GFWC/Ohio Federation of Women's Clubs Web Site
GFWC/Ohio Federation of Women's Clubs
Membership

Pardon Our Dust

GFWC/Ohio Federation of Women's Clubs is joining GFWC in their Four More in 2004 campaign to have each and every club get at least four new members in 2004. We are asking clubs across the state to kick off the new club year on a positive note by working on membership recruitment.Woman Working

Membership is the very heart and soul of our Federation and new members are like a blood transfusion. Remember the best recruiters you have are your current happy and excited members.

Kathy Combs, the Membership Chairman for the 2002-04 administration, did a fantastic job and she will be a hard act to follow! She worked to get a solid base and the 2004-2006 Membership "Construction Crew" will spend the next two years building on that base. We will visit clubs, do workshops, write Buckeye Magazine articles, distribute printed materials and have postings on the GFWC/OFWC web site throughout the administration. We will share information, issue friendly challenges, report progress and celebrate membership triumphs.

We are committed to focus our attention on ALL areas of membership; General, Junior and Juniorette. The construction crew reflects that fact. The State Chairman is Patrice Booze, Vice Chairman is Rita Hall, Junior Chairman is Sherry McClellan and the Juniorette Chairman is Stephanie Furano. We realize that the Juniorette clubs have special needs and we are prepared to undertake the challenge.

No need to reinvent the wheel. The first step in any successful club campaign is the appointment an enthusiastic chairman and committee. These dynamos will be the starting point and springboard to light the fire of recruitment in your club. Next if you do not already have them, PLEASE order the GFWC Membership booklets 1) How to Recruit New GFWC Members 2) How to Retain GFWC Club Members and 3) How to Build New GFWC Clubs. Each booklet contains step-by-step instructions for successful campaigns. We all love bargains and you can get a discount if you order all three at once. Contact GFWC Headquarters NOW so you can have these vital tools in plenty of time to plan over the summer.

The Membership Recruitment Campaigns in October are meant to be team efforts, informational, and most of all FUN! You can take a worthwhile community project and partner with other organizations for great public relations. You can have flyers about your next club meeting promoting a speaker on the topic of the project. Ask participants to sign in with a name, address and phone number and the committee can mail out invitations and include a club newsletter or two. Please remember to follow-up with a personal phone call before the meeting and offer a ride, just may be the little push the prospective member needed.

Take a cute and clever idea to entice the guests to attend the next club meeting and/or your special membership drive event. Plan for the officers and chairmen to inform potential members about the individual club, ongoing projects within the community and to explain the benefits of belonging to GFWC and the great network of clubs across the country and around the world. The Membership video from GFWC gives a great overview of the organization. An updated version should be available soon from the GFWC materials center. Informational meetings can instruct current members on facts they didn't know or may have forgotten. Using all the right tools will build informed, enthusiastic, dedicated new members.

The month of October is a virtual gold mine of potential themes for recruitment events. GFWC Membership Director Debbe Gladstone shared in a "Membership Matters" that many National Awareness topics fit right in with our department or public policy focuses. The project and program possibilities are only limited by the imagination of our outstanding members!



Make a Difference Day is October 26th and community projects could fit any department or special project. GFWC/OFWC's new state project is Women's Heart Health. Please go to www.nhlbi.nih.gov/health/hearttruth for ideas for projects that can be used as recruitment events.

Fun events could be planned around these other National awareness topics:
Invite guests to a membership event and feature an array of delicious angel food, cookies, and other desserts to celebrate National Dessert, Cookie and Angle Food Month. You know several would have to be chocolate. Friendship, food and information will be shared and recipes could be promised at the next meeting. That's one sure-fire way to get them back to a second meeting.

Invite a local chef or nutritionist and prepare and serve heart healthy and vegetarian snacks to celebrate World Vegetarian Day. You could ask participants to bring nonperishable foods to be donated to your local food band for World Food Day. A program on heart health could be an added bonus. Again share recipes at the next meeting.

October is National Pizza, popcorn popping and roller skating month. Host a Halloween or a roller skating and pizza party for the youth of the community and hold the informational meeting with the mothers at the same time. Another party could be a chick flick evening and serve popcorn. Great way to host a bunch of ladies and include the Membership video as a sneak preview of coming attractions when they join your club.

Ohio's Membership Construction Crew is starting with recruitment but we will be following up with retention and we have great plans on the drawing board to build new clubs. This Membership Campaign is a work in progress so please Pardon Our Dust as we all work to build a bigger, stronger GFWC/Ohio Federation of Women's Clubs one member at a time!



e-mail For more information on membership, e-mail the OFWC Membership Chair, Patrice Booze.
For information on the Districts and individual clubs in OFWC, click here.
To return to the OFWC home page, click here.