National Membership Officer - Peter McBride

I am very honoured and proud to have been elected as your Membership & Round Table Liaison Officer at the 2022 AGM in Cardiff.

I owe the Round Table Family much since joining in 1987 - like you, it has given me lifelong friendships and personal support - and I’d like to give something back. It was this feeling that encouraged me to establish the National Buddyline in 2020 to support our members.

My role over the past 4 years as National Councillor of one of the largest 41 Club Regions as well as being NCLO overseeing the other National Councillors for the past year, has given me a realistic ‘feel’ for our Association (that and setting up the National Whisky Appreciation Group)

We are at a critical point however, regarding membership of Round Table and 41 Club – the next three years may be the most important in the history of our Associations.

The first step in solving any problem is recognising there is one.

  • New members are joining Round Table but not enough to grow their net membership
  • The majority of retiring Tablers do consider 41 Club to be their first Club of choice and continue to enjoy the fellowship of the Round Table Family but many do not

I promise to:

  • 1.Engage tirelessly with the RTBI Board to actively support them in their initiatives to increase membership
  • 2.Ensure every 41 Club National Councillor engages with their local RTBI Regional Councillors to actively support Round Tables and help rebuild bridges with local 41 Clubs
  • 3.Identify and engage with past-tablers who have not joined 41 Club for whatever reason, understand why and help them to either join an existing Club or start up a new one
  • 4.Encourage and enable all 41 Clubs to share their creative ideas, activities and best practices for other Clubs to learn from to improve the richness of all meetings

Following the AGM, I have initially pulled together an awesome Membership Committee who are full of ideas and we have already started the necessary planning activities for recruiting new members and retaining existing members.

More news on these will be shared in the coming weeks, meanwhile I am keen to hear from any member who has a view on Membership – you can contact me on membership@41club.org.