Executive Director’s Report

Executive Summary

We are now a little over a year into the transition of the American Driving Society. Our staff is more comfortable and productive now in their jobs and more confident with the new process put into place over the past 12 months. We are no longer 4 singles trying to find our course but are now a team pulling together to accomplish the societies goals.

The past 4 months have been focused on cost saving initiatives for the Society with regards to our publications.  The Executive Committee and I have been aggressively researching alternatives to our current printing challenges, trying to come up with solutions that save money without compromising the quality of our magazines.

To date we have been able to modify the way we do business and should be able to save over 10,000 this year.   The foundation for continued success in this area is being built around our implementation of a new Quickbooks accounting system.  At the completion of this project we will be better able to make sound business decisions based on accurate financial data.
As the Quickbooks project winds down to completion we are now able to focus attention on new projects, including a new web site that will allow specific committees to access show reports and the LOC to access Judges information.  This project is  a temporary stop gap to a larger need of an application to manage this data more comprehensively.

Our members are a loyal dedicated bunch as we learned from our survey done earlier this year.  The evidence is in our membership numbers remaining steady through an increase in dues. The numbers reflected later in this report are very similar to 2006 data from the same point in time last year. We continue to gain new members at an average 5-10 members a week and seem to be increasing in JR memberships and family memberships that include juniors .
Overall I am confident that we are moving the society into a positive new direction that will be able to provide a solid foundation for future membership growth and the continued viability of our sport.

Cost Saving Initiatives

Wheelhorse- As of January 1, 2007 the Wheelhorse has been offered in an electronic .PDF format to all members with a valid e-mail address. We mail a hard copy version to all members who have requested it in that format and to anyone whom we don’t have a valid e-mail address for.  We are still mailing 1600 copies. Based on the current ratio of hard copy and electronic copies our  net savings will be 4,800.00 per year.

Quickbooks Implementation- We have implemented a new Quickbooks accounting system replacing IMS (former membership management program) and Peachtree accounting system.  This has enabled us to have up-to-date financial tracking in the Cross Plains office and eliminate the need for an outside contractor to complete this work,  eliminating a 5,000.00 expense.

• Advertising Invoices- With the implementation of Quickbooks we are now able to send  invoices directly to our customers. This work used to be outsourced to Village Press and cost the Society,  2472.55 in 2006. We began this project with the July-December Omnibus publications.

Omnibus Design- Al l the listings for the 2007 June - December issue of the Omnibus were done in-house  using  InDesign software, the current industry standard publishing software used by Village Press.  This netted us a 2,080.00 savings in the design cost of the publication. However the cost of design on this publication was still 3,020.00 for Ad and pre-press work.
Entry Forms- Reduced the number of entry forms mailed with the Omnibus publication and created an online “fillable solution” that allows competitors to use Adobe Reader 8.0 to type their information directly into the entry form and save it to their computer for future use.  This reduced the overall printing costs of the publication.  The actual cost savings of this project is still under negotiation with Village Press.

Year-to-date Memberships

Individual Memberships – 1776
Family Memberships – 589 (1234 including individual family members)
Life Members – 240
Club Members – 67
Junior Members –35
Commercial – 8
Honorary Memberships – 7
Total Memberships Sold = 2722
 Represents 3367 individuals

Ongoing and New Projects

ADS Publications- The ADS continues to cost the Society a significant amount of money on every magazine it prints.  In 2006 our publications cost us:

* based on the assumption that the editor spends75% of time dedicated to the 4 whip publications.

Along with the Executive Committee and myself, we are actively working with Village Press to come up with cost saving initiatives as well seeking bids from other printers to compare and contrast services and products. 

The Executive Committee reviewed our current advertising rates in consultation with Village Press and determined that our color rates were competitive but we could raise our Black and White Ads fees to become more in-line with other similar publications.

Licensed Officials Web Site- The ability to maintain and record licensed officials and show records is a substantial task that requires a considerable amount of staff  and financial resources.  In the past multiple copies were made of records and then mailed to pertinent committee members before meetings.

To more efficiently share this information we have set up a secure web site and begun the process of scanning reports and linking them to the site. This site will be accessible only to LOC committee members , competition standards, pleasure driving and combined driving committees.  This solution is temporary as it is still fairly labor intensive. We have begun discussions with the USEF about the possibility of using their software to maintain this data at a substantial savings for staff effort and database maintenance.

2008 Rulebook- We currently have less than 200 copies of the rule book available and will need resupply before the end of the year. Parts of this document are currently written in Pagemaker and need to be converted to MS Word for ease of use and document version control.

ADS Meetings

Super Clinic Revenues and Expenses-
Registrants 26,580 Revenue
Sales of Items 3,610.00
Silent Auction 1,851.00
Club Donations 750.00
Party Supplies/Enter. Donation, 1500.00 (estimate)

Expenses- airfare 275.59
Meeting supplies- 675.19
Crown Plaza -22,133.38
Jeff Galloway- 3,180.00

Executive Director Travel and Meetings

Dallas – Super Clinic and ADS Board Meeting. See Above

Live Oak CDE – This was the first time I had been to a competition of this caliber. It was a great opportunity to meet more of our members and absorb the atmosphere that is associated with an advanced competition.  The Koopman family hosted me and helped man the ADS booth that we set up.  We sold merchandise and memberships with help to defray the cost of the trip.

USEF IT Summit Meeting, Lexington KY- All the affiliates were invited to attend a 1 day meeting focused on the Information Technology capabilities of the USEF and how the different affiliates can participate, utilize the technological capabilities of the USEF. This meeting was a huge success and has spawned a working group charged with determining an xml data standard that is universal for different breed and discipline associations as well as encourage the opportunity to partner with the USEF on software development and distribution.

Office Staff

The ADS office is growing in capability with the addition of Natalie Byrne in June.   Natalie is our Communications Assistance and is responsible for helping the office communicate with members and other key people and organizations, through the Wheelhorse, Web site and e-mail. Her position is classified as an internship and ends in September. 

Jean Fralka, who was hired last November, is our Office Assistant and helps with getting information out to show and officials for upcoming competitions. She also helps fill memberships and other tasks as necessary.   Jean has been reduced to about 8-10 hr a week (at her request) for the summer allowing for Natalie to work 10-15 hrs a week to help stay within budget guidelines for part-time staffing.

Stacy Carlson is now our full-time Office Manager and has been so since September.   Stacy is in charge of our billing, payments and is our resident Quickbooks expert.  Stacy is also our frontline phone support helping our members with their requests and providing a warm and welcoming tone for all our members.