Vacaville Business Club members 'commit to each other as individuals' Published in The Reporter - Vacaville, CA February 1, 2009 By Richard Bammer/ RBammer@TheReporter.com
Shakespeare's Henry V had his "band of brothers," but the city, in its Vacaville Business Club, has a band of merchants.
In early 2009, club members will not face the mighty French army, as beleaguered King Henry did, of course, but the merchants face their own formidable foe: a tenuous global economy.
They have an informal tactical plan to deal with it, one that is more than merely coping until the Dow Jones industrials climb well into bullish territory.
Like the ragged, tired English troops hearing Henry's immortal rallying speech, club members ease their own tough day-to-day struggles with the warm, reassuring bonds of business relationships and hearing the state of local mercantile affairs at the club's once-weekly lunch meeting at the Outback Steakhouse on Davis Street.
"More than anything, it is a community-based club, where local business people commit to one another and are accountable to one another for the benefit of the community," said club president John McFadden, a New York Life Insurance agent.
Co-founded in 2003 with friend and business consultant Sean McGroarty of Vacaville, it is "not a social club and not strictly a business club -- it's sort of a fusion of the two," said McFadden, who likes to refer to himself as a club "facilitator," someone who runs the 1 1/4-hourly meetings every Friday.
The club focuses on building business relationships that "support the individual, not the companies they represent," he noted. "Each membership is, therefore, a personal membership, not a corporate or company membership. We decided to commit to each other as individuals, to help each other's business grow. And the best way of doing that is building relationships."
The club levies no dues or fines, boasts no formal written rules or by-laws of incorporation and only one person from any particular occupation -- one Realtor, one Internet service provider, one marketing expert, for example -- is allowed, by invitation only. At meetings, McFadden follows an informal agenda of welcoming remarks, introducing guests, mentioning upcoming business events and listening to a speaker, a member who talks about his or her business, perhaps including a computer-aided visual presentation, for about 15 minutes.
The club had its genesis earlier in the decade when McGroarty, working in the public sector, left the Vacaville branch of LeTip, a nationwide business association. Later, after starting his own wireless communications business, he decided that "I needed private sector business" and helpful referrals. But he considered LeTip out of touch with his needs. So he contacted McFadden, a friend, and they started the new club.
As McFadden remembered, "We said to ourselves, 'We know a lot of people but what do we want to accomplish? It must be a community resource.' "
"I just felt like it (LeTip) was a referral club instead of helping members generate business," said McGroarty, who recently founded the Fairfield Business Club because of the demand.
McFadden said the club rule of having only one business type represented among its current membership of 30 is more "selective" than discriminatory.
"Conflicts of interest are disallowed," he noted, adding, "If another Realtor wants to join, for example ... we can't commit to both. Our reasoning is, that if we had two or more (of the same type of business), then we couldn't commit to all those individuals."
Additionally, the club does not want members to have offices too far beyond the geographic confines of Vacaville.
"We don't take anyone who is not a good fit for us," said McFadden. "We don't seek members from Sacramento or San Francisco. We're a resource for the community in that way. We want to be more actively involved" with local groups such as the Vacaville Chamber of Commerce and volunteer service groups, such as Adopt-A-Highway.
Club member Allen Rosenberg, an account executive with Sage Payment Solutions, a maker of accounting software programs, joined in 2006 for the "camaraderie" and the side benefit of the occasional referral.
"We get leads from each other," he said of the membership and weekly meetings.
Photographer Ryan Bates, a regular club attendee, joined in 2006 out of "a need to network in order to make my business a success."
"John invited me and I'm happy to be associated with the people in the club," added Bates, who works out of a Main Street studio. "It puts you in touch with trustworthy people. I trust the Vacaville Business Club, not only for doing a good job at what they do but also who they are as people."
He said that he networks with "people that I like. No one likes to be with people who are sticks in the mud. I know that when a casual conversation comes up and photography is mentioned, they're going to think about me."
Joining in April, Mari Parisi, the director of sales and marketing at Courtyard by Marriott in Vacaville, was invited by club member Dean Lang of Ambassador Limousine.
"I thought it would be a good networking event," she said. "They accepted me into the club and it's been a wonderful experience ever since. It's a great business relationship. We've established a great networking group."
More than ever it is during business downturns when the club's creed is put into high relief, McFadden noted.
"When things get tough in a bad economy, it helps to meet with others, to exchange ideas and work together on marketing strategies," said McFadden, who works out of a Cernon Street office. "Often, when one member is struggling with something, it's a good chance others are as well. Often, another member has suggestions or even a solution."
By Richard Bammer/ 
