Are you a member of the FCA?

Depends on what day of the week you ask me!
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Kinda have to agree with this, for precisely the same reasons. As of Jan 1 I'm now officially an ex-chapter president (thank god!) and don't plan on renewing.

 

I was but did not renew. I only got a newsletter about four times per year, and never really knew about any events, so it was not worth $135 to renew IMHO.
I stick with the Fchat posted events now.

BT

 

Except for track time a resonable istance from home, there is not much happening on Long Island concerning FOA. I will probably not renew.

 

depends on the individuals who are involved in each chapter

 

Yes, Pacific

 

Yes-FCA-NC. Well worth the money IMHO. Great group of guys (and occasionally gals) associated with this group!!!

 

Yes I am a member of FCA
Jeff

 

Not sure why, exactly.

 

Sure am, it was the thing to do after getting my first Ferrari. I'll renew for a year at least then reconsider if it's worth it...

 

if i have a ferrari , sure i will be member , but.....don t have one

 

I am a member of both the FCA and FOC.

 

Not any more.

We struggled for years in the Greater Phoenix area, to put a club chapter together and we finally got a small group to form the local chapter of the FOC. We soon figured out that most of our dues went to support the very S. Cal centric club and we got precious little other than a name badge and some printed matter.

There were lots of Ferrari owners in the area and as we started doing more local events, without any real direction from FOC, we decided to change the club's affiliation to the FCA. They promised a little more, their printed stuff was better quality but at the end of the day if we wanted to organize anything we were on our own. To add to the woes the club, as clubs tend to do, attracted some super efficient, very organized, competent...Nazis may be too strong a word ...but anyway, it became a little painful to be at board meetings.
The club also attracted a whole slew of business promoters....scumbags is definitely the right word here....who tried to use the club as a promotional vehicle for their scams, whether it was selling roses or real estate or self improvement courses, which was clearly not the intention of a very social club. The dues still went mostly elsewhere and what little came in to the local chapter was being used for "Board members meeting expenses", an interesting euphemism if there ever was. The final straw was the appointment of an NSX owner/Ex CIA spy (his description) as the newsletter editor, and it turned into a commercial for him. That's when it became clear the original idea of our local group enjoying our cars together was a receding and very distant dream.

To cut a long story short, most of the original group who where there at the beginning have left the club and we now meet just about every week with cars nuts of all description, in a club without dues going to some vague umbrella organization, and for the sheer pleasure of being with our fellow afficianados and their company. A much better state of being altogether. To paraphrase a well known movie line "we don't need no stinking badges!!"

 

(Note:deleted some of original post) I know exactly what you mean!!!

 

How in the world did you manage to put on so many events per year? We struggle to
put together 5 or 6 a year.

 

Rob,

FerrariChat is becoming a greater aspect for organizing events than the 'Clubs' themselves.

I'm on the board of FOC Midwest, and we use Chat as our communication link.

 

Yes

Penn-Jersey

 

It just kinda adds up.

Monthly lunch = 12
Spring, Fall and Toy Run (technically, the toy run is independent) = 3
Car show = 1
Exotic Car Night = 3
Fine Dining = 3
Formula 1 watching parties = 4-6

So thats 26 or so right there.

And we used to have events on the 2nd Tues evenings every month, so that was an additional 12. Those ended up canceled due to lack of attendance.

We didn't start with that many events, we started with a few events every year and just kept adding on. This total does NOT include events exclusively organized here at Fchat, such as our Instalunches, Coffee Sundays, invading local car shows (and winning the trophies!) and impromptu runs on the weekends.

I have no idea what the schedule for 08 will be, I assume when we get a new chapter president he'll set one up.

 

FCA Houston member. The Houston group is fun with a lot of nice people. Grady Owens and Mike B of the club were very helpful to me when I was buying my car. Quite a few FCA members are Fchatters and vice-versa.

 

The Rocky Mountain region of the FCA is excellent, and it has been quite an additional unexpected bonus to my Ferrari ownership experience.

 

As a follow-up to this, I have to thank all the chapter members who are so active. Most of these events are organized by members for members. There's no way that all these could happen without them.

 

You guys are not going to screw up the upcoming regional meet are you? Damn, and I just sent my check.

Dale