Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2001/12/16
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]Have you looked into applying for non-profit staus? Mailing is a LOT cheaper that way, and it is not all that hard to complete the paper work. > From: LEICAMAN56@aol.com > Reply-To: leica-users@mejac.palo-alto.ca.us > Date: Sun, 16 Dec 2001 23:40:11 EST > To: leica-users@mejac.palo-alto.ca.us > Subject: [Leica] LHSA Gripes, long > > It is with some interest that I have been reading numerous LUG postings over > the last few days about the LHSA, Viewfinder and the Catalog. While most > have involved complaints about several aspects of our organization, mail > service and the cost of membership, most have been complimentary about the > quality of VF and for this, a hearty thank you. > I would like to address some of these complaints with the facts and reality, > and not conjecture. The biggest issue here is finances and the cost of > membership. This year we have increased dues for the first time in 5 years. > As most of you can surmise, the VF and Catalog do cost quite a bit of money > to put out and in fact, most of the budget of LHSA does go to the VF. We > also realize that this is the main reason for most of you belonging to LHSA, > and I have put my heart and soul into it for the past two years to give the > membership the highest quality journal which my budget will allow. All > without advertising which other sister publications resort to. I would love > to have the budget Leica Photografie, Leica World and Leica Quarterly have. > Wow, can you imagine VF then. Color throughout, better B&W reproduction, > more pages, and on and on. But back to reality. I am proud of the VF, but of > course I always am striving to out do the last issue. What most of you don't > know is that we have gotten postage increases from USPS every year for as > long as I can remember. We have also gotten at least one paper cost increase > during the past three years. This year we were faced with a major decision. > Increase dues or decrease the size, scope, color, etc. of the VF. Naturally, > I opposed cutting back on VF and I think all of you would agree that that > cutting back on VF would be a huge mistake. As the Editor, I refuse to > compromise the quality level currently achieved by VF. I felt that cutting > back on VF would be a great disservice to the bulk of the membership. As > part of a dues increase study, we looked at cost areas associated with our > publications and were really surprised at the cost of postage being such a > key factor. It is also a factor we have virtually no control over. As > reported by Emanuel Loewi, we use a mail service to handle the mailing of the > VF, Catalog and other mailings such as the raffle, renewals, etc. This is the > most efficient and cost effective way to do this. US mail is by permit and > the mailings to each country outside the US are also handled by this service. > The pieces are bundled by country and forwarded on to be handled by the > respective postal services in each country. I'm sure you all realize that > there is no way to mail each individual piece to each individual member, and > that using this service is the best and least costly way to handle all of > this. I'm sure that you also realize that the efficiency of many of your > individual countries mail services leaves a lot to be desired. Many of the > gripes about problems with receiving publications should be directed at your > respective postal services and not at the LHSA. Throw in Sept. 11th, a major > anthrax scare and general postal inefficiency and you begin to understand why > mailings can be late. > As I stated earlier, we studied the actual costs of mailing VF, Catalog, > raffle tickets and other mailings around the world and we were very surprised > at the huge cost differences of mailings in the US compared to Canada, South > America, Europe and Asia. In fact, it was found that we were effectively > subsidizing the cost of membership for those in Europe and the Far East. The > board felt that the dues structure must more accurately reflect the cost of > supporting those members in other countries (insert the hated "foreign" > word). We also listened to our members in Canada who for years have > complained that surely their memberships can't cost what those in Europe and > Asia cost. Upon examination, this is correct as far as mail costs go, but > they still cost more to mail to than the US membership. That is why we have > now adopted a three tier dues structure. As far as the LHSA considering > everyone not in the US as "foreign", this is the definition of those outside > the US by the US Postal Service. After all, we are all members of the Leica > family, but we just can't seem to convince the USPS of this distinction. > As far as the amount of time the Catalog takes to reach overseas members, > this again is something we have no control over. I agree that it's not fair > for "foreign" members to get their catalog three weeks later than those in > the US. I will now pose the question, What is the answer to this problem? > We are in a new information age with email, ebay, etc. making the paper > catalog more of an irrelevancy. LHSA leadership realizes this and we feel > that the electronic catalog will go a long way to address this problem. Ed > Schwartzreich, Catalog Editor, proposed the electronic catalog at our board > meeting in April and after a lot of work by Ed and John Barnabus thinking the > whole thing out, the board approved going forward with the electronic catalog > at the board meeting in San Antonio. Many things had to be considered in > this, including security, fairness to those who weren't online, how to > administer the electronic catalog, etc., etc. We think we've got the bugs > worked out. Any input from you out there would be greatly appreciated by Ed > or John. Their email addresses appear on the VF masthead every quarter. > I hope this answers some of the questions and complaints voiced here over the > past few days. The LHSA "big wigs" do listen to membership and there are > good reasons behind a lot of what we do. What really scares me now is the > talk by the US Postal Service of dramatic rate increases next year in the > wake of Sept. 11th and the anthrax scare. The economy is down and mailings > are dramatically down, and as a consequence, so are postal revenues. Let's > hope this doesn't come to pass or we may be looking at another dues increase > next year! > > Bill Rosauer > -- > To unsubscribe, see http://mejac.palo-alto.ca.us/leica-users/unsub.html > - -- To unsubscribe, see http://mejac.palo-alto.ca.us/leica-users/unsub.html