I have nothing against them, if there was a definite benefit to be gained from them.
My view is the public neeed to be educated with regards to the new WAHR, if they were educated, then I feel more and more of us would Join associations.
Just like the corgi registered plumber, customers now have to have one for there boilers and can't just use the cheap handyman down the road.
So perhaps they could concentrate on education first.
These are just my own personal opinions and they are not meant to knock any of the associations, I'm sure they all do a good Job.
Couldn't agree more with you!
Our problem is this! We need to educate the public which as mentioned would cost thousands of pounds in terms of media, leaflets, radio etc.....
So, how do we raise this capitol, remember, we do this of our own backs as committeee members.
Firstly we look for sponsorship from manufacturers, but they in turn look for the members as this is their target audience. Its hard to convince a manufacturer to sponsor an association with limited members.
Secondly we look for window cleaners to join as members, once we have paid for the membership pack, insurance and our overhead cost their is a small proportion left as profit. But as mentioned, everyone wants as much back as possible so with the benefits there is not much profit to use for publicity.
So if we did pay the advertising costs out of the committee members pockets and it cost for instance £10,000 (which I believe is way under the expected requirement) then in order for us to recoupe our outlay, membership would be a lot more expensive which in turn would cause resentment from the window cleaners as they would se us as dictators demanding a high premium to join something we created?
So to avoid this, we are in effect asking window cleaners to help us to help them, join now, we use the money as effectively as possible, remember, NO COMMITTEE MEMBER earns a bean from this money! We then promote the APWC to the householders, business etc....... Name awareness increases and we become more of a force to be reckoned with?
Well, thats my call on the whole situation?