My thanks to the members of the club, without you we wouldn’t have a club.
An extra thanks to the committee and work they have done for this club over the past year and years.
I would especially like to thank Murray Chapman who has been in the club for over 30 years and has served as secretary for at least the last 20. My thanks to you Murray for the many years you have put into the club, Murray has offered to remain on the committee as a committee member. My thanks to Shona although brand-new to the committee has offered to take up this position.
For the 2025 – 26 year the committee has decided that we would offer free membership to all its social members, we have done this to help retain members and also considering the financial pressures people are facing at the moment, and because we are in a financial position where we can.
Motor Sport membership. Motorsport NZ has changed the way it charges its members. All clubs with under 31 members now have to pay a set fee of $500.00 per annum. From 31 members up the fee is $14.00 per member. As well as this we have to pay an equalisation fee of around $300.00 for their annual AGM. That’s a total of around $800.00 per year. To date this year, we only have 6 Motorsport members, that means that having this membership for our members is now actually costing us money. Before the bought in this fee we were paying $10.00 each Motorsport member, so it’s been a huge increase for us. Memberships for the Z Club have just gone out in the last month so I am still hoping to get more applications, we need at least 13 MSNZ members to make this work.
In the last year we have had about 9 different events.
We have the Forgotten Highway Tour about April last year, although we didn’t have a high attendance it was thoroughly enjoyed by that that did join in. we had 2 overnight stays as part of this event.
Fish and Chip cruise with the Mini Club
Nikua Cave lunch and cruise where we were joined by the Corvette club.
Targa Tour Cruise starting and ending at Hampton downs which was very well attended.
Ross Bros Museum and cruise finishing with an afternoon lunch which was again very well attended.
Go Karts at Mt Smart stadium, we had about 15 drivers, and lunch after the event.
Drag day again this year. We were joined by the NASA Hot-rod Club and the Ford Muscle Car Club. Again, a very successful event.
Ellerslie Car Show, we had 8 cars in attendance. This continues to be a worthwhile event each year.
The first part of this year has been rather light in the way of events this year as a couple of us committee members have been away.
From the president’s point of view this last year has been bit of the same old same old. I am happy with the event schedule over last year and we will continue to committee to continue with good events in the coming year.
As a committee we have ticked along okay but we continue to face the challenges of running a nonprofit club that many other clubs face since covid. It is fair to say that we have struggled as a committee and still do.
What we have noticed:
We are struggling to get good commitment from members for events.
Events have to be extra special to obtain any good numbers.
Not enough support for the committee, we recently did a drive for more committee members. We had a total of 6 people say they were interested in coming along for a look and see. We only saw 3 at the meeting and only 2 have attended regularly. Thankfully these 2 people have stepped forward and are now on our committee. I am extremely grateful to Shona and Allan for this.
The problem we face is that 1. The current committee members have been on this committee for many years, and I am talking 20 years for myself and 30 for others. We continue to work on the committee as there is no one else to do so. Also, we are all older people and that is not necessarily a problem, but in today’s world there have been a lot of changes, for example social media. The club has a forum, this used to be the contact point for members, but it now hardly ever used. People are now using Facebook Instagram etc, none of the current committee have the knowledge needed to work these sites, we don’t have any young members or people able to run these for us. We do however post our events on Facebook, and we know that this helps, nowadays you almost need to use these platforms to there fullest to get good results. It sucks but it’s the way it is.
For me I cannot promise my support as president for beyond the 2025 – 2026 year. I feel we need a change of leadership to push us forward considering our changed environment. For the first time in years, we have had discussions on closing up the club. Honestly, it’s the last thing we want to do but the reality is if we don’t get the support, we may need to do this at some stage.
I don’t want to paint to gloomy a picture, but we are faced with certain realties.
But for the moment onwards and upwards and see you at the next event.
My thanks
Bernie Kant
Club President
