Skål International Fort Lauderdale & Palm Beaches Skål Club of the Year

CELEBRATING OUR 30TH ANNIVERSARY AND OUR 1ST ANNIVERSARY. The 1 st year as Skål International Fort Lauderdale & Palm Beaches. The 30 th anniversary as a Club in Skål International. Formerly known as Skål International Palm Beaches.

Reasons why Skål International Fort Lauderdale & Palm Beaches should be named Skål International Club of the Year. Largest increase of new members in North America – net 24 additional members. Largest percentage increase of new members in North America – 100% increase. Results - this placed our Club in the top 25% of the largest clubs in North America. Membership

Member representation at the Skål International Congress. Member representation at the NAASC (North America Area Skål Committee) Congress. Regular membership representation at most SIUSA (Skål International USA) Board Meetings. Unlike other countries, SIUSA Clubs do not have a member on the national committee board. Congresses & Meetings

Contributes annually to the Florimond Volckaert Fund. This year our club increased its annual donation by 500%. Made a donation to Richard’s Run for Life which goes directly to benefit Pediatric Sarcoma Cancer Research at the Moffitt Cancer Center & Research Institute. Assisted in collecting over $2, for the Broward Gold Coast Down Syndrome Organization, along with Airline Sales & Marketing Executives of South Florida (ASME) and District Airline Managers Executive Secretary (DAMES). Donations

All members are encouraged to make presentations about their companies when they have new and interesting information to foster “Business to Business”. Has industry guest speakers. One recent presentation was covered on the local NBC television station. Our members have assisted in manning Skål booths at several trade shows in the Florida area Have our own website Business to Business

We believe over the last year our club has effectively demonstrated our dedication to the principals and goals of Skål. In February of 2006 we received approval to formally change the name of the Club from Skål International Palm Beaches to Skål International Ft. Lauderdale & Palm Beaches. In early 2002 we realized that our Club was not only losing members due to retirement and relocation but more importantly we were stymied in our efforts to recruit new members due to the changing business environment in the Palm Beach County area. As the travel and tourism industry changed with the increased use of the internet and the consolidation of the airline industry, the majority of potential new Skål members were now located in the Ft. Lauderdale area where the airlines and cruise lines had regional offices. Information

It became apparent to us that we had to include Ft. Lauderdale in the name of the Club and commit to hosting a significant portion of our monthly meetings in that area to bring credibility to our efforts to attract new members. We were determined not to let the Club gradually decrease in membership to the point of being de-activated. The Club made the decision to be pro-active and aggressively pursue the name change. After a lengthy process to obtain approval for the name change we have had tremendous success in building our membership and enabling all of our members to realize the benefits that membership that Skål International has to offer. In conjunction with the Club’s new name, we introduced several innovative ideas with respect to encouraging attendance at monthly meetings including guest speakers. We are currently holding three meetings a year in the Palm Beach area, three meetings a year in the Ft. Lauderdale area and four meetings a year in the Boca Raton area. This program allows our members who are spread between Miami and Port St. Lucie to attend more meetings. We also instituted a credit card program to provide our members with another form of payment.

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Thank you! To fellow Skålleagues everywhere Happiness Good Health Friendship Long Life Skål