Membership and levy consultation

[andypat]

I'd imagine a lot of the level D evening events put on in and around Glasgow that typically attract 10-20 punters would become unsustainable to put on (assuming it was £30 flat rate).

[Sunlit Forres]

I'd imagine a lot of the level D evening events put on in and around Glasgow that typically attract 10-20 punters would become unsustainable to put on (assuming it was £30 flat rate).

But if those sort of events were just aimed at a local audience and advertised locally, they wouldn't need to be registered for publicity hence wouldn't attract a charge - perhaps just a very small per-head levy. I'm sure there are plenty more flaws in the idea but it was just a thought.

[Paul Frost]

What does anyone think about having a flat-rate event registration fee? Given that in 2010 there were 1755 events, it would have generated £52,650 if there was a £30 fee for every event that appeared on the BOF fixtures list (closed fixtures and activties etc not requiring publicity and hence not appearing on the fixtures list should be free).

The purpose of registering events is just that, registration, this proves it's an official event and covered by insurance. So we don't want to encourage clubs to try and "cheat" the system and not register events to save money. Plus the statistics would look better and help funding requests the more official events there are.
If there is any publicity attached to that it would be incidental. When the event list is available to association and club websites as a feed that can be filtered to show the relevant events it will be more useful as a publicity tool, but don't hold your breath, it's been on the promise list for at least 2 years.

I'm also puzzled by the view that we seem happy to make regular orienteers subsidise casual ones. If EVERY participant paid their share of developing/managing/organising the sport it would reduce the cost to regular orienteers. If individual clubs think that offering "loss leaders" to encourage newcomers is a good strategy (I personally don't believe it is, as it risks devaluing the sport), then they should fund that themselves.

[SeanC]

There is a problem with very small events held in areas with high fixed costs. For example Bexley, Bromley and Croydon councils charge a flat land use fee of between £40 and £60, and these London parks are often the best areas to attract newcomers. This shouldn't be a problem if clubs have a good mix of events and can cross subsidise, but clubs starting out a new series might be deterred. Making the first 20 or so competitors levy free would reduce this problem, or clubs starting a new local series could be given a grant from the BOF development fund as start up costs until numbers reach a more financially sustainable level?

I think local event pricing is often set using the pricing values of the experienced orienteer rather than the newcomers we seek to attract. Eg a regional = £12, district = £5 so a local event in a lesser quality (for an experienced orienteer) area must be less. Feedback from some of our newcomers is that they find our local events (priced at £4 or £3 for adults and free for children) cheaper than they expected, especially when they find out that the map is specially prepared and the SI kit costs several thousand pounds.

This might not be true elsewhere in the country, but there does seem scope for raising prices at local events without damaging attendance - in fact the opposite would probably be true if the extra revenue is ploughed back into development initiatives, advertising etc. There might be complaints from some influential experienced orienteers used to cheaper prices, but I think these can be overcome if higher prices are justified by more places, more people vision. Also some imaginative offers to support the volunteering club member who is also being asked to pay more, such as organisers being offered completely free entry for an entire series, might help too.

[Glucosamine]

online free registration which doesn't need renewals and all the work is done by a computer system

That's fine as long as you're not delivering any "membership benefits" of the sort that takes time/costs money to produce - magazines, annual membership cards, stuff like that.

ParkRun does provide an interesting comparison. Free to register. Free barcode membership card. Free newsletters. Automated results and tabulations. Volunteers to keep events free on the day (familiar?). Central costs covered (for now) by sponsorship. As ParkRun continues to expand (now going international), the sums may be become harder to square. Athletics proper seems to be following a parallel participation path with RunEngland (apparently following a Scottish model). Orienteering has maps and SI to pay for, but is it really so very different otherwise?

[SeanC]

My impression is that ParkRun can do this because the have a fixed franchise formula that works and scales. Same distance, same computer system, same event format. They make maximum use of computer systems which don't get significantly more expensive as the format grows, and the fixed format is easy for everyone to understand and promote. Because the format is fixed there is no need to spend money working out event levels, course standards blah blah. I do like the way their model praises volunteers as much as possible, and that the tasks are generally quite simple so it's probably easier to get volunteers.

Orienteers can't agree on anything though and seem to distrust central systems and models.

[Clive Coles]

I think this is the hub of the problem

Orienteers can't agree on anything though and seem to distrust central systems and models.

I think there is still a place for a nominal, easy to administer BOF membership fee ~ say £10 for Seniors & £5 for Juniors ( and I suppose Students) but after that raise all the remaining necessary funding through event levy on all participants

Let's scrap the concept of national and local members and stop trying to tie levels of membership to a spurious package of benefits.

This two tier membership has been divisive and has led to accusations that Local members don't pay their way. Let all BOF members pay the same Senior/Junior membership fee. The rest of the revenue is raised from those who participate the most.

We then don't need a Local and National Focus ~ just one simple newsletter probably not produced more often than twice a year. Much of what is contained in Focus is also covered by articles in Compasssport. We can surely make some economies here.

The BOF membership fee would cover little more than the production of a membership card and some national office costs.

The elite programme should continue to be mainly funded by grants ~ maybe a proportion of revenue generated through the event levy could be ringfenced for this purpose.

I see no need for BOF to dictate what clubs charge as entry fees or if they surcharge non-BOF members. Let clubs decide this for themselves ~ it's for them to cover their costs as they wish.

[Mrs H]

I was just doing a bit of research for my next Compasssport Column and, for reasons which you will discover when you read it, found out that Trampolining ceased to have it's own separate governing body in 1999 when the sport fell under the jurisdiction of the British Gymnastic Association. the following year if became an olympic sport. This aspect of the sport is not what I was looking into so I don't know the whys and the wherefores but thought it interesting none the less.

Do you think there is any mileage in orienteering abandoning it's own governing body and throwing in it's cap with another running or adventure sport?

[IanD]

Do you think there is any mileage in orienteering abandoning it's own governing body and throwing in it's cap with another running or adventure sport?

An interesting question.

I think only if the other governing body really wanted to take orienteering on, and then only if there was enough commonality of interest. I think it unlikely.

Trampolining does not need any significant facilities beyond that which other forms of gymnastics require. Just a trampoline, in fact. The main facilities problem would not be finding trampolines, but finding halls to put them on - a problem shared with other forms of gymnastics.

By contrast, orienteering has special requirements which are not shared.

If we threw our cap in with the general track and field athletics governing body, their primary facilities concern would be athletics tracks and stadiums; can you see them being interested in maps and forest access? We would perhaps be closer to fell running, but again they mainly use public rights of way and open access land; our map and forest concerns would be of no interest to them.

So, Mrs H, while I welcome your continuing to "ask the unthinkable", I think you are barking up the wrong tree this time.

[EddieH]

The very thought of being incorporaed into the beaurocratic AAA/SAAA would be frightening. It was precisely to avoid the way these bodies operate the Chris Brasher et al set up BOF as a separate body whose officers MUST be active orienteers.

[SJC]

If we threw our cap in with the general track and field athletics governing body, their primary facilities concern would be athletics tracks and stadiums; can you see them being interested in maps and forest access?

Cross country running was dropped from the Olympics after 1924, and the cross country element that originally formed part of the modern pentathlon has been reduced to a biathlon style lap of the park and shoot for 2012. The possibility of any sport that requires leaving the confines of what is easy to televise making it into the Olympics is non-existent.
(Maybe we should put all our efforts into developing the Micro sprint concept ?)

[NeilC]

The very thought of being incorporaed into the beaurocratic AAA/SAAA would be frightening. It was precisely to avoid the way these bodies operate the Chris Brasher et al set up BOF as a separate body whose officers MUST be active orienteers.

Interesting then that the job specification for the new (unpaid) chair of the new Events and Competitions Committee asks for lots of management experience, but not for any detailed knowledge of orienteering.

[graeme]

What Eddie said. Complaining about BOF doesn't make other NGBs any better.

BOF is the best run sports National Governing Body I'm aware of, bar none .
And the way things are going we'll soon test that by merging with the governing body for Adventure Racing...

[LostAgain]

Do you think there is any mileage in orienteering abandoning it's own governing body and throwing in it's cap with another running or adventure sport?

An interesting question.

I think only if the other governing body really wanted to take orienteering on, and then only if there was enough commonality of interest. I think it unlikely.

Fell Running & Mountain Marathons?

[Mrs H]

I'm not really barking up any tree - you know me I just like to get people thinking and talking. But I do secretly wonder sometimes how much self-preservation is built into BOF professional staff's work (finding the money to pay themselves) and how much is about the administration and furtherance of the sport itself.

There are also other aspects of professionally delivered elements of the sport which disturb me - but i'm keeping my powder dry on those for the moment.