Joining Fees

Originally posted by RS400atC HISC is not your average sailing club. I know an awful lot of people who sail dinghies in the area, and a few HISC members. Most of the HISC members I know have weekend/holiday places on 'that island' at £250k and upwards, which makes even a 4-digit joining fee insignificant. You won't fit in there if you can't afford a new boat every other year anyway. Most of the other HISC members I know joined young and probably got a better deal. There are a dozen clubs within pushbike distance for 'normal people'. The south coast/solent sailing eco-system is not like the rest of the UK. HISC is was it is. It does a lot for top-end sailing, and it's actually possible to sail there quite a bit as a local pleb without joining. Don't knock it until you've done Fed week a few times!

You have a very lopsided view of the 'typical' HISC demograpghic. Granted it is not an 'average' sailing club, but people travel for the facilities offered. The same is true at another south cost club where members I know travel from Bucks, Berks & NE Kent because of the sailing on offer.

None of the regular sailors in the fleet that I sail in have holiday homes on the island. Almost all are local; living and / or working on the island or nearby.

As for the new boat every other year - that's just total b*lls. The newest boats in the Fireball fleet are older than two years. Mine is now 13 and not the oldest by any means. At a rough guess I would put the average somewhere above 8.

HISC might have had a reputation for being elitest in the past. It is certainly not true now. I'm just an ordinary Joe club sailor who struggles to get into the top half of a circuit or nationals fleet and have been welcomed by everyone there.

The club is well run, with membership and joining fees set at rates that allow the wonderful facilities to be maintained and upgraded when necessary, whilst attracting the demographic the club feels is beneficial to its future success.

It might be understood from the above that I'm a fan. True, and unashamed to say so!

the only joining fee justifications for me would be

i) if the club uses the additional funds to create berthing spaces for new members
ii) and/or parking spaces to the first

Anything else is just BS.  I asked around about 'joining fees' and I noted a great deal of clubs at the Dinghy Show wave them to attract new members anyway (most I spoke to 2 years ago, didn't go this year) so they obviously have little, if any, fiscal significance to the clubs charging them.

HISC entry fees are at the bottom of the link up thread. You don't pay them as an under 30. 

Edited by mozzy - 10 Oct 16 at 1:36pm

And that wouldn't work eithrt because the sample is statistically insignificant 

Don't want to pay the joining fee...then go somewhere else.

As it's been mentioned - the fee is part of the clubs revenue stream which otherwise would increase further the current members fees. We've all paid it and isn't an issue, and personally feel like it was a "buy in" to the longer term investment in the club.

We have a joining fee which if you join in the last half of the sailing year is waivered...but to be honest, people still want to join at the beginning of the year and happy to pay it without comment.