Start a New NAR Club
INITIAL PUBLICITY
Publicity is the most important first step in forming an NAR Section. If you are the only rocketeer who knows about the plans to form a club, your club is going to be mighty small! So get out there and tell the world about your plans.
Finding Rocket Flyers
Rocket people aren't always very visible. Compared to other hobbyists, their numbers are small. However, they can be found if you look in the right spots.
Right off the bat, the NAR can help you by sending you a list of existing NAR members in your area. You can get this list just by sending e-mail to NAR Headquarters requesting it. Please include your name, address, and NAR number. Please note that to take advantage of this service, you must be a member of the NAR.
Another prime way to contact unaffiliated local rocketeers is through local hobby shops. Hobby shop owners will almost always help you because having a club in the area helps them sell more supplies. If you ask your local hobby shop owners for assistance, and volunteer to do the bulk of the work yourself, you can generally be sure of a favorable response.
If your hobby shop doesn't carry rocket supplies, encourage the owner to do so. Tell him of your plans to form a club and he will see possible business in the club members' purchase of supplies. You can also encourage him to carry Sport Rocketry Magazine. Let the owner know that the magazine runs the names and addresses of participating hobby shops in every issue and on our Web site.
While running a hobby shop is a business proposition, hobby shop owners are friendly people. They like getting to know their customers, including rocketeers. After a time, you will find a good rapport building between the owner and your Section. It's fun to have an inside track on when shipments arrive, when other rocket clubs are having contests or other events and generally getting a warm greeting when you go into the store. The owner may even offer your club members a discount. It's well worth your time to seek out and cultivate hobby shop owners!
Hobby shop owners will usually let you do two things:
- put posters in the store to advertise your club; and
- pass out preprinted flyers to customers.
Posters and flyers are a cheap and effective means to publicize your NAR Section.
Posters
If you make up posters, remember two things. First, make the posters
colorful and visible. A white posterboard with black lettering will
attract little attention. Adding red, yellow, or orange lettering,
colored posterboard and some photographs and drawings will have
members in no time. Secondly, put critical information on the roster:
- The date and time of the meeting or launch you are planning.
- The location of the meeting or launch.
- The name and telephone number of a person to contact for more information.
If you leave posters up for extended periods of time, remember to replace them with posters including the new meeting and/or launch dates.
Flyers
Flyers aren't as visible as posters. You may also have to count on the cash register person remembering to pass them out. The big advantage to flyers is that people carry your information home with them. They can't forget the phone number, location, or date of your events. If they have that information, they are more likely to do something about it -- i.e., come to your meeting or call you.
Flyers should also be colorful. Printing them up on colored paper works fine. You can use a word processor to pack in lots of information about your proposed club and its activities. Many clubs also include a map to help people get to the Section's activities. You must restock flyers periodically, but the cost is modest, about $15 per 1,000 copies at many printing shops.
The "Rocket Raffle" Gambit
Another possible approach is to run a "rocket raffle."
Buy a fancy looking kit, leave it in the box or build it using your best craftsmanship, and have the hobby shop raffle it off for you! It costs the hobby shop nothing, and may attract some business.
Meanwhile, you have provided the entry blanks for the raffle, complete with space for the customers' names, addresses, and phone numbers. When the raffle is over, you have a box full of names to contact about joining your Section!
Other Prime Locations
Don't limit your poster and flyer effort to hobby shops alone. Many toy and craft stores carry rocket supplies. They respond favorably to the same overtures that work with hobby shop owners.
Finally, rocketeers frequent non-rocket related stores as well. Many convenience and food stores display posters and announcements for all sorts of activities. Make sure your club gets in its poster or announcement as well.
Putting up posters and passing out flyers can be fun. For one thing, you will probably meet rocketeers while putting things up. For another, you will get to know local merchants better. They live in your community, take pride in doing business there, and want to be helpful. Go out and meet the folks who make your community a better place to live.
Print and Broadcast Media
Try using public service announcements in local paper and radio stations. Newspapers, particularly local weekly or biweekly editions, carry a "Community Calendar" of events. Your rocket club meetings and launches are legitimate candidates for these columns. Keep the information down to a minimum: time, date, place, and who to contact for further information. Also remember to keep sending in these announcements after your club gets going. It's free advertising, and every spot you advertise may bring you more members. Check with your local papers' requirements before submitting your announcements. Most will have no problem with an announcement like the sample below:
The Centreville Rocket Society will hold its meeting Friday, March 4, at 7:30 p.m. The meeting will be held at the Town Hall, Room 310. Contact Bill Jones, 555-1234, for further information.
Local radio stations also run "Public Service Announcements." Generally, the same text you sent to the newspaper will work here. Make sure you indicate you want a "public service announcement" made on behalf of your group when you write or call the radio station. Local TV stations sometimes have similar announcements, so check them out as well.
There are several ways you can use cable TV to your advantage. The first and simplest is to submit a form with a text ad announcing your new club. These ads typically run on page-oriented "community bulletin board" screens, or as "crawls" under the on-line program guide.
Even better, if you can spare the effort, you can videotape a club launch and submit it for airing on the local "public access" channel. Many cable operators are required to show whatever people in their community submit -- but keep in mind, the more professional the product, the better it will draw new members. Most cable operators will help you edit and add titles to the video, and many can even teach you how to put together a professional production and even loan you the equipment to film it!
Schools
Other publicity outlets exist. Your junior high or high school may have a rocket club already started. Check with a science, industrial arts or crafts teacher. All these groups have been known to sponsor and start rocket clubs.
If there are no existing school clubs, you can use school bulletin boards and publications to solicit members for your own club. Make sure you get permission from the principal or superintendent before using any school facilities.
The Internet
Don't forget to take advantage of the age of personal, electronic mass communication. Put up a web page for your club. Many online services such as America Online, CompuServe, and Prodigy give paid subscribers free space for web pages that can be seen by all Internet users. A web page won't get you a sudden influx of new members, but it can provide you a slow, steady supply of interested modelers.
To get that sudden influx, you can try kick-starting your club with a brief announcement in relevant USENET newsgroups, such as rec.models.rockets. Also, don't forget to post a notice to your general-interest regional newsgroup, if one exists -- for example, the New England newsgroup ne.general. People will typically respond to these postings within a few days.
If you belong to an online service, don't forget to leave one of your postings on that service's special interest area catering to sport rocketry. Consider using the Rocketry Forum, Rocketry OnLine, Rocketry Planet, or AOL's sport rocketry subtopic folder in their National Space Society area.
Keep in mind that once you have chartered with the NAR, you club will go up on the NAR Section List on the NAR website itself. If you have supplied an e-mail contact, you will receive a steady stream of inquiries from motivated modelers.
Don't restrict your publicity efforts to those outlined here. Keep
your eye open for any opportunity to get your message out to the
public. And remember to keep up the publicity effort. It doesn't stop
after you have a club formed. You will always need to replace members
who drop out, move away, or go to college.