On the 19th January IPMS Middleton Cheney sat down for its January club meeting, as well as the club’s annual AGM. Alongside the standard jokes, modelling and mucking about, we had the serious business of statements from each of the four committee members, elections for 2017, and questions and suggestions for the next twelve months.
Chairman Martin set proceedings off with a heartfelt review of the club’s activities during 2016. We’re all incredibly proud of what we’ve achieved – the interest we received for the Star Trek display and the awards it won are testament to the efforts of a small club punching above its weight. Martin’s words were a reminder to all of us around the table that our achievements should be placed into the context of what IPMS Middleton Cheney is, and what we’ve done. It was a lovely way to start the AGM off and our 2016 performance leaves us in a great place for 2017.
Gary provided a summary of the financial aspects of the club. Overall finances are strong with enough available now to facilitate expenditure on items for the club, more on which will be discussed later. Monthly subs continue to be sustainable enough to cover the cost of hiring the Parish Meeting Rooms. Overall therefore the club is in a strong position to invest for the upcoming year.
Sam gave his views on 2016 and upcoming 2017 activities as club secretary. We reached an all-time high of model shows and events during 2016, and it’s intended that we scale this back somewhat for the year ahead. With the effort that Sam put into the Star Trek display, he will take a step back from the show circuit this year, attending some but not all of the shows we intend to cover. An initial calendar for the early part of 2017 was discussed between everyone, and a select number of shows agreed upon. Once these are confirmed we will announce them in due course.
James detailed the club’s activity online over the past twelve months. The new website which was properly launched a year ago has given the club a much better presence online with greatly increased page views and the ability to share more photos and more news than ever before. In addition, the club’s Facebook presence has continued to grow steadily to more than 650 ‘likes’ at the time of the meeting. For the year ahead the target is to continue this growth and maintain the profile and appearance of the club online to attract new people into the hobby.
All four committee members were re-elected to their positions for 2017 to the unanimous approval of everyone present.
Following this, discussion turned to any other business. It was suggested that the club invest in a new banner for display at shows for clear identification. The point was made that although our Star Trek display became recognisable during 2016, the identity of the club to onlookers was likely to be a mystery to most. A clear logo and name on a banner, in the mould of most other clubs would rectify this matter and so a solution will be explored for use at our 2017 shows. Further to this, a suggestion was made to renew the club’s polo shirts, updating them in line with the club now carrying the IPMS moniker and this too will be explored alongside the banner with progress to be reported at the next club meeting in February.
A request was put in by James to have access to a digital version of the club’s logo which is featured on the reverse of our current polo shirts. Having been originally hand-drawn by Martin, it’s believed that the only digital copy will be held by our printers and an action was taken to contact them and try and obtain a digital copy. This would allow the logo to be used across the website and Facebook and provide some more consistent branding for the club’s activities.
A question was raised about the club’s participation with local scout groups this year. There are currently plans to visit two groups of scouts, one in Banbury and another in Brackley. This forms part of the club’s attempt to draw new young faces into the hobby of model-making and further details, including dates, will be confirmed in due course.
With that, there were no further questions or suggestions and so matters turned to our latest works in progress and the 2016 trophy winners. More of that in the next post!
You can read more on the club’s committee here. Any questions on the matters above can be submitted via the comments section below, or via email to Sam, the club secretary at sam-evins@hotmail.co.uk
Middleton Cheney Scale Model Club 