14 April 2011 | Tennis Victoria

East Malvern Tennis Club (EMTC) traditionally runs its open day to coincide with the Australian Open (AO). Our thinking is that tennis enthusiasm through the publicity of the AO will be at its highest and this is a good time to hold our open day.

EMTC has a strong membership due to its location, strong coaching program (through Futures Tennis) and 10 courts but still has considerable churn of membership numbers. As a committee, we are not sure why, but we lose 50-100 members each year. Holding a successful open day is critical to keep membership numbers at a strong level.

Running an open day in January means that all preparation must be done well in advance due to the holiday period. The committee has a check list and everyone has a role to play as we understand that relying on just the committee will stretch our resources on the day.

Wes Horskins and his Futures Tennis coaches run the junior program which gives children attending an opportunity to try tennis on the day. Weather in January can be extremely hot so the provision of drinks and food are a significant part of planning.

Contact is made with Tennis Victoria to obtain their generous open pack and Futures Tennis conducts a letterbox drop before the open day. We also contacted our local leader newspaper for publicity. They provided a free of charge article on the tennis club and we also advertised a week before the day. To encourage people to join up for membership, we reduce our joining fee on the day.

On the day, Wes and his team met everyone at the gate and directed those who were interested in joining to the club house and the children for an introduction to coaching onto the courts.

We made use of Tennis Victoria’s open day pack to provide giveaways to those attending and we used the radar gun to conduct a fastest serve contest. Our committee was kept busy taking enquiries and filling out forms. 

We had approximately 60 new members join and a number have since progressed to play competition. We still struggle to follow-up with new members to check to see the club is fulfilling their membership needs but this is a work in progress.

Holding an open day is a team building exercise for the committee and was well received. Planning is critical and a review of the results a must.

Tony Lane (President) and Tony Byrnes (Secretary)
East Malvern Tennis Club