DGE David Willis: Rotary Membership

District Governor Elect David Willis joined us for today’s meeting to talk about membership matters.

He mentioned that Rotary International in Great Britain & Ireland has set a target of increasing membership by 600 this Rotary year. That equates to about 25 per District. District 1240 is doing better than that because it has already added 47 new members this year, 25 of them in the new Rotary Club of Southend City.

He told us about some of the ways new members had been recruited. Most current members would have been recruited by an existing member who invited them along. New members can still be recruited this way but Clubs were also increasing their membership by publicising their activities on social media.

Another good way of recruiting new members is by involving them in Club projects. His own Club, the Rotary Club of Manningtree Stour Valley, had organised a project to clean local street signs which had been well supported by those who were not yet members, some of whom became members.

Corporate members could bring a lot to a Club. One new Club was made up exclusively of corporate members. (Our Club already has a corporate member, Backhouse Solicitors.)

Some Clubs were changing the pattern of their meetings. One lunchtime Club was now meeting for lunch twice a month and for drinks in the evening on two days a month. Others had become less formal but whatever we did should fit in with the existing members’ wishes.