Your November Playbook: The Dues Letter Lands, the Holidays Book and the Year-End Close

For clubs that mail a dues letter this fall, November is the month members react to it. The annual meeting is on the calendar, the holiday calendar fills from Thanksgiving through December, and the membership office is working to close the year. The best November club marketing ideas treat those three calendars as one plan, not three departments working past each other. (For the communications that led here, see October’s playbook on budget approval and the dues letter.)

The context matters. In PCM’s constant panel of Form 990 filers, the same clubs every year from fiscal 2019 to 2024, 29.7% reported total expenses above total revenue in fiscal 2024, according to PCM’s own analysis of public IRS Form 990 data (the underlying filings are searchable through ProPublica’s Nonprofit Explorer). That figure includes depreciation, so it is not a measure of cash shortfall, but it is the backdrop for every dues letter landing this month. Members are reading those letters while consumer prices, per the BLS release of October 14, 2026, were up 3.7% over the 12 months to September 2026.

Calendar 1: Member Communications After the Letter Lands

The dues letter is not the end of the conversation. It is the start of the weeks in which members decide whether to stay. Members weighing a resignation may not say so at the annual meeting; falling usage and unanswered emails are earlier signals. The job in November is to find those members while the decision is still open.

Start with the context members will bring to the room. One available benchmark is the CMAA Board Brief of May 2025, which cites the GGA Partners and CMAA Club Leader’s Perspective Report: the average planned operating dues increase is approximately 6.2%, which the brief describes as down 2% from the prior year’s numbers. Be precise when you use it. The brief does not say which year the increase applies to, and it is not a published 2027 figure; we found no published 2027 benchmark. If your increase sits near it, the comparison is fair. If it sits well above it, members may find the number on their own, so explain the gap before they do.

Then use the annual meeting as the retention event it is. Valley View Golf Club in Bozeman, MT, is a clean example of the timing. The announcement “2025 Annual Election Results,” published by Valley View Golf Club on its website, reports that members voting in the club’s November 2025 annual election approved a $15 per month dues increase effective January 1, 2026, with 136 votes, or 59.91%, of 227 ballots cast in favor, and that new three-year director terms began December 11, 2025. The announcement puts the vote count, the result and the effective date in one member notice, written before the increase took effect. Even a vote that passes leaves members who did not support it. The announcement “2025 Annual Election Results,” published by Valley View Golf Club, reports that 91 ballots, or 40.09%, were cast against the increase. Those members are the people membership should be calling in November.

Three moves for this calendar:

Track the quiet signals. Pull every member whose usage fell this fall, every member who has not opened a club email since the letter, and every account with an open complaint. That list gets a personal call from the GM or a board member before Thanksgiving, framed as a question about next year rather than a defense of the increase.

Publish the meeting, not just the minutes. A one-page recap sent within 48 hours of the annual meeting, with the vote result, what passed and when it takes effect, narrows the information gap that resignation decisions can grow in.

Educate the new board early. If new directors are seated after the meeting, CMAA’s virtual Governance & Leadership Symposium on Thursday, November 19 (registration closes November 17) is an orientation option before their first budget cycle.

The chart is the reason November communications deserve senior attention. The dataset “Form 990 Series Downloads,” published by the Internal Revenue Service and analyzed by Private Club Marketing, shows that, of the four fiscal years charted, 2021 was the lowest at 19.2%, and in each of the three years since, the share has been between 28.2% and 31.6%. For those clubs, a January resignation is not a rounding error, and neither is a member who stays but spends less.

Calendar 2: The Holiday and Private-Event Season

Holiday programming is where members decide whether the club still feels like theirs. Myers Park Country Club in Charlotte, NC, is a club whose holiday traditions Club + Resort Business has written about as a source of continuity during a leadership transition; see the December 2025 Club + Resort Business report for the club’s program. In a month when members are weighing a dues increase, continuity is the message.

Thanksgiving is the first test, and two clubs show the two formats worth running together. St. Francis Yacht Club in San Francisco listed a 2025 Thanksgiving Buffet in the Main Dining Room on Thursday, November 27, with six seating times from 11:00 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. and online registration. Staggered seatings spread a single day’s demand across the dining room. The Governor’s Club on Kiawah Island, SC, ran a 2025 Thanksgiving program. The calendar listing “Thanksgiving Meals To-Go,” published by The Governor’s Club, reports three order options serving 8 to 10 people, ordered by Friday, November 21 for pickup on November 27, priced from $246.50 (turkey only) to $594.15 (full meal and dessert), with prices including the member discount and tax. A to-go option serves households that host at home rather than dine at the club. A club that runs both serves both.

Keep banquets in proportion. Per CMAA’s January 2026 Board Brief (insights from GGA Partners), food and beverage contributes roughly 30 percent of operating revenue at clubs with golf and 40 percent at clubs without. Club Benchmarking’s 2025 Food and Beverage Whitepaper, drawing on data from nearly 1,200 clubs annually, argues that F&B financial outcomes are a strategic choice rather than a sign of mismanagement. And in a 2013 Club Benchmarking case study, a club with very high wedding volume found that members were avoiding the clubhouse on Saturdays, and its leaders chose to refine their banquet strategy toward quality over quantity. The practical reading for December: member-hosted parties are worth booking now, but not at the cost of the member dining room on the nights members expect it open.

Calendar 3: The Year-End Membership Close

The membership office has a different problem. Prospects who toured this fall may be weighing a decision against the holidays, travel and their own year-end finances. The clubs that close well give them a deadline with a real reason behind it.

Terrace Park Country Club in Milford, OH, built its offer around pairs. The page “2 for 1 Initiation Fee,” published by Terrace Park Country Club, lists 50% off the initiation fee for two new golfing members who join at the same time, three complimentary guest passes, no dues or capital contribution for the first three months (with the food and beverage minimum still applying), a 12-month minimum membership and no combining with other offers. The version of the page we reviewed states a December 31, 2023 end date, so confirm current terms with the club before citing them. The structure turns every prospect into a recruiter for a second one, and a stated end date gives the offer its deadline.

Neuse Country Club in Clayton, NC, shows a different door into the club. Its December 5, 2025 Tree Lighting & Christmas Market was free and open to the public: a Christmas market in the Birdie Ballroom and the ice skating rink opened at 5 p.m., followed by a 6 p.m. tree lighting with Victorian carolers. Vendors sold handmade and local gifts, the 918 Bar & Grill served food and drinks, and a distributor offered free wine samples to guests 21 and over. Not every club can open its doors to non-members, and many should not. For clubs that can, one public evening puts the clubhouse in front of the surrounding community.

For member-only clubs, the equivalent is the sponsored guest. Give every member who has referred someone this year a short, specific invitation to bring that prospect to one holiday event, and have membership follow up within a week.

Your November Week by Week

Week of October 26. Daylight saving time ends Sunday, November 1 at 2:00 a.m., so plan for darker evenings and shift late-day programming indoors. Membership directors heading to CMAA’s Membership & Marketing Symposium (November 1 to 3, Washington, D.C.) should leave the resignation-risk list with the GM before they go.

Week of November 2. Election Day is Tuesday, November 3. Keep club communications nonpartisan, and move any member send scheduled that evening to another day. Open Thanksgiving registration and to-go ordering this week.

Week of November 9. Veterans Day is Wednesday, November 11. Recognize member and staff veterans by name, with their permission. The Hospices de Beaune auction on Sunday, November 15 is a natural hook for a wine committee dinner or an allocation announcement.

Week of November 16. Beaujolais Nouveau is released Thursday, November 19, the same day as CMAA’s virtual governance symposium. Send the annual-meeting recap if it has not gone out, and close Thanksgiving ordering by Friday.

Week of November 23. Thanksgiving is Thursday, November 26; Black Friday follows on the 27th and Small Business Saturday on the 28th, which suits a golf shop holiday push. Publish the December calendar before members leave for the weekend.

December 1 and after. GivingTuesday falls on Tuesday, December 1. If your club supports a staff fund or a local charity, this is the date to say so. Hanukkah begins at sundown on Friday, December 4, which belongs on the holiday calendar alongside Christmas events.

Your November Checklist

Call the members who went quiet before Thanksgiving; publish the annual-meeting result within 48 hours; run Thanksgiving as both a seated meal and a to-go order; protect member dining nights while December parties book; and give prospects a year-end deadline with a real reason behind it.

The article “Dues Increase Retention Math,” published by Private Club Marketing, covers the arithmetic behind how many resignations an increase can absorb. Private Club Marketing helps clubs plan these November club marketing ideas into a single calendar. Talk to our team.

Sources

• PCM analysis of IRS Form 990 filings (constant panel, fiscal 2019 to 2024; fiscal year = year the reporting period ends; expenses include depreciation). Public filings: ProPublica Nonprofit Explorer.
• U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Consumer Price Index news release for September 2026, October 14, 2026.
• CMAA Board Brief, May 2025, citing the GGA Partners/CMAA Club Leader’s Perspective Report.
• CMAA Board Brief, January 2026 (GGA Partners).
• Club Benchmarking, 2025 Food and Beverage Whitepaper; Club Benchmarking, “Food and Beverage Profitability,” June 5, 2013.
• Club examples as linked: Valley View Golf Club, Club + Resort Business on Myers Park Country Club, St. Francis Yacht Club, The Governor’s Club, Terrace Park Country Club, Neuse Country Club.
• CMAA events: Membership & Marketing Symposium; Governance & Leadership Symposium, November 2026.
• Dates: NIST (daylight saving time), NC State Board of Elections (Election Day), 2026 federal holiday schedule, Sotheby’s Beaune (Hospices de Beaune auction), Mâcon-Villages tourism (Beaujolais Nouveau), U.S. Small Business Administration (Small Business Saturday), Bloomerang (GivingTuesday), Hebcal (Hanukkah).