ORIGINAL: camW


I would like to make a comment about this new emerging market. As a Club one of our goals is to further interest in the hobby and safety. People of all ages are purchasing the RTFs at the LHS and looking for a place to fly it as soon as they get their battery charged ...a field, a park, the driveway. Joining a club or purchasing insurance may not be foremost in their mind. Our problem is they may try and conduct their first flight with little attention to safety and without sufficient knowledge to avert a fatal end to their new found interest.

We have chosen to take a new approach this month by having our Local Hobby Shops insert in the aircraft boxes at the shop on the shelves an [link=http://www.rivannarc.com/PDFs/Welcome_to_Model_Aviation.pdf]Invitation[/link] to come to either of our local flying clubs on a Saturday morning for an introductory lesson to flying. This we believe will give us the satisfaction that some of these newbies will go out with safety in mind and sufficient knowledge to handle their aircraft without endangering the public.

The benefit to the club in promoting this avenue is that once at the field the flyer may be attracted to the club, the field and/or further training with larger sized aircraft. Here I see the opportunity of utilizing the Introductory membership program.

I have soken with the AMA regarding our approach but reactions have been somewhat cooler than I expected. Their focus appears to be the marketing of the PPP insurance program and new Park Flyer Clubs.