2023 Homecoming Prep Meeting Minutes

Hi All,

Yesterday, we had our second zoom call about planning for Homecoming.

On the call were: Cale Johnson – Alumni Board President, Jacob Shea – Chapter President, Ryan Piercy – Chapter Vice President, Reid Johnson – Alumni Chairman, Patrick Creech – Rush Chairman, Ryan Thomas – “SWAG Chairman” and myself.

I took notes so I thought I would share them.

HOMECOMING COCKTAIL PARTY

1. On the last call, we were hopeful that we’d be able to have the Friday night cocktail party at the same golf course (Smoky Mountain) as the golf event is currently planned for.  Smoky Mountain has told us they’re not open to hosting a fraternity event.  Cale has taken on the job of trying to find a place to have the event.  Ideas put forth were:
   1. Try again with Smoky Mountain
   2. Try other golf courses in the area
   3. Try to find a local hotel with an open conference / banquet room – looking as far away as Cherokee
   4. We may be able to access a private piece of land near the Tuckaseegee river.  If so, an idea was put forth to put a large “event tent” on it.
   5. For anyone who is concerned about making their venue available to a fraternity, we proposed offering them a substantial (but fully refundable) security deposit.

HOMECOMING TENT FOR THE ACTIVES

2. The actives asked if the alumni would consider paying for a new tent for them to use for rush events, homecoming etc.  Their current tent is 10×10.  This used to be the “standard” size used by most fraternities, but that has migrated to 10×20.  The Pikes, Sig Eps and most others have 10×20 making ours conspicuously small. Prices will be as follows:
   1. 10×15 – $1000
   2. 10×20 – $1300

DUES INCENTIVES AT HOMECOMING

3. We discussed the idea of giving out some kind of swag as an incentive for people who are at homecoming & have not paid their dues yet to do so.  Ideas were: coozies, shot glasses, beer mugs etc.
4. Reid Johnson will get prices on a variety of items for us to consider

RUSH

5. Rush will take place between August 31^st and September 6^th.  This is unusual because it runs from a Thursday through the following Wednesday with bids going out on Friday the 8^th; making what is normally a 6 day “rush week” effectively 9 days long.  The weekend in the middle of rush week is Labor Day so many freshmen rushees will be going home that weekend.  All of this boils down to a more challenging than normal environment in which to get and keep the attention of rushees.
   1. The actives are looking for ideas for events to hold over the Labor Day weekend for rushees who don’t go home.  Because rush week will be so much longer than normal, the event(s) need to be economical.
   2. A river tubing event was proposed
   3. A “day at lake Glenville” event was proposed
      1. Ryan Piercy is going to check with the school to make sure there are no prohibitions on this kind of event.
      2. He is also going to check with Blake Greene to make sure LCA nationals doesn’t have any prohibitions on this kind of event.
   4. Relative to this, we discussed the alumni making a commitment to sponsor one rush event each semester (approximately $1300/semester)

CHAPTER ADVISOR

6. We discussed the urgent need to find a chapter advisor. 
7. Logan Fender was suggested. 
8. He graduated in December of 2022. 
9. Everyone seems to think he would be a good fit. 
10. He lives in Charlotte and is a project manager for a construction company.
11. Ryan Piercy is living with Logan this summer.  He will discuss this with Logan.
12. Cale is checking with the outgoing advisor; Joe SK to get his thoughts.

BUDGET

This afternoon as I prepared to write this, I started doing the math on all of the proposed spending for the year.  A summary is below:

BZZ Alumni 2023 budget forecast
Homecoming	$1,700.00	Same as we spent in 2022 – food, drinks, awards, alumni scholarship, etc *includes $350 we paid for DJ & food for cocktail party at LCA house
Homecoming “Swag”	$500.00	*SWAG estimate
Rush Events	$2,600.00	$1300 per semester
Undergrad Tent	$1,300.00	*firm estimate
Homecoming Cocktail Party Location	???
TOTAL	$6,100.00	*total amount taken in during 2022 was $5760.  I think we’re on track to do about the same this year

I point this out because I think we need to decide as a group about how we handle our budget.  If we have no plans of saving toward being able to afford some of the things we’ve talked about like owning our own “event space” at some time in the future, then setting our spending equal to our income (or dipping into our “savings” as/when appropriate) is no problem.  If we do want to “save for the future”, then I think we should set a goal for how much we want to save every year & both budget and fund-raise accordingly.

In ZAX,

Pat

BZ410