Z Club Start-Up
 

All,

Yesterday a small group of us Z guys met up for purposes of starting an Auto Club primarily for the Z of all Generations, but open to the Infinity G lines as well. Below is the official e-mail that came out after the meeting. I know some of us here on the 370Z have in the past expressed an interest in a car club - if you'd like to join, then pipe up. There will be advantages and incentives to being in the club

Here are the meeting notes:
On August 25 at 1:30 pm there was an organizational meeting for establishing a Z Club in the New Orleans/Slidell area. Although no formal arrangements have been made in forming a Z Car Club, we are moving forward. The numbers of individuals interested in forming a club is not clear but I'm thinking we are close to about 20. That's the starting point without even looking at the people on the 350.com site.

The following areas were discussed:

Name for club: Gulf Coast Z Club or Southeast Regional Z Club

The club would be open to all owners of Datsun Z, Nissan Z and Infinity car owners. Associate members would be other interested parties either owners of sports cars or spouses and friends of members.

Dues would be $25.00 per year for a member and $12.50 per year for associate members. Associate members would have limited benefits to the club. If we become a member of ZCON they require $2.00 per person per year dues.

There will be By-Laws and we are looking into getting the formats and information to move forward in this area.

Officers with responsibilities: The following positions would be (so far): President, Treasurer, Event Coordinator and Marketing Coordinator. Paul C (PaulZ370) has volunteered to be Event Coordinator as he has been performing this function on the 370 site. Unless there is a huge objection, I will serve as President up to forming the club and anytime thereafter up to a year. We would like someone to come forward as a Treasurer (once we start collecting dues). At this time no election, looking for volunteers!!

We will look at establishing either a website, facebook page or some means for individuals wanting to become a participating member can find information about the club, events and membership.

Our club would hold events such as: Mechanic day, car shows, meets where we can either race or drive a course, cookouts, cruise/drive to various locations throughout the gulf coast, casino runs, etc. We want to meet in various locations so everyone can have at least one event near them.

As a club we want to also hold fundraising events for charity organizations.

Once we are a club with established members we'll try and get companies to offer discounts (as another benefit for being a member) and maybe allow them to have ads on our website or a club E-newsletter.

We would like to have a Club design for: business cards, t-shirts and other items.

Right now there is a need for someone to either help establish a website or facebook page (and) a design for a club logo.

Paul will be letting everyone we know of upcoming events. He has been posting events on yahoo Z Club and on the370Z.com site. I'm still trying to get a group together for Cruisin' the Coast. For that we would need a place to park (one day only) as a group. So, anyone on the Gulf Coast we need your help. I thought we might ask Peck Nissan if they would do that for one day, as they are close to the beach.

Our next meeting will be in September either on the 15th or the 23rd. Either in the New Orleans or Mandeville/Covington area. LET ME know which is a better Saturday to meet, majority will set it. [Note: Rick's e-mail is gutzy847@yahoo.com and his phone number is listed below if you wish to contact him direct and offer your assistance/help with something]

I think that covers the meeting. Hope more people come to these meeting and when we have events show up. Will be working on Oct/Nov and early Dec. Let me know what you think.

Rick Gutierrez
504-343-8513 (cell)

My Preference would be for a September 15th meeting, either in Covington or Metairie/Kenner, not New Orleans, due to parking issues in the city.

A note regarding Rick Gutierrez for those who do not know him. Rick is an older gentlemen who owns a convertible 300ZX Z32. He was very active in the Louisiana Z Club, same as myself, Mike C (PSYCOPTH), and Harold W (BUCKETMAN). This is no frivolous venture that will not go anywhere, but a serious effort.

Hope y'all find this to be beneficial to you and elect to join and help us build the club from the Ground Up!

Sorry, I missed this thread until just now.

You can count me in. I can handle the logo and other design duties as well as the Facebook and website setup. I already have my own web server. I've been designing for 15 years.

I'm good with meeting on the 15th in Kenner if possible. I could do Covington if nobody else wants to do Kenner. Let's just please not meet at 8am. :)

I would be down to join. Wont be abel to make the 15th thou. Working :(.

I'm open to doing the 23rd too.

Thanks Dave - I am thinking we'll need your skills and abilities as soon as possible so as to help advertise the club and help grow it. This is critical at this stage - we need momentum, and that's one way of generating it. If you can think up of the design (in general terms or as detailed as you want) and have some ideas ready for the meeting then that would be great. See PM for further...

I have suggested to the group that we push the meeting back to the 29th or 30th of September, given that the Hurricane has put a big dent in our everyday plans and we are still recuperating. Everyone: Pipe up and let me know what day/date is better for you. Dave: Do you have a meeting place in mind in Kenner? It would be good if we can have a few ideas from everyone for some good meeting places in various areas - a good but inexpensive restaurant with some good parking area of course! Cracker Barrel was good last time, so would these places be: Hooters, Times, Ruby Tuesday, ...etc.

Good deal AreJay - Hope you can make it for the 29th or 30th?

Also, there is a Car Show in Slidell on the 22nd
http://www.the370z.com/southern-regi...ml#post1750450

Hope to see you and everyone else there ! :tup:

Honestly, I haven't been to Kenner in forever. It's just super easy to get there for me. I can be there in like 45 minutes from my house so it's easier to plan it far ahead.

I'll start playing with some ideas on the design stuff.

Club meeting announcement
 

GuyZ and GalZ,

We will be meeting on Saturday, Sep 29th at 1:30pm at Johnny's Pizza in Covington to further discuss Auto Club start-up plans. Be there if you want to contribute your opinions and ideas to building a successful and fun Car Club. Johnny's Pizza is located in Northpark Village Shopping Mall close to Zia's, McAllisters, Lee's Hamburgers and Menche's Ice Cream shop. Here is the website where you can find the Menu :
Johnny's Pizza House Menu

Be there to be a Grass Roots part of this organization. We need your support AND your Input! :tiphat:

I'm pretty sure I can be there.

I will try, but can't promis.

Cool...!

Hope to see you and Hillary there - been a while!

I can make that one

Good Deal...

My fiance and I are going to try to make it.


Let me know if you want some help with this. My fianace, who shares a posting account with me, has also been in web development/design for 10+ years and would love to help.

That's awesome! I'll probably take you up on that. The more the merrier! :)

:hello:...REMINDER... REMINDER...REMINDER... :hello:

I will be about half hour early at Johnny's Pizza to block off a section where we can all park our Z's together. I will be passing by the place tonight to talk to the manager and have him get us a table for about 12 persons for Saturday. Let me know if you are coming (with or without company) so I can make adjustments to the seating and parking as needed.

I still plan to be there but I'll be alone this time.

We'll let you in... this time...:bowrofl:

Windex - Will you be coming to the meeting and bringing The Beast over per chance...?

lol

Sorry, but I don't think I'm going to be able to make it today after all. Sorry. :(

My fiancé and I are on the way. We're running about 10-15 minutes late.

So how was the turnout? Sorry I couldn't be there guys, sounded like fun. I hope the weather wasn't to bad, it rained most of the weekend.

We had 10 people in attendance. We discussed needing Officers, particularly a Treasurer, naming the club (we are researching several options right now), possible events that we'd like to sponsor, obtaining sponsorships from ZCCA (Z Car Club of America) and local auto parts stores etc, coming up with cards to give out to prospective members, along with the need to start up a website, membership dues, and along with all that, we had some scrumptious Pizza to boot! The rain was pretty bad, with standing water almost everywhere, but our Z's braved the rain - matter of fact, we had attendees from as far as Baton Rouge and Metairie (crossed the Causeway in their brand new Z amidst all the rain storming that was going on... and I was worried about driving my Z the 3 miles there and back!!!)

We will be holding our next meeting in the next few weeks, date not decided yet, and hopefully, we'd like to see a lot more attendees. By then, we most likely will have an official name, maybe possibly a LOGO as well, plus an official website. We have a set of Bylaws donated by another car club for us to use and edit to our situation, plus the tax filing paperwork needed to establish our tax exempt status with the IRS and the paperwork for ZCCA. So, we are definitely on the way. Keep an eye out for more info and details on this thread coming in the next couple of weeks for sure! :tup:

Sorry again I couldn't make it. Besides the rain, I had a little friend who decided to take up residence in my chimney on Friday night/Saturday morning. I spent most of my weekend dealing with that. :(

Hole-y crap! (All Pun Intended...:bowrofl:)

Ok, so it wasn't funny to you I'm sure - did it all turn out ok I hope?

We missed you, but I know you'll be around for the next time...

lol... believe it or not, we got him out alive.

I'll be at the next one for sure.... assuming a bear or some sh!t doesn't decide to break into my laundry room. lol

I too hopefully will be at the next one.

Lions, tigers and bears oh my!!! lol. I'll be at work for the next three weeks, will return on the 24th. Anything going on during my off time I will definitely try to be there.

lol

Hope y'all had a good time, I was miserable on my 24hr flight back from Japan. Trip was amazing but man... I hate planes.

Glad you're back with us safe and sound!

I want to go to Japan but f**k a 24 hour flight

Total flight time is around 24 hours, but the flight from Dallas to Tokyo was 18hours. Coming back the flight was 16 hours due to tail winds. The flight is not that bad if you are in business or 1st class. Make friends with the flight attendants and they sometimes let you crash in an empty 1st class seat for a little. (while everyone is sleeping and will not notice you) I would go back in a heartbeat. I stayed in Nagaham in Shiga Prefecture. Close to Kyoto.

Keep it going!
 

This is like dejavu to me. We found ourselves living this same scenario about 10 years ago. I can tell you from experience that it's not going to be easy.

My best advice to you guys and gals is to not get discouraged. It's going to be very important to have a good core group of officers/members especially in the beginning stages. As many of you who can get on board with this DO IT! Don't just talk about it BE ABOUT IT! Meet as often as possible to have "face time" and to get to know each other better and it will become like a family to you.

As a member of the international Z Car Club Association (ZCCA) and President of the Arkansas Z Car Club, I extend my hand and tip my hat to you all! If I can be of assistance in any way don't hesitate to ask. :tiphat:

Thanks easy-e: All encouragement is welcomed and needed. I personally have started three different area Z Club groups at three different times, and it is a lot of work. I grew these to a respectable base of members, collected dues, bought T-Shirts, organized events, did door prizes at meetings (held monthly) and, even though it was a lot of work, it was also a lot of fun to get a whole group of Z's together spanning the early S-series through the 350Z (this is thru 2005, after which I sold my 300ZX Twin Turbo and went cold turkey on Z's till 2011 when I bought my 370Z - God I Love The Car!)

Anyway, Arkansas is not that far away - maybe in the near future, we can schedule a middle of the road meet between both groups - do a sort of Z-Days get together...) :tup: :driving:

UPDATE: Gulf Coast Z Club
 

All,

It seems the name "Gulf Coast Z" Club (GCZ) is available for us to use, and so, henceforth this will be the Club's name. We also have come up with a set of Constitution and By Laws, so we're almost official. What we now need is to select officers who are willing to put in the time and effort to get the Club off the ground officially. This has to be done prior to us filing for our non-profit tax exempt status with the IRS and are able to open up a Club Bank Account. Our President is Rick G., VP is Harold W (Bucketman), Interim Treasurer is Mario, and I will be the Event Coordinator. A Treasurer and Secretary are what we need at this time.

Dues will be set at $25/year, prorated Quarterly. Provisions for Spouses or Significant others will be 1/2 price if they wish to join. Initially, dues will be used to pay for filing of the paperwork and other necessary setup expenses. We will need everyone's participation here so we can generate the funds necessary for all of this.

Our next general meeting in which your participation will be critical is tentatively scheduled for Saturday Dec 8th at 1 pm in Metairie. Location still to be determined. In this meeting, we will need to complete our core group of officers as I referenced earlier. Other business will encompass adopting a Club Logo - so, if you have an idea that you think will fit our club, then please bring a 'good' sketched drawing for us to see. We already have one design submitted by Mike C (ZYCOPTH).

Stay tuned for an update as to the location of the meeting. In the meantime, pencil it into your schedule and make every effort to attend. This club is for you, and we need you to grow it!

See you then!:happydance::driving: :tup:

Sounds good!

Bump!