Ruubdood

Hello fellow jeepers
Looking to start a jeep club. For get togethers, wrenching parties,trail runs and want local jeepers that want to hang out and discuss our passion . Reply with some thoughts. How can we get this rolling for the valley area, Stockton, Manteca, Tracy Modesto etc.

orangedude71

I guess to be friendly, i'll respond here. There are several clubs existing up there. Im really too far away to participate in anything up there. I like to think that most of the people who are on the Nor-cal forum kind of treat this like a club.. but without the membership responsibilities and or politics. Keep an eye out as we do wrenching parties and trail runs and you should try to join up on some of them.

BKGM Jeepers

Good luck! It's a fun expereience. I've been president of a jeep club for about 10 years now. Starting a club can be slow and time consuming. The best way to get going is to make sure you join Cal4Wheel, register and request your club information be added to their club section. We get about 25% of new members through that simple referral.

Then consider advertising in a local paper (free to low cost). Next make flyers and stick them under the wipers of rigs you see. Also, create some club interest cards you can hand out. You'll need to get a website up and running. That's the most difficult part if you don't have the skills.

We pay about 400 every 3-4 years in hosting/services fees so be ready for that. I've got a bunch of other advice but I won't bog you down at this point. Feel free to Message me if you have other questions.

Our club is set up with about 20-25 member rigs, 3-5 prospect rigs, and 10+ casual participants.
Make sure you give people a reason to want to join and participate.

For us, it opens another section of our website, makes people available for certain events, including a giant holiday party, and allowes them on our legally closed trail. So look for a hook to get people involved!

I'm on this forum as well, and I have to admit that sometimes politics do show up. However, this forum cannot sponsor a formal trail becuase they don't have club by-laws. So club's offer different things than a forum does. Some good and some bad...

Just_Q

As a Board Member of a newer Jeep Club, here are some tips That may help. You want to decide on what your vision of your club is, and what kind of off roading you are looking to do. Is it just hardcore trails, just easy and moderate, or a mix?You also need to decide if it is a just for fun club or if you are going to charge dues. We are a just for fun club. Facebook is a great place to set up a page with events. As soon as possible, you want to have 3 or 4 other "board members" to assist. It can be very time consuming. If you end up having a lot of newbie Jeep owners then you will want to pre run most trails to have an idea of where the new people will have trouble or get nervous. Make sure you are comfortable spotting other people as they will look to you to help. When we first started we had no requirements other than a Jeep and a good attitude. As events got larger, we made it mandatory to have a CB. We buy a few handhelds from amazon to sell for cost at events. A good way to limit the number of Jeeps participating without looking like you are picking favorites is to have more requirements in place (tire size, winch, etc). We cater more to those that don't want to bang up their jeep on hard trails. That being said, we do go out on difficult trails, but that is when we list restrictions.
There may be times where you have 30-40 jeeps show up for a trail. We have that and half are on their first run. You want to have plans in place to deal with that. The more you are able to plan events the better time everyone has. It is a commitment to start a successful club. Choose a vision of what you want to do, plan what will be needed for that vision, and find like minded people to help.

familytime

I'd might be up for this.Maybe just get some folks out for a run to see if an interest

BKGM Jeepers

Good advice.
Our club is a family-oriented style, and membership doesn't invovle damaging your rig. I had a splinter group from my club try to start a
"hard core" club. Since my jeep was built, I figured I'd show up and see where it went. I quickly learned that 75% of the people who showed up were built on very tight budgets, and will likely break on any difficult trail. I parted ways but followed their progress. They lasted less than a year and only went on one run total. Just be sure you have the audience you want in your mind as you go along. I like helping beginners get in to jeeping, so our easy/moderate runs are more fun when people run them for the first time. good luck!