Club Gti Future?

[Jay2 0]

Just thought I'd try and get some feedback from some more Corrado Owners.

 

Got a letter through today saying that Club GTi is skint, basically. Due to lack of new members and internet sites?! The change is to do away with the 'Rabbit' magazine and stick to the internet, to get any news and features to the members. Membership would then be reduced to £10 a year.

 

Now my immediate thoughts were that anything is better than the club going to the wall, as I've been a member of Club GTi since I had a MkII GTi many years ago, and even though I've changed cars a few times I've always re-newed my membership so as to keep up with the VW scene, which I've eventually returned back to.

 

The internet may be a cheaper option than sending out proper printed magazines but its not the be all and end all. For a start I still need something to read on the bog.

 

Is this the start of a spreading trend?

[dinkus 10]

Could I suggest sir invests in a wi-fi enabled laptop? You can live on the bog then! :lol:

[carpy25 0]

i'm a member of club gti have been for around 4 year won't be paying next year as our local branch has broken away due to the members feeling they weren't getting value for their money , i have to say personally i felt the we were being treated as second class members compaired to other regions. £25 is a lot of money for a few mags and they are becomming full of adds , hope they pull it together don't want to see them fold but they do need to open their eyes and see the whole picture

 

Rob

corrado club member

polo club member

club gti member

newport edition member

[Supercharged 2]

They already do eRabbit... I had heard they were having problems and membership is really low considering they should be able to attract members of all Golf based cars out there inc Seats etc... makes the Corrado Club membership figures look great in comparison!

 

I think most of it is to do with organisation, I was a member for years but since i moved house they managed to completly mess up my renewal and I had to chase it up so many times it was ridiculous, they didn't send me the form this year so I didn't renew.

 

The other problem is the shows - too many of them, badly organised and too expensive for customers and traders (talking VW scene in general here)

 

Lastly the regional scene down here is pants, there used to be regular meets but then we merged with another region and that was going really well and then just stopped for some reason... I'll just stick with the Corrado Club for now I think as stuff seems to be picking up...

[gsbellew 0]

Sad to see, but was bound to happen, I was a member for 3 years, well 4 actually, in that I was charged for the 4th year but never received anything, not one letter / Rabbit, nothing, didnt get a renewal notice either and was in my bollox chasing up another years membership for no reason, bear in mind being in Ireland I was being charged an international membership rate, no discounts were valid here so without the small incentive of the Rabbit mag there was very little reason to remain a member.

 

Funnily the last issue I ever got was the one that had my G40 and Mk2 track car featured in it :lol:

[Henny 0]

I've been a member pretty much all the time since 1994 when I got my first Golf GTI, and I've watched it as they've battled to keep it afloat with the incoming wave of smaller, more localised web clubs and Forums threatening to swamp it and finally send it under....

 

It'll be a real shame if it does go under, but I can't see a way they're going to keep it afloat and still justify the membership costs... :(

 

The curborough sprint days would be the biggest thing I'd miss... Always been a great day out, although there was a markedly noticable lack of people and cars at this years event... :(

[Yandards 0]

I've been a member pretty much all the time since 1994 when I got my first Golf GTI, and I've watched it as they've battled to keep it afloat with the incoming wave of smaller, more localised web clubs and Forums threatening to swamp it and finally send it under....

 

I think this is a problem within the whole VW scene ATM, and has been for a while.

 

The problem that I see is that there are a lot of dubbers out there and the more fragmented we get the less well represented the scene is. A really well organised club with a large membership base the club Gti could/would have been would have some serious clout - maybe even enough to get obsolete parts manufactured.

[Henny 0]

yup, but that's the way that the car owning world is going at the moment... it's not just CGTI that's suffering... we all know about CCGB, but there's many other clubs for many other makes that are suffering the same fate... :(

 

I can't think of a single older club that's managed to embrace Forums and the internet and be progressive enough to keep the membership numbers that they used to have pre-internet as well as keep their friendly local meetings going... :(

[mattosmond 0]

why do people need to have a magazine? it must cost a fortune to produce..... if all forums were as tidy as this one then i think that would be sufficent... i much prefer looking online and then being able to chat to other enthusiasts..... But the forums like golfgti.co.uk are just pants,,, must be due to the fact that loads of monkeys have got golfs now as mk3's are dirt cheap and mk4's are good value..... so they clog up forums with their un-educated rubbish... for example i had a look on the forum entioned above and someone had asked why their mk3 gti 8v wouldn't rev over 5000 rpm and people were saying that the 'clever people at volkswagen limited them to this et etc' , the redline is 6000 or just over and mine revs all the way up...... whereas here you get people who know the answers or don't post not just make up b&llocks for the sake of it... rant over.... but back to the point £25 squid is quite alot,,,,,, i also think that the mags like pvw are getting a bit cr@p and very repetetive now.... the scene has alot of good cars being produced but the majority is the same euro (boring) look that has been done for years.....

[Jay2 0]

I agree, that its great that the internet has led to more, smaller splinter groups along regional, car/engine models, etc.

 

Which are all well and good for social meets and stands at the shows, but having an all encompassing umbrella group, such as Club GTi or CCGB is surely essential, if only to have more clout to actually organise bigger events, track days, group buys, etc.

 

I'm also a member of the Capri Club, (too much Professional's when I was younger), which publishes a monthly club mag, discount card for members, organises shows and has the clout to get parts made which have long been discontinued. All for the same £25 annual membership. With the club acting as a central point for all the various regional clubs to organise more local meets and events.

 

Is it easier for the members to say what they want and take the Club GTi forward from their?

 

I'm also worried that if you go to the ClubGTi Website, there's nothing on about the changes? Am I the only one they want out?? :shock:

 

On the subject of mags, I've never yet suffered with connection problems, crappy BT customer service, people trying to knick my details and bank info, slooooooow connection speeds for photo's, ................

[carpy25 0]

your not the only one jay i got a letter today telling me about their changes to the set up and the intention to reduce the membership fee to £10 per year,dropping the hard copy of the rabbit going more internet based and giving me the chance to object ,they have been clever about the way the letter is worded as you have to reply to object and as most of those that would object can't be bothered to reply

 

anyway as i said above hope they pull it off but they won't be having any more of my money sorry

 

Rob

[saysomestuff 0]

Sorry but a club without members simply isn't serving the needs of enough people, it would have more members if it was.

 

Membership doesn't have to provide a leaflet or magazine - it's the community that counts, and we're a captive audience in that there already IS a community; look what flickr, myspace and youtube have achieved by taking a simple need a serving it well to build a community from scratch. Half that works already done when you look at dubbers - the sooner the big clubs realise this and start to work toward it, the better for the whole scene.

 

Individuality collectively represented is more important to the survival of the scene than everyone wearing the same badge; and if a few big old clubs need to go under to kick the others up the arse, then that's fine by me.

 

[/2p]

[Yandards 0]

My problem with club GTi and CCGB is that compared to my other car club, the Triumph Sports Six, they are no-where near as good.

 

They have embraced the interweb thingy, have over 30k members (Not bad for a production run across the entire model range of less than the Golf), have a large well attended club weekend and still produce an excellent monthly magazine.

 

To cap it all off they employ people full time to run the club shop which sells lots of parts and upgrades as well as run a club museum that houses some fairly unique examples of the various marques; including one of the chassis only motor show display stand type things.

 

All that for under £35 a year and you get a book detailing members across Europe that will offer accomodation/tools/help if you breakdown near them!

[Walesy 0]

To cap it all off they employ people full time to run the club shop which sells lots of parts and upgrades as well as run a club museum that houses some fairly unique examples of the various marques; including one of the chassis only motor show display stand type things.

 

That's all well and good when you have 30k people paying £35 a year though! :)

[Tempest 0]

Agree, I'd like to run the CCGB full-time if I could make a living out of it, but alas I do need my daytime job, which is, to say the elast, very time consuming (especially when you run your own company).

 

Probably the same for most of the volunteers working for the CCGB :roll:

 

Tempest

[Yandards 0]

That's all well and good when you have 30k people paying £35 a year though! :)

 

I suppose my point being that there are far more dubbers out there running mk. IIs let alone the whole of the VW community. As we are so fragmented we can't even think about getting that sort of an aspect to a club together.

 

They made more Corrados in total than three of the types that Triumph produced!

[Jay2 0]

Good question. Why is the letter and voting slip only if you disaprove of the change to get rid of the magazine, why not more open and ask for suggestions? Or people have to send their voting slips in for Yes or No.

 

I think the problem is that the changes have already been made by the Club and that the voting slips are just some way to justify them. The people who don't want the changes are simply going to vote with their membership renewels and hurt the club even more.

 

What exactly will I be getting for my £10?? I can already get on the ClubGTi site, go to the shows and their isn't that many places nearby to take advantage of the club discount scheme with some traders.

 

Clubs can be a great thing, look at some of the other car based owners clubs that have been mentioned. Why can't we have something similar with the number of VW fans out there?

[carpy25 0]

i live about 12 miles from one of clubgti so called discount dealers my mate phoned up to price a cluch for his cabby got a good quote of £90 or so went down to pick it up shows his clubcard asks for the offered 10% discount and was told its already been taken off , strange that until he'd shown the clubcard he'd never mentioned clubgti need less to say he contacted clubgti and as of 6 months later hes still wait for a reply

 

i will name the dealer if requested but this post is not ment to be a slur on them but a comment about the GREAT deal we have all been getting for our £25

 

Rob