AVA Checkpoint

Official Voice of the American Volkssport Association

August, 1997

For the six plus years that I have been with the AVA, we have been talking about marketing and selling the association to the public. We all know that we cannot do that with the effort coming only from the National Headquarters. For your events to be successful, your club must market them locally. It cannot be done at the national level - just as the old song says '· · · only you" can make it happen. What we can do at the national level is give you a variety of tools to make your marketing job easier. Our goal is to do just that Unfortunately, an undertaking such as this will be expensive if we want the quality tools we need for success. With that in mind, we are offering you a 'once in a millennium" opportunity to help us develop those tools for you. At the convention in June, I announced the kickoff of a four-year fund raising campaign to raise $100,000 ($25,000 per year) to develop quality, professional marketing tools and resources that help us in our promotion of volkssporting and the AVA. Now, a little less than two months into the first year of the campaign, we have received $2,130 toward our first year goal of $25,000. I am confident that as the year goes along and as we publicize the campaign more intensively, the pace of donations will increase. We do need everyone's help, however, to make this campaign a success. Please help us promote this fundraising effort. In the last CHECKPOINT, we sent you a copy of the campaign brochure. Use that as your guide and encourage your club members and fellow volkssporters to donate to the campaign. If you would like more brochures, please let us know and we will send them. Let's not miss this opportunity to answer an aging need of the AVA. The results will come quickly - see the story in this issue about the first project aimed at helping promote your club and volkssporting. As a team, we can be successful in ensuring that we are volkssporting into the 21st century.

There were several technical errors in the Executive Council meeting report that we sent to you last month. Those errors have been corrected and we have included a revised copy of the report with this Checkpoint. Report online

October TAW Delivery.

As we write this issue of Checkpoint, the UPS strike has just ended. This strike still may affect the timely delivery of the October issue of The American Wanderer (TAW). We mail TAW through the U.S. Postal Service at a second-class rate called Periodicals Postage. Due to the strike, U.S. Post Offices are handling an increased volume of letters and packages, creating backlogs, in some areas, for lower-priority mail pieces such as second-class service. Though the strike has ended, some mail distribution centers may not be operating at a normal capacity when we mail the paper in mid-September. Our goal is to work ahead of our normal production period for for this issues to allow for more mailing time for the October TAW

AVA Headquarters has begun an extensive membership survey, including a canvassing of 200 AVA-IVV Achievement participants and 560 (assorted) Volkssports Associate members. This information gathering project is vital to AVA strategic planning and development and, importantly, to help us better serve our association members. For example, we seek a member profile (age, gender, residence), volkssporting likes and dislikes, and/other health and fitness related questions. Individual survey responses are anonymous. Due to postage costs, we have not sent surveys in this issue of CHECKPOINT; however, clubs who are interested in participating may receive surveys and/or a master copy of a survey (to make additional copies) by requesting materials from AVA Headquarters. Send your postcard/letter request to: Sandra Ward, AVA, 1001 Pat Beaker Road, Suite 101, Universal City, TX 78148.

Enclosed is a form with three ballots to Vote for the Top Ten YRE's. Please make copies of this form as needed for your club members. Voting is down significantly from last year; however, volkssporters have an opportunity to vote for their favorite walks until September 30. Form online

As part of this mailing, we have given you a sample press release for National Volkssporting Month. If you have an event during October, this press release will help you publicize both your club and your event. It provides an excellent opportunity to bring more visibility to volkssporting in your community. Sample online

The first meeting of Executive Council X will be Sunday, September 21, at the Quality inn and Conference Center, 10811 IH 35 North, San Antonio, Texas. The meeting will begin at 8 a.m. and will be open to any volkssporter who would like to attend.

Millennium Fund Grows Slowly But Work Underway.

The new Millennium Fund is growing slowly every week With almost two months since the campaign began, we have received less than 10% of our goal of $25,000. Although we had hoped to be further along in our contributions received, we have already begun to work on the first part of our new marketing effort We currently have two, sixty-second television commercials in production, The contractor hopes to have these ready for review by the Executive Council at their September meeting. Once the EC approves these, the commercials will be available to the clubs and state organizations at a reasonable price. Watch for more details on this great new promotional product.

Winton-Salem IML Registration Ongoing.

July, 1997

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