comes down with volume. Reduce the volume, and price per issue goes up.

2) many people consider the magazine a collectible, a digital copy isn’t a keepsake, nor will you likely be able to refer to it 20 years from now when readers and file formats have changed. Everytime we ask people to vote on print vs digital, the vast majority prefer print.

3) To protect it from free distribution to anyone (it’s a member perk) we would have to make it an online viewable publication, so you’d have to be connected to the Internet to read it. If we send a PDF, there’s no reason to subscribe or join the club because once you release the file, it’s free to distribute to everyone.

4) the PDF file is a big file, roughly 133 MB, which won’t go through email. Compress the file, and it becomes hard to read and photos become pixelated.

5) Print layout is different from online layout (not PDF, which is just a soft copy of the magazine.) Online publications have to be Designed and published in a different way so they can be viewed on different platforms and orientations. (Think what happens when you rotate an iPad, the page layout has to change from a vertical format to a horizontal format, which limits design. You can’t place a graphic on the page and expect it to redesign itself for a horizontal layout.

So, bottom line is, it’s not as simple as it sounds and it wouldn’t necessarily cut costs. The cost to offer a digital option in addition to print would far outweigh the potential savings.,��

[tfunkviper]

#180928

I think each club should pick up any additional costs due to their member’s location. In MN, we have one Canadian that has been with us for many years and we would not object to picking up the extra cost due to him living in Canada. As Maurice mentioned, it is not unusual and I think a surcharge would be appropriate. My 2 cents.

[Shannon Whitehead]

#17327

Here’s a summary of dues costs for 2015. For US and Canada, we split the dues 50/50 with the region; Regular membership cost is $115, so region gets $57.50 and national keeps the other half. Mamba membership is $150, so each gets $75. However, for international members, the postage for VQ is much more expensive (like $11 per ISSUE), so we lose about $20 per international member and $5 per Mamba member. To keep everyone’s dues the same, last year, we agreed to split the loss between national and the region, so each covers half the loss, and we are doing that again this year. So international regions will receive a $47 credit for each regular member and a $72 credit for each Mamba member.

For 2016, I’d like the board to consider adding a surcharge for international members to cover the extra postage. We’ll bring this up for discussion and vote, I just want to put it out there for consideration. It’s pretty normal for any organization to charge extra postage for international regions.

In case you’re wondering what that $57.50 that we keep is for, here’s the breakdown of cost per member:

Viper Quarterly Subscription: $19
Welcome letter: $0.70
Membership cards: $3.50
Decal: $0.30
Mousepad: $1.05
Date card: $0.25
Padded Envelope: $.97
Processing charge to pack membership packet: $2.40
Liability insurance (US only): $9.31
Postage: Ranges from $5 for US bulk rate to $44 for 1st class international.

Mamba members have additional cost of pen ($1.85) and 1st class postage in US.

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