Consultation Results and NEW overflow shooting possibility

 

Thanks so much to everyone that responded. There are a few things that arose from the consultation that we think it’s worth sending a group answer out for. Apologies that this is a long post but we want to address as many things as possible. We’ve given different sections headings so you can skip through as fast as you wish.

 

January blues

 

January is busy! January is always busy as lots of people decide to return to archery / shoot more in the New Year. In hindsight it wasn’t the best time to have reduced sessions but before Christmas we had a few weeks where we literally had 3 people in the 3pm Saturday session so something had to be done. The shooting line always calms down after the January rush subsides.

 

 

Overflow shooting

 

We’re happy to organise an overflow list so if you do wish to shoot on a Saturday or Sunday and there isn’t space please email into the office saying “Saturday overflow shoot DATE” or something of that nature in the subject line (if there are 2 of you please write “Sunday overflow shoot 9th Feb – 2 people”). If we get enough people who want to shoot we can schedule an extra session – we will need around 15 people for us to book an extra session at Downside. This weekend there is no possibility for a Saturday overflow but we have good availability for a Sunday overflow. Please email in if you’d like to put your name down.

 

Sunday should be easy to put on an overflow shoot on the roof pitch at the same time as regular shooting (or 12-2pm). The easiest slot that we’ll usually be able to find on a Saturday will be 10 to 12. Please specify if there are times you can’t do if you want an overflow spot. The more flexible you are the better the chance that we’ll be able to put on an extra shoot. This will also work for MONDAY shooting as we can book Downside – but not Wednesday.

 

24 hr notice period for cancellation

 

We expect 24 hrs notice if you can’t attend. For now we’re going to chase people for payment if they come up on our no-show list. If you’re on Direct Debit we also expect you to give 24hrs notice of cancellation. If you book and don’t attend while on the Direct Debit programme we will remove you from the scheme – we offer DD at a discount but this is on the basis that suitable notice for cancellation is given.

 

Informing new members about cancellation etc

 

We’ve realised that not enough people are aware of our cancellation policy, probably because everything is a bit overwhelming at first. Our cancellation period is set out in the new member welcome emails. As very few people seemed clear on the system we’re going to send out a follow-up email to the welcome one a month after people join the club.

 

Junior club / set up for 12pm Saturday shooting

 

Every session listed includes set up and take down time. Most shooting sessions will allow for around 1 to 1.5hrs of shooting time. This is the same as every other archery club that I know of with the exception of the very rare shops etc that have fixed ranges. The session times indicate when we have rented the space for the shoot i.e. we enter at that time and we leave at that time. We are better off than most clubs as we can often leave things set up from an earlier session. I’m afraid that we can’t guarantee that you’ll be able to shoot a full Portsmouth every time.. if you arrive and shoot 6 sighter arrows and then shoot 3 arrows every end you should be able to manage it.. but we can’t guarantee this. We have actively made some changes to try and get junior club out of the hall while members set up.. although a 20 minute set up time is actually pretty good. The more people that arrive early i.e. 12 o’clock the faster shooting will start. We know it can be slow on week 1 of a beginners course.. or if there’s a weekend course in but we do our best to keep the club moving. Again, the amount of weekend courses will calm right down later in the year – you can check starting weeks / whether a weekend course is scheduled etc on the website.

 

 

 

Late arrivals / staying on for 2^nd Saturday Session

 

If you arrive more than 20 minutes late you may not be able to shoot. There is obviously VERY limited availability on a Saturday now so :

 

• If you are booked in for session 2 STAY OUT OF THE HALL until 2pm

 

• If you are booked in for the first session and wish to stay for the second session please inform Diccon during session 1 and VACATE THE HALL at 2pm until all of the session 2 people have arrived. If there are still gaps at 2.20pm these can be filled by anyone that has stayed on.

 

• If you arrive for session 2 later than 2.20pm and your spot has gone you need to leave again! Please don’t embarrass people by demanding ‘your’ spot, it is now ‘their’ spot.

 

One or two people said in their response emails “Archers need to have more respect for other archers”. I think this is something that we all need to pay heed to at the moment.

 

The result of the consultation

 

The final results of the consultation were very evenly divided between chasing no-shows and implementing a pre-pay system. As the club seems to be split so evenly we’ve chosen to start moving towards a pre-pay system as this seems to have the easiest admin for the office. Systems with more admin effectively cost more as we need to pay office staff to do the chasing.

 

Pricing

 

A number of people have noticed that if we charged more we’d be able to have quieter sessions. We wholeheartedly agree. For now we’re starting with trying to collect all the money from bookings made but basically at £10 per person we need pretty full sessions to make it worth us doing. Remember that as a small business we lose 20% of all session fees in VAT.. we need to pay for target faces, maintain the bosses (each target costs about £300 and they need regular replacement) and to pay instructors to open and close up. I expect that we will gradually increase prices on an annual basis – our session fee has stayed the same for the 6 years that 2020 Archery has existed. We’re not implementing this anytime soon… but if we charged £15 per person we could give over half the shooting line to ‘gaps’. Our intuition is that more people would prefer less space and lower costs… but just to put it out there, there’s a direct relationship between the two.

 

We are in a very unique position – which is that we have a brilliantly convenient central London location… because of this our club is busy.. and our costs are high… this mean we need to take in a lot of beginners to help pay the high rental fees.. and we are one of the only clubs that doesn’t expect any volunteer assistance from our members. We know that we’re trying to do something a bit different but we also believe that we have something great. It just needs fine tuning occasionally.

 

Huge thanks to those club members that wrote supportive emails. We really appreciate it.

 

We’ll keep everyone updated as change slowly starts to happen – please do get those ‘overflow shoot’ emails in as this will ease a lot of the pressure on the shooting line.

 

Best wishes,

 

Heidi and the 2020 Archery Team