Insights
Don’t have a Depression during the Credit Crunch!
This year has been quite a disappointing year for most of us in martial-arts, and we’re not
even half way through it yet!
Student numbers falling, competitions being postponed and
cancelled due to lack of funding and response. Clubs closing due to failing numbers. Yes,
the economical climate has effected us all. On top of this many organisations having to turn
competitors and students away from their events due to the issues of the ‘dreaded’ Statute
21.9.
Not a lot going for many of us, especially those who are trying to make things work
for the most important element in any club - the students themselves!
As you may be aware, British Wadokai has not been without is setbacks either. The recent
Southwest Wado Championships was another victim of the recession, due to lack of numbers
wishing to compete. The recent British Wadokai Squad Session, with only 6 students
participating in the course. Standardisation Courses dropping in numbers. All this has it’s
knock-on effect to the situation.
The big fish events, such as the Seni09 and the WadoEXL
has also succumbed to the effects of the financial pinch we are all experiencing.
Do we give up? Of course we don’t. All we have to do is ‘restructure’, and we do restructure.
Our competitions should not be too ambitious, for example. We rent cheaper venues to accommodate
smaller numbers. We limit, or merge, our categories to the more popular categories.
Bring back more ‘club level’ competitions and events, which we had back in the
early years in the early 80’s and 90’s. Learn from experience and bring back common sense
to the situation. People are short of money, so make things cheaper and more accessible.
Replace 10 foot trophies with small medals - replace the more expensive Sports Centre venues
with School Halls and Village Halls (so what if you have to go down early and put some
chairs out, we’re doing this for the kids and for the value of what we stand for). Borrow
some mats from a local Judo Club, for competition sparring (if you ‘really’ have a need for
them), or even contact a Judo Club and rent their facilities for the event. Don’t bother with
mats for Kata events. Do we really need mats for Kata??
British Wadokai Licences, that were to be increased in April this year, have now not been
increased, and may not even be increased for 2010 either. Licence increases were only to
be implemented due to ‘extra’ expenses in respect to unnecessary licence application discrepancies,
which were being experienced, and costing the BWK Licence Office hundreds of
pounds each year - that element has now been removed and the problem resolved to better
communication between instructor and student; in reference to their licence applications.
Short-sighted commercially motivated groups/organisations may not be able to see the effects
of this situation, as they also rely on high turnover figures to boost their income.
Additionally, they may not be as well prepared to facilitate those who are
feeling the ‘pinch’ by adjusting the costing to help their members, etc.
Clubs with failing numbers can reduce rent by reducing the booking
time and merging classes together. The British Wadokai Junior Gi price
has now been reduced to well UNDER £10 (and that INCLUDES a
FREE British Wadokai badge worth £4.50). We need to encourage
students by allowing them some flexibility on payments (or even offer
free sessions to those without, or with very low, income) until
the crisis is over - we must ride the waves for all of our sakes.
Gary E Swift Kyoshi.