Is there a gun club out there that is cheap to join ?

newtlover

thanks a lot

macnab

your post is a bit ambiguous, you should specify what type of shooting you intend to do, ie target, clays, rough etc. Also how much money do you perceive to be "cheap" i pay about 220 euro for rough shooting, that to me is reasonable given that it includes insurance. You might disagree.

cavan shooter

I am a member of 3 gun clubs and pay NARGC insurance €65 (I think) then €20 membership in 2 of them 100 in the other. Its horses for courses as they say I also shoot clays but I'm not registered or a member of a clay club such as Courtlough.

The club route if you decide gives the opportunity to meet a lot of characters and opens opportunities for other outings etc.

Terrier

What is the average price of local game gun clubs? (excluding insurance)
€25 is what I pay

bunny shooter

2 x I'm in €40 each

ivanthehunter

What about a cheap rifle range that charges you as you use it.

I'm a member of Courtlough and i paid 200 last year and i only shot there twice. So i won't be going back unless they can provide a service that provides me with better value.

Seriously i have very little interest in range shooting but it is some times handy to have somewhere official to go but with my current rate of participation I'm not receiving value for money..

Some one should set up a range that charges you as you use it-say €10 a visit until you reach the annual membership charge of say €200,

Griz are you listing:)

Chopperdog 2

ivanthehunter wrote: »

What about a cheap rifle range that charges you as you use it.

I'm a member of Courtlough and i paid 200 last year and i only shot there twice. So i won't be going back unless they can provide a service that provides me with better value.

Ivan, your logic appears to be quite flawed. Surely the onus is on yourself to make more than 2 visits per year to get better value for your €200 membership outlay.

I dont know how many other target clubs that you are a member of, as €200 is a very modest fee for membership of a club that has such outstanding facilities.

Truly, it really gets me going when people expect to shoot 50 clay targets and then throw comments that 50 clay pigeons only cost the grounds approx €5, daylight robbery..blah blah blah.

Try to establish a shooting grounds, groundworks, structures, traps, insurance, staffing, depreciation, overheads etc and any reasonable person will appreciate that all of these costs have to be met before any money is even made.
Additionally, the fancier the grounds, i.e. more facilities for members and visitors, the more costs that have to be met.

Essentially, we live in a democracy and you may well choose not to utilise club facilities or even renew your membership, but please do not confuse your lack of usage of a facility with what you are trying to proclaim as being bad value for money.

If you need any clarification on club facilities or pricing please contact me (via P.M.) Maybe there is something you have misunderstood, as most people I speak with believe their membership package is very good value.

J.R.

Terrier wrote: »

What is the average price of local game gun clubs? (excluding insurance)
€25 is what I pay

€100

J.R.

Chopperdog 2 wrote: »

Ivan, your logic appears to be quite flawed. Surely the onus is on yourself to make more than 2 visits per year to get better value for your €200 membership outlay.

I dont know how many other target clubs that you are a member of, as €200 is a very modest fee for membership of a club that has such outstanding facilities.

Truly, it really gets me going when people expect to shoot 50 clay targets and then throw comments that 50 clay pigeons only cost the grounds approx €5, daylight robbery..blah blah blah.

Try to establish a shooting grounds, groundworks, structures, traps, insurance, staffing, depreciation, overheads etc and any reasonable person will appreciate that all of these costs have to be met before any money is even made.
Additionally, the fancier the grounds, i.e. more facilities for members and visitors, the more costs that have to be met.

Essentially, we live in a democracy and you may well choose not to utilise club facilities or even renew your membership, but please do not confuse your lack of usage of a facility with what you are trying to proclaim as being bad value for money.

If you need any clarification on club facilities or pricing please contact me (via P.M.) Maybe there is something you have misunderstood, as most people I speak with believe their membership package is very good value.

As far as I'm aware, if you are not going to use Courtlough on a regular basis then you can go there any day you want & use the clay layout or the rifle range and just pay the rate for the amount shot that day ..........that may be a better option for you, ivanthehunter, if you only go there 2 - 3 times a year.

Sparks

ivanthehunter wrote: »

What about a cheap rifle range that charges you as you use it.

Not legal under the Clubs SI or Ranges SI, at least the latest released drafts, both of which say that the range or club must "not run a day or temporary membership scheme." (Courtlough may be doing it now; but once those SIs are signed, they won't be able to, nor will anyone else).

I'm a member of Courtlough and i paid 200 last year and i only shot there twice. So i won't be going back unless they can provide a service that provides me with better value.

Yeah, I feel the same way about my gym. I joined last year, went twice and didn't lose all the flab and replace it with lean muscle. What a rip-off!

Sparks

It might be possible I suppose, if you joined for a year and had X number of range days included in that, and could purchase more if you needed them; but you'd have to comply with the purpose of the SIs - which means the clubs would have to be very proactive about members attending a bare minimum number of times per year and notifying Gardai if they didn't; which drives up the workload on the range operators.
Not sure if the economics of it would support that business model.

Also, we may well see a rise in range usage anyway with the recession making it cheaper to go to the range and have fun for an evening, and people looking to get value for money. We're seeing a lot of that online - websites all over have seen serious spikes in activity since November - boards.ie has gone from the most people ever online at once being ~4,000 to being ~6,500 in January alone.

endasmail

game club near me charging nearly 500 euro to join ,get ya to pay for costs of running it and rearing and feeding pheasants ,and at that price there still an long waiting list to get into it

Heckler

Fermoy Rifle Club in Cork. 400 euros a year. Range open Sundays 10-2ish. Tuesdays 6 till the light goes from April.

http://www.fermoyrifleclub.com/

clivej

Sparks wrote: »

Yeah, I feel the same way about my gym. I joined last year, went twice and didn't lose all the flab and replace it with lean muscle. What a rip-off!

Well I didn't join a gym and didn't loose any of my flab so does that mean I saved a gym membership fee and I'm now €350 better off.:p

Sparks

No, it means you're optimised for prone rifle shooting

cavan shooter

ivanthehunter wrote: »

What about a cheap rifle range that charges you as you use it.

I'm a member of Courtlough and i paid 200 last year and i only shot there twice. So i won't be going back unless they can provide a service that provides me with better value.

Seriously i have very little interest in range shooting but it is some times handy to have somewhere official to go but with my current rate of participation I'm not receiving value for money..

Some one should set up a range that charges you as you use it-say €10 a visit until you reach the annual membership charge of say €200,

Griz are you listing:)

Have to agree with Chopperdog, Very few ranges provide a taxi service for you, I shoot at Courtlough lot but I'm not a member however they do have club competions (clay) etc. The steak is mighty and the banter is good

Vegeta

In Ivan's defence (cant believe I just said that) I think he meant it wasn't value for him as he only went twice. That's a completely different kettle of fish to it wasn't value for money, period.

I too would like a pay by usage range as I would not use one regularly enough to justify the full membership fees

Sparks

The whole pay-as-you-go model is a bit of a thorny subject though because the DoJ and Gardai interpret it as buy-your-membership-to-get-your-licence-and-then-vanish-into-the-ether, which they don't see as being terribly safe.

I'm not saying it's impossible to do though. Been thinking about it for a few days now and I think if you addressed their concern then you should be okay. Which means a different pricing model for the range but that's not a horrible thing - not even a new thing in fact.

Instead of X euros per annum, try something more complex:

• X euros per annum for full access to the range, OR;
• Y euros per annum and Z euros per day, with a minimum commitment to five days in the year

Where X is a large number (say 500) and Y is a small one (say 100, which includes your insurance cost), and Z is smaller still (say 10). A light user gets a better deal, and a heavy user (who goes once a week) gets a price break (of 120 euro with those numbers).
You could add other options to the model as well, say 100 per year as above, but 20 euro per month for range fees. Favours those who go three times a month.

The thing is, you would have to be active on the user tracking to ensure the DoJ and Gardai were happy. Most of that can be computerised to take the load off, but even a paper sign-in book would do the job in a pinch (though some poor sod has to go compile the attendance reports by hand that way).

Vegeta

Sparks wrote: »

The whole pay-as-you-go model is a bit of a thorny subject though because the DoJ and Gardai interpret it as buy-your-membership-to-get-your-licence-and-then-vanish-into-the-ether, which they don't see as being terribly safe.

Put simply then their logic is flawed.

To get a license for target shooting you have to join a range. IF your membership lapses or you stop attending the range then the range notifies the Gardai and you lose your license as you no longer have a reason for the firearm.

So how exactly will one off usage allow people to vanish into the ether?

To bring a gun to a range and shoot you will need to and produce a license, this means you have a valid reason to possess it.

If you have a license for target shooting then you are an active member of a range somewhere in the country so you haven't vanished into the ehter.
Or
You have a hunting license and have shown valid reason to possess that license too.

I understand that there is no point in fighting against legislation that will come to be but the mind boggles sometimes as banning one off range usage is not good for the sport nor any safer. If anything it allows people to go and practice in THE best place to practice.

Sparks

What they're actually cracking down on is joining the club on a day or temporary basis though - they're worried someone will do that, get the cert in the meantime and then leg it.
I'm saying you could still do the pricing model for range usage on a per-day basis, but you'd have to explicitly reassure the Gardai/FRI that you weren't facilitiating that kind of thing.
And yeah, it's belt, braces, stitches and rivets and a second pair of pants underneath just in case, but what else is new?

Vegeta

Sparks wrote: »

What they're actually cracking down on is joining the club on a day or temporary basis though - they're worried someone will do that, get the cert in the meantime and then leg it.

Ok I am clearly a little slow, I still don't get you

If you apply for a license to shoot targets you have to be a member of a range.

Are you saying that a person turns up, pays full membership fees and gets a letter from range saying the person is a member, they use this letter for the license application. They get the license and then never go to the range again after being there for just one day?

Is that the concern?

If they do the above then it will be discovered very quickly when attendance logs are inspected. The Gardai can then be informed.

Again, if that is the concern, I cant see how stopping one off range usage will prevent the situation above. Tighter regulations on the membership process of ranges maybe.

If someone does do the above (join a range and vanish) then their license should be revoked (sure they might have it 12 months) and they will not have a license to present at a range after that.

Sparks

Are you saying that a person turns up, pays full membership fees and gets a letter from range saying the person is a member, they use this letter for the license application. They get the license and then never go to the range again after being there for just one day?
Is that the concern?

Yup, that's what they're worried about. They think it'd happen a lot if paying membership fees for just one day/week/month was possible. They want there to be an annual & ongoing membership arrangement.

If they do the above then it will be discovered very quickly when attendance logs are inspected. The Gardai can then be informed.

It will, but the last draft of the relevant SIs were very messy in this regard - there was nothing in them about deadlines or timeframes for that kind of reporting or what failure to comply meant for a range/club. So you might be discovering it very quickly on going through the logs, but you might not start going through them until six months later.

I don't really see it being so big a problem that this has to be done; I think it's very much a belt,braces and spare pair of pants approach. But if we can work to it with releatively little impact, I'd prefer to see us get into it on more important things.

Vegeta

Sparks wrote: »

Yup, that's what they're worried about. They think it'd happen a lot if paying membership fees for just one day/week/month was possible. They want there to be an annual & ongoing membership arrangement.

And that is fair enough but again it has nothing to do with one off usage. The above can happen with or without it being allowed.

Lets say one off usage is banned, I join the club, pay the yearly fee, they give me a letter on my first day, week, fortnight, I get a license based on that letter and the club never see me again. Guess what difference banning one off usage made there. None at all.

The only way I see of truly addressing the issue is self regulation when dealing with absentee members (yeah right)

It will, but the last draft of the relevant SIs were very messy in this regard - there was nothing in them about deadlines or timeframes for that kind of reporting or what failure to comply meant for a range/club. So you might be discovering it very quickly on going through the logs, but you might not start going through them until six months later.

I don't really see it being so big a problem that this has to be done; I think it's very much a belt,braces and spare pair of pants approach. But if we can work to it with releatively little impact, I'd prefer to see us get into it on more important things.

I'd rather not have to dance around borked legislation.

I really am sick of dealing with that kind of system.


I can probably guess the real reason they are banning one off usage but its not very clever to say out loud?

Sparks

Vegeta wrote: »

And that is fair enough but again it has nothing to do with one off usage. The above can happen with or without it being allowed.

Yup. But it's like banning handguns to stop gun crime - the fact that it's completely and utterly wrong isn't going to stop it going ahead

Lets say one off usage is banned, I join the club, pay the yearly fee, they give me a letter on my first day, week, fortnight, I get a license based on that letter and the club never see me again. Guess what difference banning one off usage made there. None at all.

Exactly. And the way the SI is drafted right now, the Super might never find this out until next year.

The only way I see of truly addressing the issue is self regulation when dealing with absentee members (yeah right)

Yeah, I know it's cynicism-induced, but the fact is that we're in effect on a last chance with this one; if clubs don't step up now and start engaging more visibly with the gardai on the point of absentee members, we're probably going to see worse measures than this show up in the pipeline, that's the normal pattern for these things

I'd rather not have to dance around borked legislation.

You and me both, but the 2% rule comes in. There's only so many man-hours, and there's so much to shovel through. Not everything gets fixed or avoided.

I can probably guess the real reason they are banning one off usage but its not very clever to say out loud?

Not sure what you're thinking, PM me?