I’d like to take this opportunity to announce my intention to run for the Member At Large #2 position.

Thanks to those who have nominated me. While I have collected for 30+ years I have only recently been able to step up to help this great club.

In 2023 I was given the opportunity to manage the club’s YouTube platform. I organized previous videos plus recordings from DVDs and other legacy media on the channel. Coordinating with the Social Media Director we publicized the videos through Facebook and Instagram to get the club exposure outside of membership.

I was invited to join the Membership Growth and Engagement Committee when it started in 2023. Working with other committee members I’m proud to say that I helped launch the Member Newsletter you now receive in your email. This was the Club’s first electronic members-only communication. I have also leveraged the email platform to make our PR communications more professional and to advertise to previous CCA Show attendees.

I found many people on Facebook asking the same questions about starting or selling collections. In order to help educate them I wrote the “Casino Collecting for Newbies” and “Selling Casino Collectibles” articles on the Club’s Education page.

The organization is truly a team effort and I am happy to have helped with the switch of advanced ChipGuide features to be a member benefit, the drive to reduce club costs by moving to the magazine to an electronic platform and the push for the club to use the Google Workspace for Nonprofits platform to have an efficient electronic infrastructure.

In recognition of my passion for connecting the club with members I have recently been appointed Mentor Director. I’m excited to be able to help newer collectors avoid the pitfalls of the hobby and get them to understand all that the club has to offer.

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I think there are several areas the club needs to focus on; while I have already started to help in many of them, I can be more effective working directly on the board.

1. Welcome and engage members. The more connected new members feel, the more likely they will stay with the club. As Mentor Director I will be in a unique position to do this one-on-one with new members. The Club has started to better engage with members by sending regular Member News emails, opening BoD meetings to members through Zoom and very clearly communicating changes to the organization. We need to look for more opportunities to engage members.

2. Increase value for members. On the Membership Growth and Engagement Committee we continually ask ourselves the question ‘Why should someone join the club?’. In 2023 the only answer was ‘for the magazine’, which younger collectors don’t really care about. We’ve given them more reason by adding members-only features to the ChipGuide. From the top down the club needs think about what collectors want from an organization and figure out ways to give it to them.

3. Recruit and welcome all collectors where they are. The world changes constantly and the club needs to also. In the 1980s and early 1990s the Club was the hobby. Now there are 17,000+ set collectors on the 2 main sites. They have made over 2 million posts in the last 13 years. There are over 100,000 individual chip sales on eBay each year. There are over 6,000 members in the 2 biggest chip collecting Facebook groups. The potential for growth is huge if we concentrate our resources where collectors are.

If you have any questions for me, feel free to reach out. If you prefer to talk, I would be happy to give you a call.

I would appreciate your vote!

Enjoy the hobby!
- Bob Miksztal (R-8909)
Greatoz99@Yahoo.com