Chamber Questions

[Bradley]

Can anyone share if joining the OKC Chamber of Commerce would be worth it? I don't mean to sound bad there, I just don't know what it would offer. I am also interested in the Forward Projects and City goals. Any help?

Bradley

[mranderson]

To me, joining any C of C is a waste of money and time.

They are nothing but social clubs that mingle and really do not do much to help the general public. It is almost like a country club. My dad was a member of the South Oklahoma City chamber for a few years, and was an officer. He dropped his membership for the reasons I stated above.

Plus, my last employer is a member of that same chamber. All I saw him do with the chamber was to use these people to increase business and had luncheons. No real charitable help anywhere. He handed me the directory and told me to call all these people to do two things. Gain business for him and to tell them about chamber events. These are things HE should do himself. Especially the latter.

That statement about my former employer is a bit irreleveant to the question, but it gave me a different insight into the workings.

In addition. In the past, the Oklahoma City chamber, at least to me, did nothing but promote the north side of Oklahoma City and ignored the south side. They failed to accept the fact the south side has as much money as north.

(here are your "numbers". I do not recall numbers of people, however, an article published in the Oklahoman in 1999 said the third wealthiest zip code in Oklahoma is 73170. That starts at SW 104 and goes south.)

So. No. I do not recommend C of C's.

[downtownguy]

It was the Greater Oklahoma City Chamber of Commerce that funded and led the campaigns for MAPS and MAPS for kids. I don't know of another group out there that could have done the work, so can't it be argued that without the chamber, we wouldn't have the Bricktown Canal, Ford Center, Bricktown Ballpark, Oklahoma Spirit trolley, downtown library or the Oklahoma River parks. And couldn't it also be argued there would still be no effort to make something out of local schools? Several people have pointed out the chamber played a big role in getting the Dell campus to OKC. Is the chamber worthless, or is it just doing a poor job of explaining how they promote the city?

[Patrick]

Hey Bradley, it all depends on what you expect out of your membership with the chamber. The chamber serves two purposes: 1. Serves as sort of a social gathering of local business leaders.....can be used to get the name of your business out there among other business leaders. 2. An investment into the future of our city. By gathering together, business leaders in our city are able to leverage each other's support to fight to bring more business to our city.

mranderson is pretty right when he describes it as a social club......it's mainly just a place to mingle with other business leaders and share your business with them. But as downtownguy mentions, being part of the chamber is also an investment and contribution to the future of our city. For example, downtownguy lists many of the successes the chamber has had. Everything from community projects like MAPS and MAPS for kids to luring in major companies like Dell and Corning (unfortunately, due to the downturn in the economy, the Corning plant was started but never completed, but the Chamber was still responsible for luring Corning to town.....boy, the economy sure turned sour at the wrong time for our city....a Corning plant would've been sweet!). So, the chamber does spend a lot of time trying to lure new businesses to our city. How does this help a business owner out? Well, it helps the city overall! So I guess it would help you indirectly.

Anyways, I see it more as a group of city business leaders getting together to plan business strategy for our city.

[Patrick]

Oh yeah, you asked about Forward Oklahoma City...basically, this all started with Forward Oklahoma City I. It was basically just a plan layed out by the Chamber to expand the local economy in the city. I'm not quite sure what the specifics were, but all of the goals were met. I believe the development of the research park, expansion of the airport, along with luring businesses to our city were among some of the projects, but I know a lot more was involved. I can't remember exatly what all of the details were.

For more information on Forward Oklahoma City II, the plan for the next 5 years, check out the following link:

http://www.okcchamber.com/page.asp?atomid=134

The goals are also listed there. Just click on the link on the right side! As far as I'm concerned, it's a very ambitious plan for our city.

[Patrick]

So I guess by seeing Forward II, you can conclude that one perk of joining the Chamber is that you get to have a say in the future of local business in our city.