In January 2022 NVHC conducted a survey of its members. 158 members responded.
Almost 60% of the respondents said that the club works great as-is; an additional 32% said that it works well in a majority of areas.
About 20% of the respondents were hike leaders.
Following is a detailed analysis of the results.
Respondents are grouped by their membership history with the club and their hike participation.
Membership length grouping based on years with the club:
- New: less than 1 year
- Pandemic: 1-2 years – these members’ experiences with the club are predominately during the pandemic
- Developing: 3-5 years
- Established: 6-10 years
- Seasoned: >10 years
Hike participation grouping based on total hikes participated in 2021:
- None: 0 hike
- Sporadic: less than 5 hikes
- Occasional: 6-12 hikes
- Regular: 13-24 hikes
- Frequent: >24 hikes
| Membership length | ||||||||
| New (<1 yr) | Pandemic (1-2 yrs) | Developing (3-5 yrs) | Established (6-10 yrs) | Seasoned (>10 yrs) | Total | % | ||
| Participation | Sporadic (<5) | 14 | 23 | 12 | 13 | 0 | 62 | 39% |
| Occasional (6-12) | 8 | 12 | 7 | 6 | 6 | 39 | 25% | |
| Regular (13-24) | 1 | 7 | 7 | 3 | 3 | 21 | 13% | |
| Frequent (>24) | 2 | 12 | 6 | 5 | 1 | 26 | 16% | |
| None | 1 | 4 | 2 | 0 | 3 | 10 | 6% | |
| Total | 26 | 58 | 34 | 27 | 13 | 158 | ||
| % | 16% | 37% | 22% | 17% | 8% |
Quick observation: the markup of the respondents most likely doesn’t represent the whole club. Although, I don’t know if there is a way to tell.
The Pandemic group appears to be the most critical.
Analysis of suggestions for improvement
Suggestions for improvements are categorized. Two groups of themes are identified and displayed below.
The first group expresses the desire to see more hikes at various ratings, time frame, and speed. Total of 34 respondents mentioned hikes they wanted to see more of. Members and leaders, alike, wanted to have more hikes at all but A+ rating. More weekend hikes and slower hikers are also in demand.
The second group includes comments and suggestions to the club’s operation. Categories mentioned by at least two people are included. The most common issue is on how hikes fill up quickly and some hikers sign up fast and on multiple hikes just to get a spot before they read more about the specifics of the hike offered.
