Quote from: morpheus on May 20, 2016, 01:02:07 PM

Bingo! The vast majority of our members have been leaving every year for over a decade and no one seems to care. You guys and the USBC need to come down from your penthouse and think about the average league bowler that has never given a rats @ss about the "sport" of bowling. The die hard 1% are going to be there every year no matter what so why cater to them, we need a plan to grow membership. And please stop telling me how great youth is doing because their membership is declining too and has been for a very long time.

 
I just don't get this mentality. People have been leaving bowling for many reasons, most of which being socio-economic. That's been hashed over too many times to count and is well understood and accepted.
 
No national organization (USBC or otherwise) is going to come up with some magic plan to "grow membership". If you can't articulate what that elusive plan should be, it most likely doesn't exist.
 
The answer you don't want to hear is that it's up to you, me, and the centers we bowl at. People like miloraferty (here on BR) who put in the time an effort to get new bowlers involved are the answer. Grassroots efforts work. The problem is that it's easier to moan and complain, which is the reason these topics never go away.

morpheus,

We all have opinions.  You make think some of ours are terrible, and I bet there a people on here that think some of your and mine are terrible too.

Dismissing socio-economics side is foolish.

There is no "one cause" for the decline in membership.  There are a lot of contributing factors that led to the decline of membership.

Was or is USBC/ABC a part of those contributing factors.  Yes.  How much?  You and I would probably disagree on the percentage and I won't give out my guesses to simply continue the argument.

So going forward, I believe there is no simple solution to growing membership or slowing its decline.

Just like it took decades for the membership to decline, I think it will take decades for the membership to stabilize and possibly grow.

Do I think we are headed in the right direction.  Yes, but very, very slowly.

The phrase the horse has been let out of the barn applies.  But the horse also ran away.  It's never coming back.  The numbers of the 80s will unlikely never return. 

The conditions of the world and technology have changed.

Think about this.  Why did bowling leagues happen when they happened.  Because for a lot of the country, it's really cold in the winter and not a lot of people want to be outdoors.  Another reason people got together to bowl; work leagues, factory leagues.  Detroit had/has the highest number of sanction bowlers.  Why?  Factory worker leagues in a very cold climate during the winter.  Same all across the country.

Well today, some if not a lot of those workers have had their job replaced with technology.  Robot welders doing the job of 100 welders in one 8 hr shift, except the robot doesn't take breaks or eat lunch.  In fact, he doesn't sleep.  24x7 if necessary, he welds.  Just an example.

And also:  There are many other things to do this day and age during those winter months.  TV is now 500 channels, not 4 or 20 if you had cable.  Never mind playstations, game cubes etc.  Now one can stay home, save gas and be entertained when it's 28 degrees outside.

Just examples of contributing factors that aided in the decline of membership.

Easier scoring conditions.  Sure, it probably caused a few people to quit too.  But I promise, that it away now, and 25% of your current membership will quit too.  They like it easy.  That horse ran away too.

Bashing USBC does nothing.  Yes they made mistakes.  We all do.    Hell we make the same mistake 3,4 or 5 times.  Oops got caught speeding again.

I think they are trying to improve everything about bowling.  EVERYTHING.  Leagues, tournaments, professional bowling, etc.  It all falls under their umbrella, and you may not like it all because you think it doesn't benefit you, when in reality, it does.

I've read people hear saying why should USBC put money into the womens PBA.  Well if seeing those ladies on TV gets 2000 little girls nationwide to start bowling in juniors, that helps bowling doesn't it? 

Quit bashing and help where you can.

You do realize something like 5000 golf courses closed over the past 10 years.  Organized (usga members ) are a fraction of usbc members