Heroes & Villains, the Aston Villa fanzine
Heroes & Villains => Heroes Discussion => Topic started by: dave.woodhall on February 27, 2014, 11:44:15 AM
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Partly as an indirect result of Mat Kendrick's article and also because of their ongoing membership drive, the Trust have been asking websites/blogs to join them as affiliates. I don't want to go down that route as I don't think it's right that I should affiliate thousands of members/readers to an organisation they might not support. However, I have always backed the Trust, have been a director, am a life member and am currently working with them on a couple of projects. I would urge everyone to join as a full member. Details are http://www.villatrust.org.uk/
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I've joined. Will be interesting to see what their plans are.
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I am a 'free' member, I think. What, other than voting rights, are the benefits of paying an annual fee? Will be ordering the '82 shirt tonight.
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Signed up for 10 years
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Signed up for 10 years
Thanks. The more members, the more credibility.
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I'm in too.
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the Trust have been asking websites/blogs to join them as affiliates. I don't want to go down that route as I don't think it's right that I should affiliate thousands of members/readers to an organisation they might not support http://www.villatrust.org.uk/
Spot on Dave.
Had a look yesterday and was wondering what others thought.
May be a positive act as I sure as hell need to do something
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The "blurb" is encouraging:
Mat Kendrick today (25/02/14) posted an article on the Birmingham Mail website stating that Villa supporters need to unite collectively to form a “supporters union” with clout like Liverpool’s Spirit of Shankly.
Well, that “supporters union” already exists at the Villa – it is the Aston Villa Supporters’ Trust.
The Spirit of Shankly have done a tremendous job since its formation, tackling ticket pricing and other fan issues. Along with our fellow premier league supporter trusts, such as MUST (Man Utd’s Supporters Trust), Tottenham Supporters Trust etc, the Aston Villa Supporters’ Trust hopes to be a champion of Villa supporter issues. We are members of Supporters Direct, the governing body of the supporter trust movement, and affiliated to the Football Supporters Federation.
We are currently preparing our relaunch strategy, like Tottenham’s trust has done in the last year, and will soon be requesting input from members in a survey.
How do we get clout? We need you! We need you to be a member of the Supporters Trust and be involved. The aim is to represent Villa supporters to a level that has never been done before. The more members we have, the stronger our voice will be in representing our collective voice with the Club, so that they will listen to us.
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I'm in
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Partly as an indirect result of Mat Kendrick's article and also because of their ongoing membership drive, the Trust have been asking websites/blogs to join them as affiliates. I don't want to go down that route as I don't think it's right that I should affiliate thousands of members/readers to an organisation they might not support. However, I have always backed the Trust, have been a director, am a life member and am currently working with them on a couple of projects. I would urge everyone to join as a full member. Details are http://www.villatrust.org.uk/
If you click on Site Host Simon Bonnick's name at the bottom of the page, you get a page in Chinese/Japanese/Korean.
Most unSimonly.
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Great concept, which I fully support. However, the website needs addressing quickly, along with other aspects such as communication, if it is to be taken seriously. Although, this is of course natural as the trust develops.
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Signed up for 10 years
Thanks. The more members, the more credibility.
Who knows one day we may get a voice on the actual AVFC board itself like other clubs have.
If so I hope you will be receptive to be nominated.
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Signed up for 10 years
Thanks. The more members, the more credibility.
Who knows one day we may get a voice on the actual AVFC board itself like other clubs have.
If so I hope you will be receptive to be nominated.
You'll be disappointed there. No way on earth would I want that.
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Sorted...annual membership.
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I've never been a member of any Villa group but I'm joining up.
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Signed up for 10 years
Thanks. The more members, the more credibility.
Who knows one day we may get a voice on the actual AVFC board itself like other clubs have.
If so I hope you will be receptive to be nominated.
You'll be disappointed there. No way on earth would I want that.
I will then. As long as I get a parking bay.
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I signed up 4 months ago but have still not received anything in the post as yet - I've been told this is due to relaunching so cannot say much about the trust until I have received the membership details.
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I'm in for an annual sub
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I signed up 4 months ago but have still not received anything in the post as yet - I've been told this is due to relaunching so cannot say much about the trust until I have received the membership details.
I joined ages ago, don't know if my membership expired, I have not heard from them for a long time. So I am not exactly sure they have the resources to get organised.
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Right in for a fiver!
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Shirt bought and I think I'm now a paid-up member, according to the page I was redirected to.
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I am bunging Pete Warrilow a fiver and a business card after the game on Sunday.
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have joined also
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I've never been a member of any Villa group but I'm joining up.
nor me ,I wanted to join that aston villa group but didnt fancy moving abroad and wasnt sure If they needed a synth player ;)
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Signed up.
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Signed up for 10 years
Thanks. The more members, the more credibility.
Who knows one day we may get a voice on the actual AVFC board itself like other clubs have.
If so I hope you will be receptive to be nominated.
You'll be disappointed there. No way on earth would I want that.
I will then. As long as I get a parking bay.
Just as long as you get the shit that goes with it.
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I might join or I might kill myself. See what happens against Norwich. A victory and I join the Trust a defeat and I call Samaritans.
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Signed up for 10 years
Thanks. The more members, the more credibility.
Who knows one day we may get a voice on the actual AVFC board itself like other clubs have.
If so I hope you will be receptive to be nominated.
You'll be disappointed there. No way on earth would I want that.
I will then. As long as I get a parking bay.
You will and it'll say MEMBER on it. To keep it you will have to be compliant.
Joined.
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I signed up 4 months ago but have still not received anything in the post as yet - I've been told this is due to relaunching so cannot say much about the trust until I have received the membership details.
I joined ages ago, don't know if my membership expired, I have not heard from them for a long time. So I am not exactly sure they have the resources to get organised.
I joined (with my son) a few weeks ago - before all the Kendrick exposure - not heard yet apart from my money being taken!
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The Trust has had an affiliate scheme for a number of years and is part of the relaunch strategy. Due to Mat Kendrick's comments, we pulled forward the task of contacting potential affiliates to use the momentum from his article. We are still working through what we are doing on the relaunch, so the website is a mess and we are looking at upgrading this urgently. We have just started using intouchcrm for our membership record database, and I only got the forms to work mid-week, so some people will need to be manually added still like eastie (sorry) and the people today have gone direct into the records database making life simpler for me.
Thank you to all the new members who have signed up recently and I really must apologise for the delay in processing old applications.
ChicagoLion - please email me at enquiries@villatrust.org.uk and I will check your membership status.
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Thanks for the update woody .
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Folks - a question for you:
For the annual subscription package of £5 (reduced from the previous £10), we went electronic to save on paper and printing cost so all communication will be by email. Paid members are entitled to vote/attendance to General Meetings, and have a democratic say in determining our stance on supporter issues. We do have a discount offer on a certain Villa publication (that is offered to other supporter clubs). We utilise the funds first as we have to pay the FCA (Financial Conduct Authority) as we are a registered company and pay our membership subscription for services from Supporters Direct. We would like to utilise then some funds to support grass roots football projects as part of our community objectives.
Do you have any expectations for further benefits from the Trust? Naturally we will work to expand our benefit offering over time but wanted to ensure that we are not misrepresenting anything. The surge in membership has caught us on the hop, before we were ready with website and correct communications/offerings.
I'll also naturally sort out anyone on annual/ten year memberships who would be disadvantaged and start membership dates not at the point you paid and then not heard from us!
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I think regular communications would be the most important thing for me.
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Joined.
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Let me know if I can help out with any graphic or digital design stuff woody.
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I think regular communications would be the most important thing for me.
Same here + action!
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I just want to change the name to The Villuminati and have some claret and blue robes.
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Mazrim - May need some nice gifs/jpegs for the new site when I've worked out how to set it up on our new host!!
Pictures of fans etc also appreciated (with their permission)
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I've just imported my email and name is that enough?
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Hi Woody
Just wondering if you're going to be doing anything in your LinkedIn feed?
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Folks - a question for you:
For the annual subscription package of £5 (reduced from the previous £10), we went electronic to save on paper and printing cost so all communication will be by email. Paid members are entitled to vote/attendance to General Meetings, and have a democratic say in determining our stance on supporter issues. We do have a discount offer on a certain Villa publication (that is offered to other supporter clubs). We utilise the funds first as we have to pay the FCA (Financial Conduct Authority) as we are a registered company and pay our membership subscription for services from Supporters Direct. We would like to utilise then some funds to support grass roots football projects as part of our community objectives.
Do you have any expectations for further benefits from the Trust? Naturally we will work to expand our benefit offering over time but wanted to ensure that we are not misrepresenting anything. The surge in membership has caught us on the hop, before we were ready with website and correct communications/offerings.
I'll also naturally sort out anyone on annual/ten year memberships who would be disadvantaged and start membership dates not at the point you paid and then not heard from us!
The benefits should accrue from the trust achieving it's aims/objectives, rather than membership benefits per se in my opinion.
Any residual money could perhaps be donated to the grass roots football initiatives you mention or affiliated charities, e.g. Acorns.
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Got a polite apology yesterday. The shirt may no longer be available so please don't try and buy it.
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I might join or I might kill myself. See what happens against Norwich. A victory and I join the Trust a defeat and I call Samaritans.
A defeat and the Samaritans line will be engaged.
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Joined
Defeat and the Samaritans will have a booth set up in the Academy for the remainder of this seasons fixtures
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Folks - a question for you:
For the annual subscription package of £5 (reduced from the previous £10), we went electronic to save on paper and printing cost so all communication will be by email. Paid members are entitled to vote/attendance to General Meetings, and have a democratic say in determining our stance on supporter issues. We do have a discount offer on a certain Villa publication (that is offered to other supporter clubs). We utilise the funds first as we have to pay the FCA (Financial Conduct Authority) as we are a registered company and pay our membership subscription for services from Supporters Direct. We would like to utilise then some funds to support grass roots football projects as part of our community objectives.
Do you have any expectations for further benefits from the Trust? Naturally we will work to expand our benefit offering over time but wanted to ensure that we are not misrepresenting anything. The surge in membership has caught us on the hop, before we were ready with website and correct communications/offerings.
I'll also naturally sort out anyone on annual/ten year memberships who would be disadvantaged and start membership dates not at the point you paid and then not heard from us!
The benefits should accrue from the trust achieving it's aims/objectives, rather than membership benefits per se in my opinion.
Any residual money could perhaps be donated to the grass roots football initiatives you mention or affiliated charities, e.g. Acorns.
This sounds good to me.
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Joined
Defeat and the Samaritans will have a booth set up in the Academy for the remainder of this seasons fixtures
We asked Angela, after the West Ham game, to set up a Samaritans table in the Lions Club ready for our remaining home games.
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I'm really pleased that the Trust is gearing up again, there are some very good people involved and I just hope they are able to avoid falling foul of the factionalism that often seems to bedevil attempts to do things across the wider supporter base.
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I'm really pleased that the Trust is gearing up again, there are some very good people involved and I just hope they are able to avoid falling foul of the factionalism that often seems to bedevil attempts to do things across the wider supporter base.
I also hope that new members don't expect barricades to be manned and regular notings with interest. Consultation not confrontation has always been the Trust way and for all the unfounded criticism they get about being unapproachable, as the original article says, the club's hierarchy have always been receptive to reasoned contact.
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Joined
Defeat and the Samaritans will have a booth set up in the Academy for the remainder of this seasons fixtures
We asked Angela, after the West Ham game, to set up a Samaritans table in the Lions Club ready for our remaining home games.
In my experience the Samaritans are crap. I rang them once when somebody I knew was suicidal, they would not give me any support as I wasn't suicidal myself, I think they were upset that I was trying to do their job, in the end I felt like I wanted to top myself. But that was 20 years ago - and I'm still here!
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I've signed up to a 10 year membership, I'm afraid I am a lapsed member, forgive me for I have sinned.
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I'm really pleased that the Trust is gearing up again, there are some very good people involved and I just hope they are able to avoid falling foul of the factionalism that often seems to bedevil attempts to do things across the wider supporter base.
I also hope that new members don't expect barricades to be manned and regular notings with interest. Consultation not confrontation has always been the Trust way and for all the unfounded criticism they get about being unapproachable, as the original article says, the club's hierarchy have always been receptive to reasoned contact.
Hear, hear.
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I'm really pleased that the Trust is gearing up again, there are some very good people involved and I just hope they are able to avoid falling foul of the factionalism that often seems to bedevil attempts to do things across the wider supporter base.
I also hope that new members don't expect barricades to be manned and regular notings with interest. Consultation not confrontation has always been the Trust way and for all the unfounded criticism they get about being unapproachable, as the original article says, the club's hierarchy have always been receptive to reasoned contact.
Hear, hear.
I note with interest the singular lack of activity in barricade building activity, never mind said structures being manned.
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I'm really pleased that the Trust is gearing up again, there are some very good people involved and I just hope they are able to avoid falling foul of the factionalism that often seems to bedevil attempts to do things across the wider supporter base.
I also hope that new members don't expect barricades to be manned and regular notings with interest. Consultation not confrontation has always been the Trust way and for all the unfounded criticism they get about being unapproachable, as the original article says, the club's hierarchy have always been receptive to reasoned contact.
Hear, hear.
I note with interest the singular lack of activity in barricade building activity, never mind said structures being manned.
Is that you saying you think they should be built?
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I'm really pleased that the Trust is gearing up again, there are some very good people involved and I just hope they are able to avoid falling foul of the factionalism that often seems to bedevil attempts to do things across the wider supporter base.
I also hope that new members don't expect barricades to be manned and regular notings with interest. Consultation not confrontation has always been the Trust way and for all the unfounded criticism they get about being unapproachable, as the original article says, the club's hierarchy have always been receptive to reasoned contact.
Hear, hear.
I note with interest the singular lack of activity in barricade building activity, never mind said structures being manned.
Is that you saying you think they should be built?
No. I am located firmly in the wait and see camp.
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No need to call in the Samaritans yet then.
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The Samaritans are in a holding pattern in the skies above, or maybe it's police helicopters.
It was a pleasant surprise to bump into Percey on Sunday for a quick chat: thought he'd been digitised.
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Will join up when payday rolls around. Support the cause and all that.
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They really do need to look at that web site.
Apart from broken images and it looking horrible, it is full out out of date information.
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They had a 'sneak preview' of their new website up on Twitter though other day. Only a single screenshot but much better looking than the current one.
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The new Supporter's Trust website is now up - but they've exceeded their bandwidth this morning!
They have released a new statement however:
http://www.birminghammail.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/aston-villa-fans-fear-relegation-6985077?
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New website now up & running:
http://villatrust.org.uk/
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Just joined, finally.
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Site is much better. Responsive, too, I see.