A Message from Vice President Marge Kelly and President Karen Hamilton
Thank you to all who completed the EGA National Membership Survey in 2021!
Last year, the EGA board launched a survey to help determine how to stem the tide of declining membership and how to make sure everyone feels welcome to join our organization. We also wanted to understand what benefits our members enjoyed and what we need to add to become more inclusive and welcoming.
The results were tabulated and reviewed in late fall. Since that time, we have been working to determine what can be done to ensure the success of EGA well into the future. We will soon be undertaking an initiative entitled “Securing Our Future,” which you will hear more about in the coming months.
The survey results are numerous. We are going to release them in a phased manner so you will have time to review and send us your comments.
Here is a summary of the demographics of EGA’s current membership. More details can be found in the link below.
- The EGA National Membership Survey was sent to 7823 members. We received responses from 3338 members, an extraordinary response rate of 42.6%. This response rate allows EGA to use the results to set a strategy for the future. Please note respondents did not have to answer all the questions.
- We received responses from 492 Members at Large (MAL), 254 Life members, and 2560 Chapter members. It is interesting to note the 49% of all MALs responded, 47% of all Life Members responded, and 41% of Chapter members responded.
- We are an aging group. 68% of those who responded are 57-75 years old. 23% are over 75 years old. When added together, we see that 91% of our membership is over the age of 57. Only 9% of the respondents are under 57. We need to expand this group for future leadership to surface.
- We then looked at the length of membership. 25% of the respondents have been members for 5 years. 12% of those who responded have been members for 10 years and 10% have been members for 15 years. It decreases as the years go on.
- We were not surprised by the answer to the Ethnicity question: 89.5% of those who responded to this question are white. Collectively, 5.6% of respondents identified as Black, Indigenous, People of Color or a race or ethnicity not listed [See slides for specific breakdowns] – with some individuals describing their multi-racial backgrounds. 7.16% preferred not to respond.
- When asked why they joined EGA the overwhelming answer was “To Learn” with the next most popular answer being “for the social aspect of meeting new friends.”
- When asked why they stitch, the most popular answers were “love of stitching, relaxing, and pure enjoyment.”
- It is interesting to see how our members answered the question on the type of needlework they do and how they classified their skill level. Cross-stitching was the most popular category and it was surprising to see how many classified themselves as beginners.
- Lastly in this group of questions we asked where people engage with embroiderers and learn the most in EGA and non-EGA activities. Chapter meetings were the favorite for EGA sponsored activities and in-person and Facebook for non-EGA activities.
Did we see any big surprises? Not really, but this data sets a baseline for us that will enable us to create strategies and measure our success moving forward!
So what is next for us?
Look for more communications and offerings that will transition EGA to the future where we grow together, become even more inclusive, and flourish as an organization.
Thank you again for responding to the survey and helping us understand who EGA is and where you’re finding value, and for providing feedback on how we can grow and improve as a group!
If you are interested in being a part of this process, please drop us a note at dei@egausa.org.@egausa.org.
Press the link below to see a slide presentation with detailed results. This presentation is also available on our website in Document Downloads.
Presentation: 2021 EGA Survey Demographics
The piece featured above is a section of our National Tapestry: America the beautiful.
