The root of the problem is lack of sailors. You can see this in the scarcity of young sailors at our events. WRCRA, Seacats and others who have responded have evolved a flexible system to accomodate the scoring issue and may have found a way to bring new people into the sport. I totally agree with Keith that we don't locally advertise ourselves and our local races enough. I am copying below something I picked up from the NAHCA web site on one way a fleet in Seattle boosted their membership. I don't know if its out of date, but the ideas certainly aren't. Many areas also don't have the benefit of a good local dealer, but that just means the club has to work harder to get into contact with new and potential sailors. Its a bit of work, but anything worthwile is and if we aren't willing to step up and do some work to grow our sport, then we are just passing the time in futile complaining. As one business advisor once told me, "a complaint without a solution is just bitching". My apologise for the length, the following is thanks to NAHCA:
Fleet Building 101
Last year Fleet 95 (Seattle) came up with a crazy idea that was so crazy, it has become infectious. We want to share the concept with you in the hopes it will help you.

Like many fleets around the country, Fleet 95 is/was situated in the middle of a major metropolitan area with a dying fleet. We didn't even need to use our toes to count active members!! This, with over 3 million people less than an hour away!!

So last year we decided to teach a seminar on how to sail Hobies. On the surface, it seemed like a pretty mundane idea. But we were so blown away by the response, that we haven't stopped running!!

We call the seminar 'Hobie 101'. Fitting, since we use the Hobie University booklet produced by NAHCA! We run the seminar on a Saturday in May one week after Opening Day -- the official opening of the yachting season in Seattle. (We figure Opening Day reminds everyone about that mossy hunk of fiberglass buried in the weeds out back.)

Our advertising/marketing is almost exclusively through the local dealer -- Dan Carpenter and Kevin Cunningham at Hobie Cats Northwest. They get a booth at the Seattle Boat Show every January. So we get the word out there and through their shop during the springtime. That's it. No direct mail. No phone calls. Just the Hobie dealer.

The seminar goes from 9 to 5. We have a chalk talk in the morning. Around 11 a.m. we head out to the floating dock to a fully rigged Hobie 16. There we demonstrate tacking and gibing, talk about safety and clothing and boat tuning and stuff like that. Then we send them off to Laura Sullivan and Jerry Valeske's motorhome for lunch. They grab their box lunch, sit down with someone they don't know (we hope and encourage them to), and make friends.

After lunch, they start rigging their boats. Fleet volunteers walk around and help them rig and tune their boats, answer questions, and help them launch. We hit the water around 2 p.m. for two hours of Rick White-style drills. Or at least we try to get it as synchronized as Rick's seminars. But it always fails miserably. Instead, the boats are being sailed off in a myriad of directions. So we abandon the 'drills' idea and power around in the fleet Avon with a megaphone shouting instructions and encouragement to each boat -- giving them personalized instruction.

After a couple of hours, we send them back to the beach. They break their boats down and head back into the classroom. There, Laura greets them with a cool beverage of their choice while Jerry is playing back the video. We analyze the video, talk about the day, and send them on their way!

Last year we figured we might get 5-10 people of which maybe 1-2 would show interest in joining the fleet and our racing activities. We were inundated with 20 people in about 10 boats! It was so successful, the attendees were literally begging for another class!! We weren't prepared for that, but shrugged our shoulders and said "Sure!" Hence, Hobie 102 was born.

Hobie 101 deals almost strictly with boat tuning and handling. Hobie 102 deals with racing -- how starts are run, what the courses are, how to round marks, stuff like that. At Hobie 101 we encourage regatta participation. In Hobie 102 we expect regatta particpation!!

This year we had 38 registered for Hobie 101 of which about 27 showed up with 16 boats! Both years we have had someone travel over 5 hours to attend our seminar!!! 5 hours!

Many of these people don't even own a boat, and are coming to check out Hobies because they are thinking of buying either a Hobie or some other dinghy. Two guys last year didn't even know what a Hobie Cat was, but came anyway and spent the day with us because they was so intrigued with what we were doing. This year we had some fleet members rig their boats and take the people without boats out for rides so they could check it out for themselves.

The best part is this: last year, of the 10 boats that showed up, at least 5 are racing on a regular or semi-regular basis!!! For those of you doing the math, that's a 50% retention rate! Of the 16 that showed up this year, we expect 7-9 new boats out on our race course! That is about a dozen new boats in the past two years!! What would your regatta look like with 12 more boats registered?!!!

The fleet 'regulars' (you know, the ones we can count on our fingers!) were mostly tied up with other obligations the day of our event. The week prior to the event we were so overwhelmed with late registrations that we panicked and put out an APB to our division members asking for volunteers. This is really the clincher…..Just about the entire graduating class from last year showed up to help out with the newbies this year!!!! Can you believe that!

Last year we went on a pretty heavy follow-up campaign. We do all the registration via email, so we have their addresses for follow-up. We create a distribution list and politely hammer them with emails after the seminar about upcoming events, tuning tips, etc. This year we are delegating that responsibility by decentralizing it amongst our active fleet members and last year's class. We are using a 'buddy up' system to help bring these new ones to our regattas, answer their questions, drink their beer, and generally have a Hobie time!!! It helps the guys just one year into this feel like they are contributing something too!

We charge $10 to cover the cost of lunch and to put a value on the seminar so the attendees will place a value on it. We put the seminar on at Sail Sandpoint -- a recently converted Navy base now home to a sailing school. But the location is immaterial. This could be done on any beach with a white board!! We had a couple of passer-bys ask for our fleet contact information when they saw our boats.

Another cool thing is that all this new blood has stirred up some of the old blood. There is excitement in the air!! Things are happening!! The fleet is alive!!

There is a cool breeze blowing in Seattle! Come join the fun! We'll share our ideas with you and help you to have the same kind of success we've enjoyed.