Contact members for renewal success

American Legion Internal Affairs and Membership Division staff at National Headquarters reached out to posts with membership growth this year to share their success stories. We will be sharing the stories submitted over the next few issues of the Dispatch. The following submissions were provided in April 2024.

Post 434, Chula Vista, Calif.: We have the right leaders in the right place at the right time. I know that sounds easier said than done. Some of the things we have done:

• Last September, the post commander sent out a letter to all Legionnaires to let them know what was going on with the post and upcoming events.
• Stayed on top of members who did not renew the year before.
• Had an Early Bird Dinner and handed out longevity pins.
• Had a 91^st anniversary dinner for our Legionnaires, Auxiliary and Sons

The Auxiliary, Sons and post members all work well together on events and getting members signed up. We even have our bar staff signing up members. 

Dana Davies, commander

Post 143, Post Falls, Idaho:   I am in my fifth year as membership officer of our post and as I did in my career in corporate sales, I take time to learn what works and what doesn’t in customer/member relations. Every organization, community/industry and customer/member base is different, but the one thing that remains the same in all situations is listening. The first year I just sat back and observed the process, talked to the members, and listened to our commander who had been the 1st Vice before I took the position. At his direction, I did not worry about making goal, just understand the organization, the process, the workload of other officers and the enthusiasm of our volunteers.

Our post has achieved a goal of making itself more attractive to current members and the large veteran community in our city. We have:

• increased meals served to six days a week
• instituted a Veterans Coffee & Donuts every Wednesday morning
• instituted a No Smoking policy throughout the post and also installed a smoking shack outside the lounge
• installed new flooring, painted and replaced ceiling tiles

We were lucky to have the services of a great retired bookkeeper to set up a new bookkeeping system so that we could improve the cost-to profit-ratios of the bar and meal services. Once the system was set up, we recruited a new finance officer who was trained by our retired bookkeeper who continues to check on our system. These changes and improvements were carried out by our officers and our member volunteers with the help of professional trades people.

With the post and fundraising operations now operating quite well, I moved my recruiting efforts to a higher level this past year with a complete calling of all members on our roster, both active and expired. I started in September calling all long-term members who had not renewed and then followed with the three to five-year members. Last October I made up lists of 10 to 15 members for all officers to call and we carried this through to December 31 when we finally reached our goal of 622 paid members for 2024. We also instituted a Welcome Letter given to all new recruits and a Welcome Committee of one to call all new members in the months following their joining to make sure all of their questions were answered.

I have found in this work the same fundamental actions work as well as they did in my work in corporate sales for 30 + years, offer and deliver a good product/service and then both talk and listen to your customers/members and to top it off, if you haven’t seen a regular member around the post in days or weeks, do a Buddy Check, most of the time it is because of other responsibilities or commitments they have. But the personal touch/call does work and certainly helps with retention!

Robert Shay, 1^st vice commander

Post 164, Yelm, Wash. In 2023 we chartered an American Legion Riders chapter and have been able to pick up new members because of this program. This has helped since we have an Auxiliary unit as well as Sons squadron and some very active Boy Scout troops. This helps us offer activities for all members of a veteran’s family.

A couple of things that we are doing are:

• We are actively contacting veterans who were members in 2023 and have not yet renewed their membership for 2024.
• We are in contact with some members of Post 110. These are veterans who signed up for The American Legion online and did not have a specific post to join. We have transferred several veterans to our post this way.

Carl Puchalski, adjutant