Anakosha
Integrating sex and spirituality in the lifestyle
Lifestyle Education
In the 1980's a lengthy survey on swinging was conducted among swing club members across the country by Paul Miller of Chicago. He found that only 25% of all swinging couples who belonged to clubs at that time renewed their memberships at the end of the year. Diana's husband, Robert Adler of the Sensitivity Seminar Group in Florida, led a symposium at a club owners meeting of the Lifestyles Convention in Las Vegas several years later. Paul Miler was a member of his panel. While this information is thirty years old, there's a reason for including it here. This is Bob Adler writing:
"Representatives from many clubs from the United States and Canada were present. Each person present had compiled a list of clubs in their area to discuss at the forum, including many different factors that made up the profiles of those clubs. Membership renewal was one piece of information that was shown. The information that came out that day in 1989 showed that the representative areas of the panel, probably over 200 clubs, had a median renewal factor of just under 27%. Four years later, it had not improved and may have gotten slightly worse in the area of retaining members in swing clubs in the United States.
"This means that a swing club, in order to just stay even, has to replace 75% of its entire membership each year prior to being able to grow by even one member couple. This is a task that is beyond the means of most clubs over any period of years. That is one reason why, in the state of Florida where we are located, only one club owner operating in 1981 when we began, is still in the swing club business today [1990]. At that same convention in 1989, following the panel presentation, we gave a presentation to the some 65 club owners in attendance about our seminar on swinging. We explained to them that it was a requirement for membership in our club, Club Sensitivity. What we tried to show to the club owners was that, while they were fighting a 27% renewal rate, we had enjoyed an in-excess of 65% renewal rate for eight consecutive years at our club. Simplistically, that meant that we only had to replace 35% of our membership before we could start to move ahead and grow.
"While only a handful of clubs around the country after that point tried to establish an educational seminar as extensive as ours, we were gratified to find two positive things happened in the ensuing period. First, close to 40% of the clubs who put us on their reciprocal mailing list, were in fact running educational meetings of one or two hour duration every time they had a party. A number of these even went so far as to make this mandatory before a couple could actually come to a party. The second thing that happened on a positive note is that a number of the swing publications began to devote a portion of their space to educational rather than frivolous articles for the benefit of the would-be swinger.
"The real problem that creates this low line renewal of couples in swing clubs is not couples moving around from club to club, but sadly couples dropping out of the lifestyle. The dropout factor is, to a great extent, the result of expectations not being fulfilled because they were allowed to be unrealistic, and couples finding mediocrity rather than excitement. These two things occur because the couples who drop out do not understand what swinging is and why it exists. They were not prepared for it properly, either mentally or emotionally.
"Swinging has grown and survived as a lifestyle because some of the more responsible people involved have recognized that, like driving a car, there are rules of the road that, if gone unrecognized and therefore violated, can kill them. While there are clubs who do not have rules, there are those swing club owners who take the time and make the effort to create a set of rules of behavior for their membership. When they go a step further and teach those rules carefully and enforce any violations of those rules, they create a safe and comfortable environment in which the swinging couple returns over and over again. In essence, they create a level playing field for all participants equally. A level playing field is a safe environment because it implies that everybody is playing by exactly the same rules which does not allow stronger and more aggressive individuals to take advantage of the weaker or more sensitive ones. If you know the rules and the club enforces the rules, there should seldom be unpleasant surprises.
"There will be a number of readers of these words who are just beginning to explore the idea of swinging. And there will be those who have had limited experience, most of it bad, and there will be those who have been swinging for awhile and never found an environment in which they could be totally comfortable. We would urge any such couple, if they are struggling to find a group to join, to ask the club or group leader the following three questions: (1) Do you have a well-defined set of rules of behavior that we can see before we come there? (2) Do you teach how to recognize and deal with situations that could be unpleasant so they do not actually occur? (3) Do you limit your membership to people who have agreed to follow those rules so that we can have a level playing field in which to enjoy our swinging?
"We did that in Club Sensitivity. We guarantee that virtually all of those clubs who do have rules and do enforce them will still be around in five years, and none of the others that you talk to will even exist. That is the way it has been in the past, and that is the way it will be in the future. The bottom line is, for good and happy swinging experiences, a little education goes a long way. If you are going to choose a swing club or group, find one that has standards of behavior, teaches them and enforces them.
From the online book "Swinging With Safety" by Robert Adler
"Representatives from many clubs from the United States and Canada were present. Each person present had compiled a list of clubs in their area to discuss at the forum, including many different factors that made up the profiles of those clubs. Membership renewal was one piece of information that was shown. The information that came out that day in 1989 showed that the representative areas of the panel, probably over 200 clubs, had a median renewal factor of just under 27%. Four years later, it had not improved and may have gotten slightly worse in the area of retaining members in swing clubs in the United States.
"This means that a swing club, in order to just stay even, has to replace 75% of its entire membership each year prior to being able to grow by even one member couple. This is a task that is beyond the means of most clubs over any period of years. That is one reason why, in the state of Florida where we are located, only one club owner operating in 1981 when we began, is still in the swing club business today [1990]. At that same convention in 1989, following the panel presentation, we gave a presentation to the some 65 club owners in attendance about our seminar on swinging. We explained to them that it was a requirement for membership in our club, Club Sensitivity. What we tried to show to the club owners was that, while they were fighting a 27% renewal rate, we had enjoyed an in-excess of 65% renewal rate for eight consecutive years at our club. Simplistically, that meant that we only had to replace 35% of our membership before we could start to move ahead and grow.
"While only a handful of clubs around the country after that point tried to establish an educational seminar as extensive as ours, we were gratified to find two positive things happened in the ensuing period. First, close to 40% of the clubs who put us on their reciprocal mailing list, were in fact running educational meetings of one or two hour duration every time they had a party. A number of these even went so far as to make this mandatory before a couple could actually come to a party. The second thing that happened on a positive note is that a number of the swing publications began to devote a portion of their space to educational rather than frivolous articles for the benefit of the would-be swinger.
"The real problem that creates this low line renewal of couples in swing clubs is not couples moving around from club to club, but sadly couples dropping out of the lifestyle. The dropout factor is, to a great extent, the result of expectations not being fulfilled because they were allowed to be unrealistic, and couples finding mediocrity rather than excitement. These two things occur because the couples who drop out do not understand what swinging is and why it exists. They were not prepared for it properly, either mentally or emotionally.
"Swinging has grown and survived as a lifestyle because some of the more responsible people involved have recognized that, like driving a car, there are rules of the road that, if gone unrecognized and therefore violated, can kill them. While there are clubs who do not have rules, there are those swing club owners who take the time and make the effort to create a set of rules of behavior for their membership. When they go a step further and teach those rules carefully and enforce any violations of those rules, they create a safe and comfortable environment in which the swinging couple returns over and over again. In essence, they create a level playing field for all participants equally. A level playing field is a safe environment because it implies that everybody is playing by exactly the same rules which does not allow stronger and more aggressive individuals to take advantage of the weaker or more sensitive ones. If you know the rules and the club enforces the rules, there should seldom be unpleasant surprises.
"There will be a number of readers of these words who are just beginning to explore the idea of swinging. And there will be those who have had limited experience, most of it bad, and there will be those who have been swinging for awhile and never found an environment in which they could be totally comfortable. We would urge any such couple, if they are struggling to find a group to join, to ask the club or group leader the following three questions: (1) Do you have a well-defined set of rules of behavior that we can see before we come there? (2) Do you teach how to recognize and deal with situations that could be unpleasant so they do not actually occur? (3) Do you limit your membership to people who have agreed to follow those rules so that we can have a level playing field in which to enjoy our swinging?
"We did that in Club Sensitivity. We guarantee that virtually all of those clubs who do have rules and do enforce them will still be around in five years, and none of the others that you talk to will even exist. That is the way it has been in the past, and that is the way it will be in the future. The bottom line is, for good and happy swinging experiences, a little education goes a long way. If you are going to choose a swing club or group, find one that has standards of behavior, teaches them and enforces them.
From the online book "Swinging With Safety" by Robert Adler