Lifetime Membership discussion

[mike100]

I'm a car switcher so I never know how long I'll have any particular ride, but my other feeling is the club will raise more money over time with regular annual dues.

[HIZNHRZ]

At one time the stated objective of the ZR-1 Net Registry was to promote the education, preservation, and restoration of ZR1 Corvette to owners, general public, sports car enthusiasts, and collectors.

Here's another crazy idea. The purpose of stating a purpose, mission, or objective is as a measure of accountability. It helps to insure a team, club, organization, etc doesn’t lose its way. If an action is taken or decision is made, any action or decision, does it move us towards or away from our stated objective?

If the clubs purpose is still to promote the education, preservation, and restoration of ZR1 Corvette to owners, general public, sports car enthusiasts, and collectors; and if so, what are the facts, risks, and assumptions and where is the business case that demonstrates moving towards lifetime membership makes sense as a defendable and prudent step towards our stated purpose?

[ZR1]

I was looking for the place to pay for the right to be a lifetime member here when I stumbled upon this thread. Not sure about the suggested $350 dollar or higher cost though. It really doesn't cost much to maintain a forum with a domain name. Other forums I am a member of charge less than $20 for yearly and less than $100 for lifetime. Let's not forget supporting vendors who can advertise their products. They also have banner ads that display to the non-paying members.

After going back and reading some of the comments on this thread, it seems some of the members of this forum considers this forum strictly as a ZR-1 LT5 club. Hate to say it, but as a Z06 owner, I feel a little left out by some of the comments I have read thus far considering I am planning on owning a newer ZR1. As it is, this is the closest thing to a ZR1 forum I can find. I can only hope you all consider opening your arms to C6 ZR1 owners as well. I'll save my drawn out comments on what I had to do just to figure out what the random answer was to even join this forum. Obviously it is not LS9 or Supercharged. Now that I look at the banner, this sight is exclusive to C4 ZR-1.

Currently as a non ZR-1 owner but rather a future ZR1 owner and a true Corvette enthusiast, my comments might not hold much water. Who knows, I might be rubbing some the wrong way. But keep in mind, there are many like me who would support this Corvette forum as long as it shows a long term business plan by promoting yearly and lifetime membership plans along with open arms to all ZR1 Corvette owners, past, present, or future.

With all that said, how is this forum supported? There has to be ads somewhere or someone is being very generous.

If I may be so bold as the latest noobie on this forum and an average webmaster, may I suggest to the administrators of this forum to look into Z06Vette.com forum and see how they do business. Success breeds success!

For the record, I am only providing a fresh perspective to what I have seen in the short amount of time I have been here. I would not be offended if anyone were to tell me to go pound sand.

If you can't tell, I am all about promoting anything Corvette, especially ZR1. As a future ZR1 owner, I would consider buying this sight if someone is willing to sell it just to allow newer ZR1 owners a place to communicate. I know a good investment when I see one. This is why I drive, race, and show Corvettes. Corvette is best bang for the buck!

You all have a great forum here and for the current price to be here, nobody can complain, especially me.

[tomtom72]

I'm not the welcome wagon, but ZR1 and welcome to our little corner of the asylum!

I'm not gonna tell you to 'go pound sand' as I know beans about running a forum! I will say this we had a general discussion about other "Z" cars awhile back and our general feeling was that "sure, the more the merrier".

To be blunt, this place exists as a ZR-1 forum so that us ZR-1 owners can take care of our cars. Well, so that guys like me can learn enough hopefully to take care of our cars. Don't take this the wrong way, but our motor makes it an absolute must for us to band together. After all, you can't turn around without tripping over traditional sbc info or LSx series motor info....try that with an LT5.

Beyond the motor issues though, we have had C6 ZR1's and LT-1 ZR1's owners hang with us at our events. We welcome those people to hang out and chew the fat.


Tom

[Kevin]

Originally Posted by ZR1

I was looking for the place to pay for the right to be a lifetime member here when I stumbled upon this thread. Not sure about the suggested $350 dollar or higher cost though. It really doesn't cost much to maintain a forum with a domain name. Other forums I am a member of charge less than $20 for yearly and less than $100 for lifetime. Let's not forget supporting vendors who can advertise their products. They also have banner ads that display to the non-paying members.

After going back and reading some of the comments on this thread, it seems some of the members of this forum considers this forum strictly as a ZR-1 LT5 club. Hate to say it, but as a Z06 owner, I feel a little left out by some of the comments I have read thus far considering I am planning on owning a newer ZR1. As it is, this is the closest thing to a ZR1 forum I can find. I can only hope you all consider opening your arms to C6 ZR1 owners as well. I'll save my drawn out comments on what I had to do just to figure out what the random answer was to even join this forum. Obviously it is not LS9 or Supercharged. Now that I look at the banner, this sight is exclusive to C4 ZR-1.

Currently as a non ZR-1 owner but rather a future ZR1 owner and a true Corvette enthusiast, my comments might not hold much water. Who knows, I might be rubbing some the wrong way. But keep in mind, there are many like me who would support this Corvette forum as long as it shows a long term business plan by promoting yearly and lifetime membership plans along with open arms to all ZR1 Corvette owners, past, present, or future.

With all that said, how is this forum supported? There has to be ads somewhere or someone is being very generous.

If I may be so bold as the latest noobie on this forum and an average webmaster, may I suggest to the administrators of this forum to look into Z06Vette.com forum and see how they do business. Success breeds success!

For the record, I am only providing a fresh perspective to what I have seen in the short amount of time I have been here. I would not be offended if anyone were to tell me to go pound sand.

If you can't tell, I am all about promoting anything Corvette, especially ZR1. As a future ZR1 owner, I would consider buying this sight if someone is willing to sell it just to allow newer ZR1 owners a place to communicate. I know a good investment when I see one. This is why I drive, race, and show Corvettes. Corvette is best bang for the buck!

You all have a great forum here and for the current price to be here, nobody can complain, especially me.

yes this site is mainly about the C4 zr-1 but that doesn't mean its exclusively a c4 zr-1 forum. Most of us have known each other over the life of 2 or 3 zr-1 registries, I've have my car since 1999, long before the c6 zr1 was ever thought of, and quite a few of us are the same way. But that isn't to say we against c6 zr1's or even c7 if they come to be, we welcome all who are interested in the zr-1/zr1 even if you're not an owner. I know at carlise two years ago there were several c6 zr1 that parked next to the c4 zr-1 and that's the way it should be.

Seeing as you're new, you may not know the history of the zr-1 registries dating back over the years, there have been 3. The original zr-1 registry that Larry Merrow had for the better part of a decade which passed away with him, there was the LT5 registry, which Clint Hooper started and ran for a few years which disbanded, then there was the zr1 net, which was an email list serve run by Dave Bright. When the LT5 registry died Dave started this registry combining the ZR-1 net with a formal registry and giving it the name of the zr1 net registry with the list serve being a separate thing. At no point has owning a zr-1 been necessary to join the zr-1 net registry, I had a 91 L98 when I joined then moved up to my zr-1. Until the ZR-1 net registry, there was no zr1 to have as members, only the ZR-1.

I looked at z06vette.com and i'm happy our admin doesn't think that's the way to do things. I also don't know if I'd come in talking about wanting to buy the forum in my first post...

[We Gone]

I voted maybe,

Here is how I see it. I do think there should be value in how long you have been an owner of the C4 ZR-1, Your participation in this and past ZR-1 forums. Your contributions to helping other ZR-1 owners. Based on this criteria a once a year vote by the members for 1 maybe up to 3 member to be moved to an elite status would be nice.
I belong to a computer form that you earn flames tagged under your aviator based on help you provided to others applied by those you have helped, I like this because it shows recognition to those who contribute the most applied by the members. The member who applies a vote also gets to add a short thank you note. this is viewable in the members details for others to view. If I remember it takes 100 or so votes to get the first flame than to 150 for 2, 300 for 3 you get the point. This is just an example. (overclock.net)

Now as far as a lifetime membership, after reading all the posts to date I believe it could be detrimental to the registries long term health. I say this because they will never build any more LT5 ZR-1's so this limits the overall membership. I also would not like it become covered with adds a few would be ok as long as they are related to our ZR-1's specifically. What I think needs to be done is a better awareness of our organization to recruit new ZR-1 owners.

Now on to keeping things alive moving into the future. The new ZR1 would be a great way to accomplish this it would be just a matter of blending the new with the old as they will be the ones to carry the ZR1 mystic into the future and it is again a limited production Corvette with the same performance status that was established with the ZR-1.

Steve

[DaveK]

Welcome to the forum ZR1. The forum (and ZR-1 Net Registry club) were initially created to support C4 ZR-1 owners as that was all that existed at the time. That said, we're happy to welcome C6 ZR1 owners also and several of our members have both ZR-1s and ZR1s.

There is no advertizing on the forum or our website. On our website we have some small banners lining to sponsors of the club and we may add them to the forum but we're not looking to go down the mass banner ads route here.

Support for the forum and website come from membership dues paid by joining the zr-1 net registry club. If you're interested you can join through the store on our website (www.zr1netregistry.com). Membership also provides access to special members-only events, an annual t-shirt and member discounts in our store and with other vendors.

Although the organization historically was for the older ZR-1s I'm sure everyone is more than happy to welcome our "younger" bretheren and if we can attract more we could create some ZR1 specific sections for those members.

Dave

[RyanChappel]

I consider this a ZR-1 LT-5 club. The message content and resource base on this site is amazing because it is so focused on the 90-95 Z's. I believe there are numerous other places owners of other Corvette specialty cars can frequent which provide similar, in-depth support and items of interest concerning their cars. This site is unique, and needs to stay that way.

My $.02

"Don't Mean Nuthin' "

(War Zone C, RVN, 1969)

[Franke]

I vote no. Several reasons listed in the above posts as well as I believe a club like this needs a constant source of income to remain intact and viable. The perks and get together events aren't cheap to put on and costs will go up in the future. Funny how that works.

[ZR1]

Great feedback!

After further review, I think what you guys have going here is a great thing and should be left as is.

As stated in a private message to Hammer, for some reason I did not make the connection between the Registry website and the forum. I was looking for a forum for newer ZR1s and this is the only one that came up. I failed to realize and understand the uniqueness of the ZR-1 and its sponsoring web based registry club. Hence the question on how this forum was funded which was answered by the admins.

I do not mean to stir the pot or offend anyone. As a Z06 owner, I understand the importance of keeping the integrity of a specific model of Corvette. In the case of the ZR-1, it is a very unique and specific to it's generation. I would have to concur on keeping the integrity of this forum as is for the purist at heart.

As for buying the forum, that was made in jest not knowing of the website behind it. Really, the last thing I would want to do is come in and change it knowing what I know now.

Until I buy a new garage with a house attached to it, I do not foresee owning a ZR-1 anytime in the near future. Honestly, if I had the garage space, I would have already purchased Frank's black ZR-1 and joined this site months ago. It is a sweet ride with great show quality.

As it is, I am looking to buy a newer ZR1 and will continue my search for a forum that is better suited for my research. Who knows, if I cannot find it, I might have to create one.

Thanks to all those who have made me feel welcome here. It just confirms my belief that ALL Corvette owners are good people and that no matter what type of Corvette someone owns, we are all family because of it.

As they say, I came for the car and I stayed for the people.

Again, you all have a great thing going here. I wouldn't change a thing!

One last thing concerning this thread:
For lifetime membership, our local Corvette club honors its members with a lifetime membership with no dues to those who have been members for 20 years. Just a thought.