Recruit new members

Gaining and keeping members

Growing a club requires a twin focus on gaining new players and keeping those you have.

A third wing is reaching out to former members. It is very common in bridge for players to take breaks from the game. Sometimes these breaks are driven by family circumstances, a new family or a new job. Sometimes they can be a frustration with bridge. Making the decision to come back to bridge can sometimes just be a matter of having somebody ask. (Issue 3 of Bridging NSW noted that members of our Australian Team have taken time out, not included in the item was that Dagmar Neumann came back because someone asked her to).

 Recruiting

The days of people learning bridge in a family or social setting and then bringing it to the club are largely over. New players need to be attracted to the game and given beginner classes. This really takes us back to the 1930s when Contract Bridge boomed in America through the entrepeneurial flare of Ely Culbertson. Soon after publishing his Blue Book he had 4,000 teachers trained in his system across the USA.

Our objectives need to be more modest but they require much the same flare. There are three essential steps: getting people to come to lessons, conducting successful lessons and transitioning the new players to duplicate sessions. We’ve included a separate box about Youth bridge which requires different strategies.

Getting people to come

Building your club’s local community profile is a good foundation for your marketing and promotion efforts. From there you can ask two threshold questions: what is your target market and where and when will you conduct lessons?

There are three broad possible markets: youth, empty nesters and retirees. Youth players might take a lot of investment, and they might only play for a few years, but a vibrant youth community based around schools or a University can become self-sustaining. Retirees have the time to commit, but learning bridge from scratch takes a lot of effort. Empty nesters (meaning people probably in their fifties whose children might still live at home but are otherwise independent) are the best long term prospect, but they will be most interested in night time sessions and some clubs with older members are finding nights hard to run.

Which group you choose has an impact on where and when you run lessons. It might be better to go to youth rather than have them come to you. Teaching bridge through U3A is a very effective approach in the Southern Highlands. WEA or Community Colleges might be better at approaching empty-nesters as they will be looking through those courses to find activities to fill in their evolving spare time.

These decisions also change the way you promote your classes. The message content is different for youth, empty nesters and retirees. The channels you use should always include your Facebook Page. We have not heard of any success from boosting the post (i.e, paying to be put into people’s feeds), but the post is important. Include any local online listings of “What’s On”. A4 leaflets on relevant community noticeboards do have success. You might also consider letterbox drops or handing out leaflets at busy locations near your club.

The equation is simple, the more people who know about your lessons the more people that are likely to come.

Running successful beginer lessons

Teaching bridge has become a little harder as people in general are less familiar with card games, especially trick taking card games. But the process is simple. A course can be based on any of the popular Australian bridge writers – our club survey found that Paul Marston and Joan Butts were the mostly commonly used authors, but the introductory books of Ron Klinger and Derrick Browne are also very good. If using a book, choose the one the teacher feels most comfortable with.

To make it even simpler Bridge NSW has published resources for a Beginners’ Course based on work done in New Zealand. These resources helpfully include deal files as well as the lesson resources.

Almost anybody who can play bridge can teach bridge, as long as they employ the right methods of instruction. All the courses are modelled on a “tell-show-do” approach. For example, in bidding opening and responding to a major, first tell the class the criteria. Then show them some hands that are close to the criteria and ask them how they would bid them as an overhead question (i.e. one directed to the whole class). Then let them do it by playing some sample hands.

School teachers or former school teachers running lessons need to recognise that they are teaching adults not children or adolescents. The teaching methods need to be modified accordingly.

Transitioning new players

Supervised sessions are a useful way to transition your students from beginner lessons to more independent play.

These are sessions where players can obtain some advice and support during play. This support is offered by selected players who have some bridge experience and who can provide a constructive and positive approach to this support. It is essential that these players understand the system that is being taiught to the beginners. The experienced players can either be playing with the less experienced players or simply be available to be called to the table.

The structure of supervised sessions depends on what your club can support. Larger clubs include one or more supervised sessions in their weekly schedule. Supervised play can be organised as simply a separate section in conjunction with ordinary duplicate which may only run for a limited period after lessons have been completed, or a short period odf an additional session.

As supervised play is consolidating material they can benefit from having specially prepared deal files that cover just material being focussed on or other material that the players are familiar with. These deal files should not, however, be predictable or repetitive; they should include a good mix of hands the beginners should be able to bid. Bridge NSW will be building a library of supervised play deal files; clubs with files they would like to contribute should email education@bridgensw.com.au.

The Masterpoint Scheme recognises supervised play as a separate category for masterpointing. They earn half the number of masterpoints as an ordinary club session and they only need to play 15 boards (it can be as low as 12 with appropriate weighting).

Youth bridge

Bridge clubs looking to grow their player community might consider recruiting youth players. The Bridge NSW Office has received requests to find places for people as young as nine to play bridge – they are often self-taught from online resources.

Youth players may be more comfortable playing in a session dedicated to youth bridge. That is certainly the experience at the Sydney Bridge Centre. Clubs in the inner Sydney area should refer potential players to these Wednesday night sessions. Neighbouring clubs might like to develop a joint session for youth bridge.

Clubs should also note that players under the age of 26 can join the ABF Youth Club for free. As such they are not included in club numbers for affiliation fees by the ABF or Bridge NSW.

We also have a small section about teaching bridge in schools.

Retaining

The club environment

A welcoming, supportive and fun environment at your club is essential to converting your new recruits into club members who play regularly. Particular attention has to be made by all players to new players. It is surprising how new players can be put off by being groughly told not to put their bidding cards away until after the first lead is made or other similar mild transgressions.

Also ensure players give proper explanations of their bids when asked. It doesn’t help the beginner to be told that responder’s bid is Bergen…explain the shape and point count required.

This is an all of club effort. Make sure that your club members are aware of the requirements for welcoming new players. Remind them that they were all beginners once, and that without new players they will eventually have no club.

Player development

Encourage beginners to use the resources available to them to improve their bridge. This begins with learning how to review hands from printed or online hand records. Where possible hold sessions that review as a group some hands played at club sessions.

Paul Lavings’ advice when asked by Bridging NSW for advice for players on improving was a succinct “read books.” If your club doesn’t have a library consider starting one; if you do, check to see if there are newer books that you should include. Otherwise follow the advice given in the section Develop players’ skills.

Club duplicate bridge is enjoyable, but can become very routine. Make sure your club provides a variety of sessions and also encourage your members to try playing in congresses or other events beyond your club.

Returning

Often lapsed players just need to be prompted to return to your club. The ABF has developed a Lapsed Player Toolkit. (Club Secretaries can obtain the password for this toolkit by emailing office@bridgensw.com.au).

This identifies the following as the key reasons (other than death) for members not renewing:

  • Physically Unwell or Incapacitated
  • No Transport – no longer able to drive or has lost their transport to venue
  • Have lost partner or have no Suitable Partner
  • Didn’t like Players or Atmosphere
  • Didn’t like Club
  • Going Travelling
  • Don’t see a point in renewing

All of these can be addressed once identified, even the first where solutions might include online bridge.  The Cardturner is a fictional account of a player who keeps playing bridge after diabetes caused blindness with the aid of a person to tell him what his cards were (away from the table) and to play the cards as instructed.

Some players will leave because bridge just isn’t for them, and they should not be harassed. But all the others should be considered for inclusion in a campaign to return them to the club. The lapsed members from your club can be identified by filtering the MPData.csv file (from the ABF Masterpoints Centre downloads ) by Active=N and your club number.