Uni O'Week Recruitment

[Guest]

The ultimate forum for talking about Ultimate Frisbee. Aimed at bringing new life to the world of Ultimate Frisbee discussions, UltiTalk.Com (UT) combines both regional and international topics in one friendly place. So say hello to UT: The International Ultimate Frisbee forum.

[Pallen]

I didn't see anybody mention the university of the sunshine coast anywhere in here. Is anybody aware of a team there?  Is it possible to play for another school if your school doesn't have a team?

Or if playing at QUT and with Jangles doesn't suit you could travel to UQ on Wednesdays.

[simmo]

Uni of Ballarat had their clubs & societies signups today, and being before everyone else's I thought I'd share with you how it went.

We got 51 signed up and paid up, which is a massive improvement on last year's 30 signed up and none paid up. A lot more came by and had a look and showed interest, but didn't commit straight away - didn't have money on them or whatever. Couple of photos of our setup...





We had a laptop playing highlight clips from Ultivillage DVDs - that attracted a lot of attention. The barrel was a ridiculously strong punch (I'm no good at maths, particularly with volumes). We had a banner on the front of the table, and about 8 of us with our shirts on mingling around the crowds, throwing discs and whatnot. We charged $10 to sign up and this is what they got...



Starting from the top left...
- Info about the club and what we do
- Brief 'how to' on throwing
- Toohey's bucket hat (or Cruiser cap, they got to choose)
- Toohey's Extra Dry thongs
- Noodle Box voucher thingy
- Drink voucher for our first function (next week)
- Jeanswest 15% off voucher (they also supplied the bags)
- Buy 1 get one free voucher from Sjokolate (cafe)
- Lanyard and privilege card offer from New Generation (clothes shop)
They also got a BUUF stubby holder and keyring, which I forgot to include in the photo  All that stuff was pretty easy to get - rounded it all up last Friday.

Got everyone's emails and phone numbers, and those who are on Facebook will be added to our group. First pickup game and party next week.

[Chris]

You guys charge $10 a semester!?! That is pretty dam good! Don't you have to pay for field hire etc? What are your club's major expenses?

[simmo]

$10 a year, champ. Field hire is relatively cheap, but our social functions cover that. Only major expenses are going to tournaments and AUG. We run on a very small budget compared to you guys.

[Frank]

Simon I am amazed at the amount of stuff you give to your new members!

[gref]

Wow Simmo, that's intense.

You're showing us how it's done. Unfortunately though... we have to pay $1600 a semester for fields, about 15.50 per player in various fees for AFDA and QUDA, a $15 disc, so we (UQ) can't scrape that low unless we had a ****load of social events.

I'll see if I can post some photos of how we do at our stall, although we can't get the great court this year due to rain, so it's a looking slightly shaky.

[simmo]

Simon I am amazed at the amount of stuff you give to your new members!

I can't take any credit this year - Doobie, Greta and Amanda did all the work. However having a strong existing relationship with our major sponsor (21Arms) did help.

You're showing us how it's done. Unfortunately though... we have to pay $1600 a semester for fields, about 15.50 per player in various fees for AFDA and QUDA, a $15 disc, so we (UQ) can't scrape that low unless we had a ****load of social events.

The differences between the Big 8 and the regional unis  We payed about $250 per semester to use our oval (with lights) one night a week. We shared the oval with the rugby club who also paid $250. Before VSU, it was free!

We're up shit creek now though because our uni oval has been closed so we're without a training venue at the moment. The only grass covered ground in Ballarat at the moment either belongs to someone who can afford a bore, or is where our lake used to be.

[gref]

We're at the other end of the spectrum at the moment...

All our ultimate is getting cancelled because of rain, and people afraid that their fields will get wrecked if we come play on them.


Well we had a our Market Day, which is our big recruitment day yesterday, and it went fairly well (Apart from me getting chronically sunburnt in the great court.) With UQ Sport telling us that all our recruiting was meant to be done in the gym at the start of the day, we decided to take a QUDA Play Frisbee banner and stick it in the great court, and afterwords I couldn't stop throwing a disc with beginners. There were a fair share of Americans and Canadians who were wandering around wondering where the local ultimate connection was, and with that presence, hopefully we managed to get most of them.
All in all, we handed out well over 200 flyers, and got about a couple of pages of name onto our mailing list ... Oh, and sold one disc, so it was a good day in all (I hope).

[Brettski]

SUUFA only charges $5 per year for new members. We feel the MOST important thing is the initial step of getting people to come along that very first time, from there the appeal of ultimate and our friendly members keeps them there for the rest of their degrees. For existing members it is jacked up to $15 a year.

However thanks to VSU, members now have to pay $55 to SU Sport in order to join any club, so it's important we keep the cost for the beginners down. Note that at sydney uni we receive a fair bit of help from the uni, around $2500 - $3000 per year.