[TheForge] "Official" news from ABANA

[dann at wctatel.net]

Dave,

Thanks for sharing.  That was a well written response.
I have been a paid ABANA member  just the last 8 years, but am still
current.  The idea of the conference costing $400 K for less than 500
attendies is out of the question many times to expensive.  I attended the
2002 La Crosse and thought it was wonderful, like a Worlds Fair, but not
nearly enough people could afford the $250 gate fee plus other costs.

The last GoM conference that I attended had something like 300 paying a
$40 gate fee.   Guessing at the costs of bringing a dozen or so
demonstrators from Europe and Japan in 2002 about blew my mind.  I don't
think we had 500 members attending  that one either.  My wife and I set up
our tend out on Goose Island to keep our costs down, and we packed some
bread and bologna sandwiches.  (We did eat a couple on site meals.)

As mentioned before there were so many demonstrations going on at once,
that we could only take in a few, or resort to the TV Channel Flipping
strategy and miss some of all.

My wife and I got to see part of the Japanese saw making demo, and part of
the sword making demo, and some of the German smith group that was making
that big bird scuplture.  One thing that really I appreciated was see the
vendors like Kane and Son, getting to meet Sid Suedemeyer.

The point is having a national ABANA conference with lower gate fees.. say
$75 or less, and keeping costs down but MORE Members attending would have
a chance of making it worth the venders' expense of coming.

I might be totally wet, but some of the chapters can put on a good
conference for 300 members that costs less than $20 K.   Why couldn't
ABANA do a national conference targeting 2 or 3 times that for $50 K.  
One or two "International" smiths would be interesting.  Multiples of
international demonstrators is one of the Straws that break ABANA's back.

I kind of wished I had been able to go to  Kentucky ABANA 2004.  The
dollars of cost just scared me away.

I am also a member of the EAA / Oskosh experimental aircraft group.  My
local minnesota chapter gets member call for volunteers  to come to
Oshkosh pre-convention work.
The cost of attending the EAA convention is many times LESS than I would
have spent going to Seattle.

Dann


> I have been following the conversations about ABANA and the '08
> Conference, but was bound by corporate bologna to wait for the
> "OFFICIAL" news release before I could talk about it. Some of your
> questions are hitting the mark and some are way off base but all are
> valid. As vice president, affiliate liaison, and chairman of member
> services, I will be happy to answer questions now.
> dave mudge
> The following is the "official" word on ABANA's position.
> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
>
>
> Whoever said  "the more things change 
 the more they stay the same"
> doesn't know the plights of non-profit organizations.  Because what I
> want to talk about is this - ABANA must change its focus to be
> relevant for another 34 years.  ABANA has come to that fork in the
> road – where do we go from here?  Or as Yogi Berra would say – "When
> you come to a fork in the road, take it."  We are taking it, grasping
> it and coming up with some difficult decisions.
>
>
>
> ABANA has been producing conferences every other year for decades now.
>  Well the time has come to reevaluate how we do these events.   We,
> the ABANA Board, have decided not to have a conference for 2008.  This
> decision did not come overnight.  After months of discussions and
> negotiating a formal motion was made on February 9 "that ABANA not
> have its biennial conference in 2008."  On February 13 , the motion
> passed by a vote of 14-0.
>
>
>
> As painful as this decision was I know it cannot compare to the
> disappointment of individuals of the Northeast Blacksmith Association
> (NBA).   Since the Fall of 2004 the NBA put a great deal of time and
> energy into the possibility of having the conference at the State
> University of New York at New Paltz.  Jonathan Nedbor and the Steering
> Committee of NBA are to be commended for all the work they have done.
>
>
>
> So why aren't we having a Conference?  What's the deal?  Is ABANA
> going bankrupt?  Let me start by answering the last question first –
> NO.  Though I wish the financial situation were stronger, we are not
> going bankrupt.  To put things in a simple nutshell here is a quick
> summary of the conferences.  They have become too expensive.  They
> cost hundreds of thousands of dollars, which is too much!  That
> doesn't even include the thousands of hours from all of the
> volunteers.  For many years ABANA has supplemented its budget by
> living off the profit from previous Conferences.  We can no longer do
> that.  The Seattle Conference was not the financial success of
> previous Conferences.   It probably lost money.  We still do not know
> the final tally, because there is an outstanding invoice from the
> University of Washington.  When we do know the accounting figures,
> they will be posted on the ABANA website.
>
>
>
>
>
> So why no Conference.
>
>
>
> First there is the Money –
>
> The costs to put on a Conference have skyrocketed to somewhere in the
> vicinity of $400,000.   With those figures the average conference
> expense including transportation would be in the $1,000 per person
> range.  The majority of our members cannot afford to pay that.  Of
> course we all agree that costs must be trimmed.  We need to look at
> other locations such as fairgrounds.  The college campus environment
> has gotten too expensive.  The number of demonstrators has gone
> through the roof.
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> Second there is the Conference Chair -
>
> Every Conference needs to have someone in charge to do the
> negotiations, troubleshoot, make decisions, etc.  This is a full-time
> job!  Past Chairs who have held this position have burned out – just
> ask Dave Koenig and Bill Callaway.  And did I mention that this job
> pays nothing?! No one wanted to step up and be Chairman for the 2008
> Conference.
>
>
>
> Third there is the Membership –
>
> The membership has declined in recent months.  A year ago the number
> totaled 4815.  Today it is 4468.  Our budget figures are based on a
> membership of approximately 5000.  Without that number there would be
> practically no funds to pay for seed money or pre-conference expenses.
>  Another factor to consider regarding membership is the number of
> attendees to our biennial Conferences.  Seattle had 575 paid
> attendees, which equates to less than 14% of our membership.  This has
> been a consistent percentage over the last several Conferences.  That
> low figure is another indication that we are definitely not meeting
> the needs of our members.
>
>
>
> Fourth there is the Central Office –
>
> LeeAnn Mitchell performed many duties on the three previous conferences –
>
> La  Crosse, Richmond, and Seattle.  She worked tirelessly at each of
> these events putting in many hours of "volunteer" work.  Much was
> asked of her and she did it - beautifully.  There is new a Central
> Office Administrator, Heather Hutton, of Knoxville, TN.  She has many
> strengths and will be a valuable asset to ABANA, but her experience in
> working with large conferences has not been tested.  Without a
> Conference Chair this would be an impossible task for the new Central
> Office.
>
>
>
> So where do we go from here?  This is a question that I asked in my
> message to the affiliates.  I know that many of you like me look
> forward to getting together with old friends.  For that reason alone
> the idea of not having the Conference will be a great disappointment.
> The first ABANA Conference I attended was Birmingham in 1988 – Sloss
> Furnace.  The sharing and camaraderie alone won me over.  There will
> be other Conferences, but we need a new model.  I want to continue
> this dialog in future letters. Please let me know your thoughts.  ALL
> suggestions are germane.  There are no stupid ideas.
>
>
>
> The more things change 
 the more we need to change 

>
> Clare Yellin, President of ABANA