R.P.S.C. Chapter # 58

August 29th, 2011

To All Our Members

As our 2010 / 2011 stamp season was drawing to a close, (after yet once again a very interesting and successful year, our 55th year as a club by the way!), your executive met on June 23rd and reported, reviewed, and finalized programs as follows.

1. MEETING PROGRAM 2011 / 2012

The enclosed 2011 / 2012 program was reviewed, modified, and approved. As has been the case over the last many years, this program is very much the work of our president Karl Wysotski. This is not to say that the program has not benefited from some very creative tweaking by the board members whose’ input has been most valuable. But Karl is “The Man”; in this, and so many other areas of the clubs activities and successes, his effort and dedication have been the keys to making good things happen.
WE ALL OWE YOU A VERY BIG VOTE OF THANKS KARL ! !
[Karl says he has done the program for 8 years and says that this is his last turn – We hope he is just saying that, as he can certainly get the very best people out to enliven our meetings.]

This year’s program will have some new elements. Probably the biggest change will be the introduction of short talks about how the club operates. I call these the “education talks”, they will briefly tell the newer members and some of us older members who never learnt anything except by happenstance, just how things work in our club. We have a batch of these scheduled at one per meeting. [I personally want to find out about our library – I suspect we have a ton of information I did not know existed let alone that we have a copy I can borrow!] Look out for these they should be very interesting and informative.

2. REPORTS

A. FINANCE
Our treasurer Don Hicken reported another good year on the financial front. At June 15th 2011 our bank balance was at $ 3,788.15. Your board feels that this is more than an adequate reserve and that in the order of $ 800.00 to $ 1,000.00 should be creatively re-distributed to the membership, possibly as more prizes at the Christmas party. Watch for news on this front during the year, “you could be a winner - - -“.

B. CLUB SALES BOOKS
Sales for the year were good again this year, but not up to the record year of 2009 / 2010. We sold just under $ 2000.00. [Maybe too many of us have filled in the easy blanks in our collections and need to start new collections where we can find lots of material on the club books!}
We will continue the “5 Happy Dollars” for every page submitted for the Club Sales Circuit Books program up to December 31st 2011.
Bill Crins continues to do great job of looking after the circuit books and all the accounting that goes with that job. This involves a lot of hard work and Bill does it all quietly and very carefully. We are lucky to have him on board for this job, and, we owe him a large vote of thanks.
It was again suggested that Bill consider retiring pages that are not generating interest or sales back to the member who submitted them for other use or possible revised/reduced pricing. [Like Bill needs one more job to do?!]

We currently have a lot of very good material in the circuit books, and most of it is very fairly priced, including almost 300 new pages this month.

That having been said we always need more good pages for the books, so please clean out some of your stock, at bargain prices, and help your fellow members. Bill reminds us that the better stamps when reasonably priced are always the best sellers.

Also, NEW ! ! We now have a minimum 25 cent per stamp net price limit on items for the Club Sales Books. So please do NOT put inexpensive stamps that belong in the “Woolworth’s” 5cent, 10 cent, and 25 cent books in the club circuit books.

C. R.P.S.C. CIRCUIT BOOKS
These are still being very well received. But mailing costs being what they are, it was decided to continue having them for the first meeting of every second month, [or 4 times a year]. We will continue to have a table dedicated only to the RPSC books for those meetings. Thanks to Malcolm who looks after this and so much more.

D. SECRETARYS REPORT / MINUTES OF MEETINGS
The system of posting the minutes of the meetings on the wall at the next meeting has been working well, and will be continued. We welcome Dave Shooter as our new Secretary.

E. CLUB WEBSITE
The club’s website is up and running at rspc.org/chapters/kawartha
Please take a look and let us know what you like and don’t like on the site.

F. CONSTITUTION
All new members will continue to receive a copy of our constitution and present members can obtain a copy from Don Hicken.

G. MEMBERSHIP REPORT
Our current membership stands at 84 members, which is a new high. ( Just over half our members live in Peterborough; and “Other Halfs” are from “All Round About” as far afield as Bancroft, Port Hope, Manilla, Frankford, Trenton, Oshawa, Marmora, Lindsay, and points in-between.)
Our strength as a club depends on the diversity of our membership and the diversity of their collecting interests. We strongly believe that promoting new memberships is vital, for any stamp club and for the hobby as a whole. So, please try to round up two members each!
Again this year we are offering a “First Year Special” for new members. Any new member, who joins up and pays the annual membership, will immediately receive a club voucher for the full amount of the first year’s membership. The voucher can be use to buy stamps from the club circuit books or from any visiting dealer at our meeting.

H. DOOR PRIZE TICKETS AT MEETINGS
We will continue the door prize draws at each meeting. The tickets will remain $ 1.00 each or 3 for $ 2.00.
The traveling “Ticket Men” John Fredrickson and Rusty McQuaid will take turns circulating at the meetings to sell you tickets at your table.
The door prizes will continue to be 1 - $10.00 club voucher, 2- $5.00 club vouchers, and at least 9 [and usually more] philatelic items.
Vouchers will be redeemable for Club Circuit Book Items and at our visiting dealers.
John Fredrickson is always in need of donations for door prizes.
Please remember the door prize draw ticket sales pay the rent for the church hall for our meetings, so your continued strong support of the draws will keep us going.
We will also continue the regular name tag draws; wear your name tag so new members can find you and you could win!

I. ONE FRAME EXHIBIT COMPETITION
To encourage more participation in exhibiting we will again have the one frame [6 page] exhibit competition at KAPEX with a first prize of $ 50.00 and a second prize of $ 25.00.
We will also continue to have sample one frame exhibits on display at meetings so you can see how it is done and how easy it really is to exhibit.

J. CLUB AUCTIONS
We will again have 4 club auctions during the year. There will be no limit on the number of lots that any member may submit for the auction. The minimum price of $2.00 per item will remain in force. During viewing you will be able to mark on the auction tags if you want to bid on an item, only items marked up during viewing will be auctioned.

K. “HAPPY DOLLAR” AUCTION
We will again have our annual “Happy Dollar” auction. This event is always a great hit; [would that our membership would bid with such reckless abandon at out regular auctions!].
We plan to continue our scheme of planting a good and valuable stamp as a nugget in one or two of the auction tins; this was a tremendous hit last year. We hope to continue this tradition; without always picking on Grant; [although we hear that he has donated again this year-Thanks you very much Grant]. So if you have a nugget, or two, to donate please see our auctioneers Karl and Malcolm.
Also please remember that the success of this event depend on your putting some good stamps in your auction tin not just all “Woolworth’s” material.

L. CLUB CATALOGUES
We will again this year be buying a set of “gently used’ 1 year old Scotts catalogues; this is our normal annual program. The 2011’s are due in for our September 28th meeting and we will auction off the 2010’s at our Oct 26th meeting with a starting price of $50.00.

M. WINTER MEETINGS
With a lot of retired members who do not like driving at night in the wintertime, we will again move our January and February meetings in 2012 to Noon to 3:30 P.M. The Christmas Party will also be at 12:00 noon.
One of the highlights of the Christmas Party will be the elimination draw with TWO grand Prizes. [A Penny Black and New Brunswick #1 are the goodies this Christmas]. Also new this year will be even more prizes for the party goers, so do plan to attend.

N. HAPPY DOLLAR DISTRIBUTION
John Fredrickson will continue to be the keeper of the Happy Dollars.
He will decide when Dollars are to be distributed, how many to distribute, and for what events they are to be distributed. [He says he can’t be bribed – darn!]

O. WELCOME FOR VISITORS
Welcoming visitors to our meeting is most important, we need new members, [and we want to find out what great stamps they can provide!]. To this end the executive will be on the lookout for visitors who will be welcomed, provided with a name tag as a “Visitor” with their name added on, shown around the meeting by an executive member who will explain how our systems work. Please introduce yourself and give a warm welcome to any newcomers who turn up.

P. TABLES AND CHAIRS
Fred Saunders and Doug Coones will continue to look after opening the
doors, setting up the tables and chairs, and putting it all away after the
meetings, and locking up the hall.
This is a big and too often thankless job, so if you can be there a few
minutes early or can stay a few minutes later please help Fred and Doug
with the set-up and knock-down.
Fred and Doug, - many thanks from us all for your time and effort.
Again this year we discussed and agreed to buy more folding rectangular tables to use
for more space for the Woolworth’s books in the back room.
Don Hicken will arrange to source and buy these tables.

Q. “COFFEE and CAKES” and OUR LIBRARIANS
Jose and Joe Wintjes occupy the corner table back by the kitchen. They are in charge of fueling the troops. The coffee and goodies that appear by magic at our meeting are their good work. They also preside over the 2 cent jumble boxes, these are boxes of stamps donated by our members and sold at 2 cents each & all proceeds go to the club. [If you have not tried these boxes you should you mighty start a whole new collection for less than $ 3.00 !] And, because, “they don’t have much to do” – as if, they also look after our Catalogues and Library. Jose is amazing – if you are at a meeting and need to look something up in a catalogue and it is out somewhere; ask Jose and she will tell you who has the catalogue and where he is sitting!

Jose and Joe we can’t thank you enough for all you do. [That goes double for those of us with a long drive home in the dark fueled by coffee– an extra big thanks for that.]

R. CANADIAN VARIETIES
We have asked Ron Perry to continue his series of displaying some varieties on the easel at most meetings with enlargement to show the details of the variety. We will often ask him to talk for a few minutes so we can learn about the world of exotic varieties.

S. HELP WITH SELLING A COLLECTION
We regularly get members of the general public turning up seeking help and guidance with disposing of a collection that they have “inherited” in one way or another. Karl Wysotski and John Fredrickson, along with Grant Collins and Mark Armstrong, have volunteered to look after this on top of their many other duties. [We are still looking for a catchy name for this committee – one that we can repeat in polite company at least ! I thought maybe “The First & Last Resorts”]

3. KAPEX

I. CHAIRPERSON
Rick Stankiewicz is back on board as Show Chairperson. Rick has done this for a number of years in the past, he always make this big complex job look easy! We know it is not! Ted Lichacz has done this job for the last two years, and is very pleased to be able to rest on his laurels. Our thanks to Ted for a super job in 2011...

II. SHOW HOURS
The show hours will remain from 9:30 A.M. to 4:00 P.M. New this year is our date switching to Easter Saturday. This will allow us to say “but Dear this year I am only taking one third of the weekend off for Stamps”; and we will offer a special prize for any member turning up in a Bunny Suit – maybe even 100 Happy Dollars ! !

III. SILENT AUCTIONS
There will be two [only] silent auctions with a limit of 5 items / member, and a minimum starting bid of $ 10.00 per item. We need good quality items at realistic [modest] starting bid prices to make this auction the success it should be.
Malcolm reports we could use some “Shoe Box” lots of better stamps [but please no boxes of Woolworths 5 and 10 cent junk!], seeded with some obviously good stamps, right on the top of the box, for the auction.

IV. SHOW COVER
We had a lengthy discussion on the subject of the KAPEX Show cover.
It was decided to do this at least for one more year, and to cut back on the number of copies issued. We could use a fresh keen volunteer to take this on for 2012 show.
We will concentrate on making sure we sell these out at the show.

V. MAIN RAFFLE-DRAW PRIZE
- Draw ticket price to remain the same as last year.
- We will stay with 3 main prizes only. For these you do not have to be present to win.
- But we will add 4 “close but no cigar prizes” which will be first prizes drawn, and, to win these you have to be present. All tickets drawn for these prizes only go back in the drum and can be drawn again for a second prize.
- The draw will be moved up to mid afternoon, to get some audience participation, so we will need to get the last of the tickets sold in time.
- For the main [first] draw prize Dave Shooter is shopping for a suitable high impact prize at an affordable price to the club.
- For the second and third prizes we will once again ask for our member’s kindness to donate suitable prizes. This has become an annual tradition – will this be your year to donate?

VI. TABLE RENTAL RATES
Dealer table rental will remain at $ 60.00; and the Canada Post rate for the larger space will be a suitable and substantial donation.

VII. ADVERTISING AND PROMOTION
Again this year Mark Armstrong will look after Advertising and Promotion.

VIII. MAIN ENTRANCE AND TRAFFIC OF VISITORS
This remains an area of some concern as we try to balance the conflicting needs of; -avoiding congestion; - giving the visitors the information they need; - giving out club information [as opposed to show information]; - signing up new members; - and selling door prize tickets.
We will add two “GREETERS” to each shift on the front desk, who’s function will be only to “welcome” each new arrival & give them the basic show information package; and then to gently steer them into the hands of the “shakedown artists” who will sign them up as members or sell them all kinds of goodies!
Rick with John Fredrickson, Mark Armstrong, and Jim Thomson will revise the lobby layout and traffic pattern to achieve this objective. Rick will produce, or delegate the production of, a “Show Map” to be included with the package give to all visitors.

IX. EXHIBITS
This will again be Marie Olver’s domain ably aided by Ron Perry.
All exhibits MUST be registered with Marie by March 13th; no more last minute entries. [This was started last year and worked well – please stay with this rule so the exhibition can run smoothly.]
A reminder the more exhibits we have the better the show, please do take part in the exhibition.

X. DEALERS
Malcolm Pacey will again look after the dealers and will lock them in by December 15th. The dealers will again be listed on our advertising to help attract visitors to KAPEX.

That seems to be it for this year’s late summer newsletter. Enjoy your Indian Summer, now that the bugs and cottagers are almost gone! We are looking forward to seeing all you at the meetings.
Jim Thomson - for your board who are -
Co-Presidents – Karl Wysotski and Malcolm Pacey; Past President – Marie Olver;
Vice-Presidents – Grant Collins and Jim Thomson; Secretary – Dave Shooter; Treasurer – Don Hicken; Directors – Dave McIsaac; Rusty McQuaid; Bob Bomhof; Rick Stankiewicz. and Club Consultant – Mark Armstrong