a quick question for you all

[big_fish_guy]

just putting this question out there... if no interest, i'll stop posting about it here.
Is anyone even slightly interested in helping me out by attending the Delta waterfowl banquet that we put together for our chapter that was just created in the SE metro?

It's thursday feb 22nd, and we are really struggling selling tickets as it's a new chapter and word hasn't gotten out. We have a great event put together, and there is tons of stuff... you don't have to be a duck hunter to enjoy it. really, if you are just a hunter, i think you'll be happy with it.
A portion of our proceeds go to do things local, sponsor HS trap teams, youth mentor hunts, and build hen and wood duck houses on the Mississippi.
We can't do any of it with out people coming to the event.

if you sign up before this friday, you'll be entered into the early bird drawing for $200 in raffle tickets.

ticket info here. https://deltawaterfowl.org/se-metro-chapter/

[lanyard]

BFG~

I can tell you, I'm interested in what you're doing but have no interest in going to the event.

Personal reasons:
1) Thursday night..... band concerts, swimming, basketball, baseball is starting, whatever...
2) Cottage Grove..... from Chanhassen that's almost as BFE as Stillwater. I'd do better just mailing you $60 and saying "keep the change"
3) Kids, man..... after taxes, my largest household expense is kids. See above re: time.... remember, Time = Money... No Time = No Money

Strategic Issues I see with your start-up:
1) No clear reason. "Sponsor HS Trap Teams".... great, which ones? "Other local projects".... excellent, identify something first.
2) No differentiation: this isn't your fault, banquets ran their hay day in the 80's and 90's. The model is cliche.
3) Straight up competition: DU, PF, other Delta Chapters, MWA, are all longer established than your chapter. Also, cancer, ice bucket challenges, etc.... everyone's life is full of organizations holding fundraisers to help save the world. Run for Warriors, Ride for Leukemia, Walk for Breast Cancer....
4) Hunter numbers appear to have stabilized, but there is no net gain on recruitment at this point. At best, we're only adding one hunter per person that quits or dies.
5) Relative wealth has made auction prizes fairly worthless. It's like going to a garage sale and paying the new price for something that is NIB.... it doesn't happen. I can get that deal better when things are on sale. You need to find "experiences". In my life right now, I don't need another damn duck print or lamp or chair or blanket. Want to make an impact on my life: time or discounts at Dick's Sporting Goods, Fleet Farm, the local inside baseball facility, or get me one of those discount cards the kids sell with the coupons at the pizza place, etc. Maybe some free birds at a pheasant farm, or a free round of trap or sporting clays, a half day boat rental or guided fishing on the St Croix. The BIGGEST fundraiser at my kids school has been the M'tonka boat cruise.... you want to attract middle age people with kids: give them a night away to do good and drink.... at something a bit more up scale than the VFW. My wife is HUGE on that trip. But she won't be going to anymore duck banquets and barely suffers the PTO Spring Fling..... it's the "other", desirable, experience she gets from suffering through the fundraiser.

Reccomendations:
1) Strategy vs Tactics: if the focus is on local spending/support, the recruitment needs to be local in both sponsors and attendees.
2) Clarify mission: "We're good guys doing good", meh. Better: "Raising awareness and sponsorship for Cottage Grove HS Trap team, water improvements for Local Crap Hole Carp Infested Waters, and increasing local wildlife habitat....."
3) Find a partner with an existing, larger brand. This might be the HS School Trap Team, a local celebrity, a large employer in the area (Flint Hills, 3M, any of the processors sitting on remediation sites along the river?), your State Legislators, the Mississippi USFWS peeps, whatever.... but get someone involved that more people will recognize their name.
4) Bring a call maker in to do tuning and sell their calls. Maybe take some % commission for orders on site or something. Or, better yet, a cigar roller!
5) Long haul: first year profitability is a very, very long shot. You're going to need a patron money person/sponsor, see Item 3.
6) Get a kick back from the VFW on their charitable gambling donation requirements if it's not already dedicated to another f'ing hockey team
7) Start a firearms safety training program through the chapter. It is a HUGE need in the community, fits the mission, acts as a recruitment point, expands your chapter's brand awareness/development, etc.
8) Clean water, clean water, clean water. Time and time again, the higher value social benefit of Clean Water will win out over a hen house. for you, maybe it's rain gardens, or helping the boy scouts with storm drains, or lining up as a partner for bank restoration, or helping with silt removal before a damn gets pulled, etc. Whatever it is, the target of Clean Water is more better for humans and ducks and granola munchers in Volvos.

Good luck man. I did that job for a long time. It's fairly thankless and your success will be based on your committee being able to bond as a group, stay on message, and "on board" strategic partners that will be the primary recruitment for banquet attendance.

[big_fish_guy]

lanyard, thanks for feedback.
You have some good ideas there, thanks.
ok, to be specific, this year we are sponsoring Cottage grove, Hastings and Red Wing trap teams. We will work with Oakdale gun club to do youth firearms shoots.
We have the standard gear items and guns for prizes... but we have guided fly fishing trip, Red Wing Shoe experience, Hot air balloon ride, membership and pheasant hunt at wings north... but i hear ya

as for the venue.. I understand that too... but starting out i have to take what i can work with. I am a member at the VFW, and well, it fit in the budget if you know what i mean.

And i understand that there is fierce competition out there for everyone's donation dollars. And with in the outdoor banquets...
Thanks for the feedback, it gives me some more stuff to think about.

[Quack]

I've been in your shoes and it can be fun, but it's a tough party to throw.

First problem, in regard to your post, there's only about 12 people that participate on this site.

I second all the reasons Lanyard stated. I'm in rural northern MN and you'd think a night out for the banquet would be an easy sell right? Wrong. Everyone everywhere is "busy" and we went into the last three banquets thinking ticket sales were going to crash. No one is willing to plan ahead and commit. The last two weeks, the RD freaks out, and 7-10 days out we're talking about reducing the prize list because ticket sales are so low. Last year he almost cancelled the event during the last week but we hung on and enough people bought tix to have a decent fundraiser... but the constant stress and drama was enough for me.

The real beauty around here, every local group has ripped off the "conservation banquet" model so you have all the state and national conservation groups trying to hustle tix, plus churches, Eagles Club, High School Football team, Baseball boosters, Basketball boosters. All of them do the banquet / auction / gun raffle model up here. And 100% of that money stays local.

So I'd say ditch Delta and throw your own party for the trap team and keep all the money. The kids on the team help sell tix around the community since they have a vested interest in raising the funds, the kids also help with the banquet the night of, their parents come and spend money, and you network to sell tix to support "local youth sports"

[lanyard]

BFG-

Quack's got some interesting points that are more fresh than my experience. Now, with the advent of the internet, everything is planned JIT. Back in the day you didn't have so much competing with your customer's attention. No one knows what they're doing next Friday unless it's a commitment they pre-paid for, like a basketball tournament in St. Cloud......

and don't worry, I get the VFW. Ran a banquet at Hopkins VFW for a number of years. Tough to break away from, and it's likely where you need to start.

On leveraging the support for the donations, I'd talk with the ADs or the Booster Club's at the schools (they'll likely take the money into an earmarked fund for the trap team if they are school sanctioned) and see if they could help work with the teams through DECA. The fundraising and mission development could be a Capstone for their graduation. Likely no help now, but in a "outside the box" concept, this could be a solid 2-3 year plan.

Good work on the Hot Air Balloon Ride, fly fishing, etc. I do recall you had that posted in the other thread, I was just working off your Delta Sign-up page.

Other things: 1- get your own dedicated web page that will let you pump the sizzle. you can get one for free at Weebly.com, Wix.com or Squarespace.com; 2- do the same with your facebook page if you haven't already; 3- get some young buck that undertands Pinterest, Instagram, and SnapChat. I can't believe these things matter, but holy hell, if you Google "home made duck boat blind" like 70% of the results are wankers dropping their pics into Pinterest. I thought it was just a place for mom's to share recipes and pics of bad decisions after the divorce, but apparently its a thing guys do with camo, too. I used Facebook Messenger today and my daughter says, 'People still use that?'. Don't bother with Twitter. The only thing happening on Twitter is the Presidential Tweet Parade and things you need to know from people that could have just sent an e-mail anyway.

Again, don't get too discouraged. One thing we also tried to focus on was "value proposition" in getting a sponsor. Right now, your local construction contractors are at their slowest period. See if one of them would take a Corporate Sponsorship Deal, like 3 tables for $1000 and a print for the office. They've got a crew that: 1) likes to eat free, especially on the Boss's dime; 2) likes to drink; 3) tends to make bad personal purchasing decisions (I used to run a construction company). Particularly your first year, bodies in the room!

[big_fish_guy]

thanks guys for the feedback. and didn't know there were that few active people on the site... we need keller back i suppose

[9manfan]

Facebook seems to be the big hangout now days for advertising things.....

[lanyard]

Facebook seems to be the big hangout now days for advertising things.....

Yeah, but you need to get into a group for it to be effective. Facebook was watching "engagement" numbers plummet and figured out that people don't really like seeing spam in their news feed.

Someone just posted a DU event in the Minnesota Waterfowlers FB forum. That would be the best bet to get in front of people's face with it.

The last few months some hunting and fishing friends have been signing me up for different groups. I just went through and "unfollowed" these, but still "like" them so I can check in when it's timely, but I don't need that shit cluttering up what I view as a necessary pain in the ass way to keep track of family, etc.

If I was BFG I'd see if there were any local fishing tournaments or get to the bait store, gun shop, etc with some sort of coupon like a 2 fer coupon on beers or see if the VFW would do some sort of happy hour pricing, let them buy the keg (like a wedding), etc.

I know these things are family affairs, but it's kind of like what Las Vegas went through trying to change it's image from "Sin City" to become a family destination.... in the end they had to make it cool for adults because they're taking the kids to f'ing Disney World and need to scrub the Zippy-freaking-Doo-Dah off their skin.... Zip lines, roller coasters on 80 story buildings, booze, hookers, and gambling is apparently a decent antidote to Disney World.

I'm of the opinion that making everything family/kid/woman recruitment has the 80%+ of hunters not feeling like it's really a deal for them. Let's face it, for the most part married men are a bunch of sorry sad sacks that are looking for a legit reason to drink, sneak a cigarette or cigar, and drop some cash on light gambling.... but since most of us aren't complete ass wipes we like to feel like we're doing good and helping things out like ducks, pheasants, deer, the local ball field, whatever.

Me and another buddy just shake our heads at the memory of growing up with dads that smoked in the house, were never home on a Friday night, etc. but still managed to coach baseball, be active in the community, and kill shit on weekends.

[9manfan]

Yep, I join but unfollow them, way too much drama and like you say it clutters up when I go on FB, I thought the Ice Fishing Mn site was bad for whiney bitches but I belong to a Auto Body repair site and they are worse, my God people need to not get they're feelings hurt so easy.....

[Hansen]

I come probably once a day still. Don't post much. I've been involved from the start with the SW metro chapter. With a few exceptions we have had the same number of guys coming to our banquet for 10+ years. It's great, don't get me wrong. I just wonder where the banquet events are headed. I've gone to dozen and dozens and dozens. With a few difference they are all the same honestly, sorta stalled out IMO. If my kids didn't have hoops this weekend I would probably attend.