[sageofages]

Originally Posted by DSTCHAOS

I think these societies are poorly arranged on the part of the members and excellently arranged on the part of the founders and higher ups if they want to make a profit. What are the profits being used for?

Near as I can tell, all the profits are used to make the founder RICH (as revenues are "not disclosed"). The money comes through the national membership fee of $35, various "national gatherings" to meet the "Mother Queen Bee" (or some variation of that), licensing of the merchandise (and from what I see they are extremely aggressive about protecting their trademark, dressmark and image) and credit card kickback, etc etc etc.

I was floored to learn that the poem's author get nada, zippo, bupkiss out of this after all it is a celebration of her poem. They actually say "the publication of the poem is prohibited on all official RHS materials". WTF?

I know my mom enjoys her group, so I guess it is worth the "membership fee" but geez....the crass commercialism of it all with no philanthropic attitude just puts me off.