ReNews -- Remodelors Council News - 05/26/2006 (Plain Text Version)

Vince Butler CAPS, CGR, GMB
Remodelors^TM Council Chair
Clifton, Virginia

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In this issue:
Home Remodeling Heads for Another Record Year
Remodelers Report Moderate Growth in First Quarter
Remodelors Council on CBS Evening News, Front Page of USA Today
Spring Board Highlights
Worldwide Marketing for Your Remodeling Firm
Remodeling Show Events
Deadline Approaches for Remodeling Hall of Fame Nominations
Platinum and Gold Strategic Partners

Spring Board Highlights

Below are the highlights from the 2006 Remodelors Council Spring Board meeting. View images from the board meeting here.

CGR Board of Governors

CGR Statistics:

871 active CGR graduates nationwide
To date, 54 graduates in 2006
To date, 41 candidates have taken PREP

PREP Revision:

A motion was passed that the PREP revision move forward by addressing Section Three issues, picking a chairman to lead the working group, and reconvene progress with the aid of staff. The goal is to have Section Three completed by IBS 2007.

Public Affairs:

With very limited publicity thus far in 2006, public affairs chairman led the Governors in a brainstorming session on how to market the CGR designation.

Revocation Policy:

The Governors will be coming up with a list of offenses that would result in revocation of the CGR designation to offer legal counsel when writing up the designation wide policy.

New Governors:

The CGR Board appointed Greg Theis, CGR, CAPS and Frank Malpere, CGR to the Board.
Susan Cain, CGRA of Dupont has resigned from the CGR Board of Governors.

CAPS Board of Governors

CAPS Statistics/ University of Housing Report:

938 active CAPS graduates nationwide (total 1046)
To date, 91 classes in 2006
To date, 240 graduates in 2006
The breakdown of CAPS designees:
- 76 % — Contractors
- 1% — Architects
- 12% — Designers
- 2% — Consultants
- 10% — Other (including those in medical professions)

Public Affairs Committee:

CAPS is receiving amazing press with most recently the CBS Evening News story that aired on 5/9/06 and the USA Today ran a front page story on May 15 as well about CAPS.
Through May of 2006, more than 39 million people were exposed to CAPS through the Remodelors Council and its members’ outreach to the media.

Rules and Procedures:

A motion was passed not to include the NCIDQ certificate as an addition to the list of acceptable exemptions from the third day of CAPS classes. The motion was then ammended that this list would be reviewed as needed by the CAPS Board of Governors outside of the policies and procedures document without official approval by the Remodelors Council Board of Trustees.

Leadership Development

Bryan Patchan Scholarship 2006 form was updated to clearly state the winners will be expected to attend the spring board meeting.
The current market value of the Remodelors fund of the National Housing Endowment is $33,720. NHE reported $300 received in 2006 in Ed McGowan’s name
Interviews are being conducted for both Trustee positions and Second Vice Chair position for 2007. Contact Jan Williams for trustee interviews and Mike Weiss for Second Vice Chair interviews.
Golf Tournament — An “unofficial” golf tournament will be held Wednesday, Sept. 13 at 7:00 a.m. at the Mountain Dell Canyon Golf Course in Salt Lake City . Suggested cost is $100 per person. Looking for sponsors. Net proceeds will go to the Bryan Patchan Scholarship Fund.
NAHB Membership Committee is reviewing the structure of NAHB membership and is looking for input from the remodelers. A subcommittee has been formed to work with the membership committee on possible new structures: Mike Weiss, Mike Nagel, Jan Williams and Alan Hanbury.
Mike Weiss reviewed the Mentoring Document. This living document can be updated and shared with Potential leaders of the Remodelors Council on how to get set priorities and get exposed to NAHB leadership

Business Associates Committee

Clyde Anderson, CGA provided an overview of the Certified Graduate Associate designation program. The program started in 2000 with two graduates; the current number of CGA graduates is 112. Texas has the most graduates with 43 CGAs.
The committee discussed ideas to promote the use of the Associate Member Blueprint for Success presentation. The Associates Blueprint will be emailed to all the local councils encouraging them to use it as a recruitment tool. A follow-up email will be sent asking the councils if they have used the tool. Committee members are charged with following up with their local staff.
At the Winter Board a joint taskforce was established with the membership committee to re-purpose the Associates Blueprint for use for remodeler members. Taskforce members are Carroll Bogard , Frank Malpere , Beverly Koehn and Andrew Remm. The taskforce will meet via conference call sometime this summer.

Education & Business Development Committee

The committee received 52 IBS education sessions proposals for consideration. This compares with the 37 education sessions considered for 2006 IBS. A subcommittee was formed to review and make the final selections and rankings via a conformance call. The volunteer members are Jeff Hunt, Alan Hanbury, Carroll Bogard, Bob Peterson, Brindley Byrd and Greg Tice.
The First Road Show was hosted in Jacksonville , Fla. in February. Six new members joined the North East Florida Builders Association Remodelors Council; the second Road Show for 2006 will be decided in the next few months.
The Education & Business Development Committee has been merged into the Membership & Local Council Development Committee

Membership & Local Council Development Committee

As of March 2006, we have 7452 members; this is an increase of 276 members from March 2005.
There are currently 140 councils Remodelors Councils — of that only 137 are active. Staff has been contacting councils with low numbers to find out what is going on with their council and what we can do to assist them.
Our current leaders in the Year Long Membership contest are:
- Large Councils — Greater Atlanta HBA with 8 new members
- Medium Councils — Currently we have a tie between the BA of Metro. Pittsburgh and Southern Tier HB & Rem Assoc with six new members
- Small Councils – Central OR BA with 42 new members.
National Membership Day is Tuesday, May 23. The council is awarding a $250 American Express Gift Card to the top Council in each of the three size categories. The Remodelors Council produced a 5 minute segment for the National Membership Day web cast. Try to tune into the web cast by 3:30 to see the segment.

Public Affairs Committee

Remodelor of the Month:

Change in Remodelor of the Month program has increased number and quality of applicants (five applicants for May award, nine for June)
Did not have enough qualified candidates in the previous system.
The application process will be streamlined to make it easier for candidates to apply, as well as judging.
The May winner — Greg Miedema — is featured in QR. Winners will be sent applications for Remodelor of the Year.

RC In the News:

More than 44 million media impressions so far this year. This is taking the circulation or audience of any place the Council is featured and multiplying by the number of stories in that newspaper/TV show, etc.
Last year we reached approximately 18 million at this time.
Building on the success of CAPS with CBS Evening News on Tuesday and a USA Today story on Monday. Last year CAPS was in Time magazine, NY Times, CNN American Morning, among other major media.
Created public service announcements to be played in radio stations across the country.

Council Web Site:

Currently using consumer advertising and Google advertising to drive consumers to the directory at nahb.org/remodel.
Dissatisfaction with the member site — too many clicks to find what you want, too much text, not easy to navigate.
Would like to find a way to work outside of the current NAHB system.
Created a working group to provide feedback on changes: Pat O’toole, Greg Miedema. Lucy, Carol, Larry Murr.

Member Marketing:

Held a brainstorm to try to get members to use the Council logo more often.
Suggestions include providing easy to use high-quality electronic versions of the graphic, creating a marketing checklist, encouraging sponsors to use logo in consumer promotions.