Need your honest feedback about BMWCCA

[m3dragon]

Because I am a crazy person and organize events, I reached out to BMWCCA for support in the 15 years of E46 M3 event. While I chatted with them, I got on the topic about how to entice BMW Enthusiasts and younger members to join the national club.
Short story is I have the blessing of BMWCCA to make this post to gather feedback on how BMWCCA can offer more things to have enthusiasts and younger members join the national club.

Please post your honest replies below and I will gather them to send to national. Please also ask all of your friends to chime no matter what their thoughts are so I can present their feelings to national.
Forum admins, please help forum members find this so we can get our voices heard. Also please add your comments on how BMWCCA could support the forum if they are not already doing so. The forums are the backbone of the enthusiast community so we need your input whether good or bad.

If people cannot reply to the forums please have them email me at norcal.drivers@gmail.com with the questions below.
1. Are you a BMWCCA member currently?

2. What is your regional club (if you don’t know just say don’t know)?

3. If you are not a member, what was the reason for not joining?

4. Have you attended any meeting or event with any BMW chapter?

5. What are activities you would like to see the BMW chapters do in your area?

6. What activities would you like to see on a national level?

7. What type of programs would you like to see BMWCCA support?

8. Do you want BMWCCA to find ways to help enthusiasts with acquiring parts for projects?

9. Open comment / suggestion.

[iwantspeed]

If people cannot reply to the forums please have them email me at norcal.drivers@gmail.com with the questions below.
1. Are you a BMWCCA member currently?
Yes, been a member for the last 4 years.
2. What is your regional club (if you don’t know just say don’t know)?
La chapter
3. If you are not a member, what was the reason for not joining?
-
4. Have you attended any meeting or event with any BMW chapter?
Yes, they had a cool meeting at spectrum collision in irvine.
Also have attended the detailing classes at the Meguiars corporate office.
5. What are activities you would like to see the BMW chapters do in your area?

6. What activities would you like to see on a national level?

7. What type of programs would you like to see BMWCCA support?

8. Do you want BMWCCA to find ways to help enthusiasts with acquiring parts for projects?

This would be awesome. I spent close to a year piecing my interior together.
I ended up getting e30 m3 front and rear seats from a track e30 m3 from Oregon thanks to my friend Archie.
Through word of mouth was the only way. I constantly searched e30 forums bmwcca classified, craigslist classified eBay and had no luck.


9. Open comment / suggestion.

Is there any way to get the old bmwcca static cling window sticker back. The new one looks soo cheap and pixelated

[butters]

1. Are you a BMWCCA member currently?

Yes.

2. What is your regional club (if you don’t know just say don’t know)?

Currently Pocono, I keep my eye on Delaware. Formerly Oregon.

4. Have you attended any meeting or event with any BMW chapter?

Oregon chapter hosted multiple drives and gatherings.

5. What are activities you would like to see the BMW chapters do in your area?

Drives, gatherings, tech days, etc.

6. What activities would you like to see on a national level?

A huge meet would be cool. East coast picnic?

8. Do you want BMWCCA to find ways to help enthusiasts with acquiring parts for projects?

Would be nice, yea.

9. Open comment / suggestion.

Go to the PNW and find out how they are so good. I also would agree with the driving school regulations only because I wanted to invite a friend with a Z4 M roadster but it's stock and wouldn't be allowed. That's a bummer.

[James Crivellone]

1. Are you a BMWCCA member currently?

Yes, over 10 years

2. What is your regional club (if you don’t know just say don’t know)?

BMW Car Club Puget Sound Region

4. Have you attended any meeting or event with any BMW chapter?

///M Car Day, E30 Picnic, Burgers and Coffee, BMWCCA Driving schools back in the day.

5. What are activities you would like to see the BMW chapters do in your area?

Exactly what they are doing now, Tours, schools, car shows, etc.

6. What activities would you like to see on a national level?

Nothing else I can think of, Roundel is great

7. What type of programs would you like to see BMWCCA support?

They are awesome in the Pacific Northwest, can't think of anything else.

8. Do you want BMWCCA to find ways to help enthusiasts with acquiring parts for projects?

We partner with the CCA for local car shows and events already, its a great way to reach the BMW community.

9. Open comment / suggestion.

I think they do a great job, everyone should be a CCA member in my eyes.

[DaveSmed]

1. Are you a BMWCCA member currently?
No. Let my membership lapse.

2. What is your regional club (if you don’t know just say don’t know)?
Delval

3. If you are not a member, what was the reason for not joining?
Lack of value to me. Only thing I took from my dues was a meet I could manage to attend once every year or three, and a magazine. I can meet with more bimmerheads more often through online communities local exchanges.

4. Have you attended any meeting or event with any BMW chapter?
Yes.

5. What are activities you would like to see the BMW chapters do in your area?
Tech sessions, loosening of the driving school rules to be more in line with NASA, specifically pertaining to convertibles, more modern online meeting place/hangout.



Really, it boiled down to the membership providing nothing for me but a magazine subscription. And for that, it was overpriced. The online communities provide much more, and are much more engaging to me. The superb local vendors and the events they hold are another example of a job well done. See G-fest, and VAC's open house.

And as far as track stuff, my hooptie is forbidden anyway. At least with NASA, I have the option to install a rollbar.

[m3dragon]

I realized the way I worded question 8 was not thorough enough.

The question is would you like help with getting things for projects such a European parts or harder to find parts from BMW?

This is not for BMWCCA to become a parts vendor but to help select vendors acquire the parts for members.

[DaveSmed]

Getting around the gray market parts "ban" would be nice. A ton of stuff for my engine is now a bit of a pain to get/takes forever.

[nando]

1. Are you a BMWCCA member currently?

no

2. What is your regional club (if you don’t know just say don’t know)?

BMW Car Club Puget Sound Region

4. Have you attended any meeting or event with any BMW chapter?

I've gone to a couple dyno days as a guest, the concours once, and of course the E30 picnic.

5. What are activities you would like to see the BMW chapters do in your area?

They do a lot of activities that I like but they're really for people who live really close to the seattle/Tacoma area.

6. What activities would you like to see on a national level?

The Roundel is probably good but I couldn't pay for a membership just for that..

7. What type of programs would you like to see BMWCCA support?

The programs are good, just too far away. and the few that I really do like to go to are generally open to non-members (E30 picnic, dyno days)

8. Do you want BMWCCA to find ways to help enthusiasts with acquiring parts for projects?

Well, the closest dealer is 150 miles away. so, a moot point. there's a dealer in Canada that's closer but Canadian prices are like 50% higher.

9. Open comment / suggestion.

It's just too Seattle/Tacoma-centric for me. I understand, there's just more people there. but up here, there's just no point. I'm not driving 2+ hours away for an autox, and I don't have the time for HPDEs right now.

[m3dragon]

Thank you all that have answered the thread so far. I am going to let the threads run until Nov 8th before I start to compile the data.

I wanted to address some of the people who chime in with their post whish could be summed up as “the club is what you make of it”.

The point of me doing this was to make the first step to help BMWCCA / chapters change to be in line with the majority of the enthusiast crowd. By no means will things change overnight as that requires more steps but you can’t get there without taking the first one. The replies many of you posted are excellent ideas and in line with what I first suggested to National in May of this year.

Last thing I wanted to address is those who posted on some the different forums that are arguing with me about making these threads.

I took on this project on my own with the blessing of National because I am an enthusiast like most of you. I also have a unique perspective as I stated a national club run by volunteers that faces the same issues as BMW. I am not getting anything for my time and energy and I chose to use the forums VS. a survey tool so that people could see others replies and comment. So if you feel that me taking my own time and energy to benefit us the BMW enthusiast’s community is something to argue over then I don’t know what to say other than, at least I did something then sit on my hands.

Thank you all again for posting and please let others know to chime in so I can present this to National. After Friday I will compile all the replies and post a summary to all the forums with what others have said / suggested.

[BMWManiac]

1. Are you a BMWCCA member currently?
Yes

2. What is your regional club (if you don’t know just say don’t know)?
Bluegrass Bimmers

3. If you are not a member, what was the reason for not joining?
N/A

4. Have you attended any meeting or event with any BMW chapter?
Yes, and some local events with other BMW clubs

5. What are activities you would like to see the BMW chapters do in your area?
Same activities they always do....dinners, drives, etc

6. What activities would you like to see on a national level?
I think we do plenty?

7. What type of programs would you like to see BMWCCA support?
N/A

8. Do you want BMWCCA to find ways to help enthusiasts with acquiring parts for projects?
Maybe help located ways to find parts for E30s that are NLA...maybe source someone who can get a hold of the mold and start making replicas?

9. Open comment / suggestion.
N/A

[F34R]

Always thought about joining, never really looked into it.

[matthugie]

1. Are you a BMWCCA member currently?
No. Let my membership lapse.

2. What is your regional club (if you don’t know just say don’t know)?
Delval

3. If you are not a member, what was the reason for not joining?
Lack of value to me. Only thing I took from my dues was a meet I could manage to attend once every year or three, and a magazine. I can meet with more bimmerheads more often through online communities local exchanges.

4. Have you attended any meeting or event with any BMW chapter?
Yes.

5. What are activities you would like to see the BMW chapters do in your area?
Tech sessions, loosening of the driving school rules to be more in line with NASA, specifically pertaining to convertibles, more modern online meeting place/hangout.



Really, it boiled down to the membership providing nothing for me but a magazine subscription. And for that, it was overpriced. The online communities provide much more, and are much more engaging to me.

This pretty well sums it up for me, though I have never made it to a chapter meeting (they're a solid 45 minutes from me) and my car isn't verboten from track. I'll probably renew next year just for track events.

And for posterity:

1. Are you a BMWCCA member currently?
No, let it lapse (again)
2. What is your regional club (if you don’t know just say don’t know)?
Tarheel Chapter
3. If you are not a member, what was the reason for not joining?
Lack of value, discounts at the dealer don't matter as they don't stock anything for the e30 anyway and not any cheaper than ordering from Blunt or another online vendor.
4. Have you attended any meeting or event with any BMW chapter?
No, the dissemination of information about types and times of local events seems to be lacking. Most of what I have heard of is by word of mouth, and the local monthly meets aren't convenient to me at this time.
5. What are activities you would like to see the BMW chapters do in your area?
Track/AutoX. I know they do some track events, but haven't heard of any AutoX.
6. What activities would you like to see on a national level?
-
7. What type of programs would you like to see BMWCCA support?

8. Do you want BMWCCA to find ways to help enthusiasts with acquiring parts for projects?
Yes
9. Open comment / suggestion.
-

[WarHammer 2/1]

Always thought about joining, never really looked into it.

+1 I've looked into it a little bit but not sure of the benefits

[kendogg]

1. Are you a BMWCCA member currently?

No
2. What is your regional club (if you don’t know just say don’t know)?
Peachtree Chapter

3. If you are not a member, what was the reason for not joining?
Used to be a member. The people running the region are dickfaces, not accepting of help, and angrily defend their dear leader.

4. Have you attended any meeting or event with any BMW chapter?
Yes

5. What are activities you would like to see the BMW chapters do in your area?

6. What activities would you like to see on a national level?

7. What type of programs would you like to see BMWCCA support?

8. Do you want BMWCCA to find ways to help enthusiasts with acquiring parts for projects?

9. Open comment / suggestion.

The BMWCCA, for the most part, is great. I feel like the national focus, just like sales of the newer cars, are geared towards the people that can afford them, towards getting them into that new, fancy car, rather than towards the enthusiest or the history of the Marque.

I've had 2 beef's with the BMWCCA that turned me off, and made me decide to go spend my money & playtime with other clubs. The officers of my chapter repeatedly say 'step up and do something about it', as if thats reality. Thats like saying if you don't like Obamacare, do somethign about it. It doesn't quite work that way. However, if they'd all step down and GTFO of the way, I'd probably re-join, and might even volunteer again like I used, to. I'd be willing to do most anything the club needed. And when I went to a trackday at Mont Tremblant a few years ago now, the car I was supposed to drive popped the motor in the last instructor session on Friday (I hadn't even put a tire on track yet). I asked the registrar for a refund, and was denied. Understandable, it was apparently a slightly under-sold event anyways. I asked if it was possible to issue me a credit for another trackday at a later date (I drove from Atlanta, GA to mont Tremblant, Quebec Canada), and I'd drive up to I think it was the Boston region and run again - was also denied. That seemed a bit unreasonable. Shit happens, but at least work with people.


So, in essence, the BMWCCA doesn't seem to be willing to be reasonable with people. Thats 2 chapters I've had negative dealings with. I'm a proud member of the SCCA now (which, btw, national annual dues are nearly twice as much as BMWCCA), and volunteer to help run the Atlanta regions autox program, among other thing

[TheTacoMan]

Id just like to say that Im not a member, but havent had any reason to join. I was told by m3dragon there was a big tahoe drive on 9/14. We were told to meet up at 12( I think) in South lake tahoe. We waited for 2 hours, once everyone got here they went to lunch which didnt bother me. What did was waiting about almost 2 hours then getting no information on the drive, then the group proceeded to leave with out us(we were in a group of 4 e30s).
Really sucks when the lack of communication for big drives like this are terrible and really a huge waste of a day. From what Ive seen locally of bmwcca its not all exciting.

/rant.