Modelling Lives
Tales from the model-making community. Like most clubs, Twickenham & District MRC has faced many problems since the arrival of Covid-19, the two biggest being the loss of income from its open days and, perhaps more importantly, the need to retain members
Twickenham and District MRC discusses the problems caused by COVID-19.
Clubs like ours basically offer members two things: (1) access to the construction, operation and exhibition of layouts, and (2) companionship and membership of a community with shared values and interests. The pandemic has rendered access to layouts out of the question, and so the club’s attention turned to fostering that more elusive and ‘spiritual’ sense of community. Yet such community, it could be argued, is a real ongoing asset, especially if one remembers that modelling projects come and go, or, as is the case right now, stall all together!
The club therefore began the pandemic with a period of reflection. What should it be offering members in the ‘new normal’ and what would club life be like post-coronavirus? We decided to put greater emphasis on community and the laudable principle that each and every member was part of the whole. This, in certain respects, went against the natural development of the club since its foundation in 1961 – a process of ever more ambitious layout projects which have tended to become the focus of members’ attention to the detriment of other aspects of club life. Faced with the prospect of many members feeling deprived of their main interest/activity, we felt that we should relaunch a club-wide monthly magazine to replace the various newsletters specific to individual layouts, and thereby boost overall club cohesion. The new club magazine, Single Line Working (SLW), reaches out to members and encourages them to tell other members about their personal modelling projects and other interests outside our hobby. We took this personal ‘connective’ element very seriously, and hence SLW is far more member-centric, as opposed to layout-centric, than previous club newsletters. In this spirit, we have tried to commission as wide a range of contributors as possible – 50 members contributing one article a year being, in our opinion, far better than five members contributing ten each. In fact, SLW has been so well received by our existing membership that we have decided to offer a free magazine subscription to any interested party. So we are, in effect, offering FREE trial membership to potential members and included in the package is an invitation to a special open evening once club nights return. So far, we are pleased to report that we have received almost 20 requests to take up this offer; one of which has already resulted in one new full-time member – an ex-pat living in Norway! We have also sent out trial copies to a number of lapsed members, and this too has had a positive result, with one ex-member rejoining. By the way, anyone reading this who wishes to take advantage of our free trial offer should apply by email to chairman.tdmrc@gmail.com
As regards income, in any normal year the sale of donated models at our open day would be an important source of extra funds. We had already accumulated a great many saleable items for our 2020 event, and when it was cancelled we decided to sell the stock on Ebay instead. This turned out to be a good move, as we sold everything and raised a substantial amount – ironically a far greater sum than we might otherwise have expected. Open days, you see, tend to favour a buyer’s market – few visitors will be on the lookout for unmade K’s wagon kits from the 1960s, but on Ebay it’s quite a different story! Another issue is that we never get to sell all our stock at an open day, which means that there is always a ‘roll over’ to the following year. Ebay, in addition to generating income, has also saved us valuable storage space. The only downside is that having a well-stocked second-hand stall has always been a great incentive for visitors to come to our open day. That is a bridge we shall have to cross at some future date, but for the moment all we can say is that once we’re able to re-open our clubrooms, we will welcome any donations of any unwanted model railway items, no matter how old, no matter how battered.
The club’s attention turned to fostering that more elusive and ‘spiritual’ sense of community
CLUB PROFILE
For full details of Twickenham & District MRC, visit www.tdmrc.org.uk or Facebook www.facebook.com/ Twickenhammrc/