Author: soundersalliance

SEATTLE SOUNDERS FC ALLIANCE COUNCIL

MEETING MINUTES

February 7, 2017 – 6:30 PM –  The NINETY

Present (11 of 15): Nicholaus Biela, Martin Buckley, Cameron Collins, Michael Dollard, Alex Eagleton, Darla Langdon, Jeremy Monsivais, Daniel Roe, Stephanie Steiner, Kristina Vaughn, and Steve Wilson.

Via telephone (2): Roberta King and Karl Picard.

Absent (2): Bill Kaczaraba & Eric Flatness.

I. Call to order – Stephanie Steiner

II. Roll – Cameron Collins: 11 of 15 Present

III. RAVE Foundation

Ashley Fosberg. Executive Director of the RAVE Foundation came to the Alliance Council meeting and recapped RAVE’s programs. She told the Council that RAVE received $12,000 in December as they were glassybaby’s charity of the month. Relatively soon, The Sounders will even have their own glassybaby candle that they can sell in the Pro Shop.

IV. Concessions

Ashli Brown, Michael Johnson, and Dawn Wheeler from concessions came to the council to discuss the changes coming to concessions. The Alliance Council was able to try some of the food and met the new Executive Chef, who comes over to CenturyLink from Safeco Field. The Seahawks have decided that they don’t want a concessionaire and, as such, they will do it themselves. They have created First and Goal Hospitality.

→ 2017 Concessions Goals

– Food quality and selection. Focus on local.
– More food and beverage combos.
– Beer matrix and strategically placing brands where the fans want it.

– Vending. Food and beverage items that fans want.

→ Executive Chef Michael Johnson
The key to his move from Safeco Field was the promise that the concessions would have a focus on sustainable and local. In the last 8 months, they have tripled the amount of local businesses with whom they do business.

– Sustainability: Compost from the stadium will go to Cedar Grove Compost and then will be used on a farm in Redmond. They will grow all the vegetables for the stadium. They will also have bees and will produce honey. If they have too much food in this process, the plan is to donate the excess to local food banks. The crops are being planted in the next 10-15 days.

→ 2016 Concession Specific Fan Survey
– Fans are looking for more variety.
– Fans are looking for speed of service.
– Fans are looking for better quality. Not as concerned with pricing.

Because like the team is dedicated to tickets and food for a family being available for under $100, there will be more family packs and combos to help achieve this goal.

→ The Beer Matrix
– Anheuser-Busch

* 2015 – 95% draft
* 2016 Sounders Matches – 89% draft

– Domestic vs. Premium in concessions
* Specialty stands will only be selling premium beer

– Local craft brand opportunities
* Georgetown Brewery (Manny’s), Alaska, Mack n Jacks, Black Raven, Ghostfish, & more
* They will also be partnering with Seattle Cider

→ Community Concessions Program

They will take a cross-section of of Seattle and bring it in to CenturyLink. They will have a range of unique items that are just at CenturyLink Field and replica items that are available. They have been out to Eastern Washington to meet with many ranchers and growers. CenturyLink is already ranked #1 in the MLS in terms of food.

– 2016 Partners:
International District: Hue Ky Mi Gia & Pho Cyclo
Pioneer Square: Rain Shadow & Kraken Congee
Pike Place Market: Beechers & Uli’s Sausage

→ Questions and comments from the Alliance Council

– Vegetarian & Vegan Options: Cameron Collins spoke on vegans options and the ways that the extenuating circumstances that made the vegan food fail at Safeco Field. He also asked that they make the ingredients of the food available at the various concessions and grab and go stands. They said that ingredients will be available, will have food maps, and will do a better job of educating employees on the various food options.

Martin Buckley spoke on the lack of quality in the vegetarian options and expressed hope that they would be improved moving forward. He also spoke on the hope that the options will be better advertised to fans. Taylor Graham said that the Sounders are dedicated to communicating those options.

– Beverage Selection: Stephanie Steiner made a request for better non-alcoholic beverage options and cited a the growing concern about the coming diabetes epidemic. Coke, as the beverage partner, could hopefully help move this forward.

– Local Alcohol Options: Alex Eagleton spoke on the hope that the Sounders could incorporate local wines in to the fold.

→ Other plans moving forward

– The chefs want to be visible during the matches. This can help them better connect with the consumers and let them receive comments and criticism directly.

– There will be some more concessions that are sold in the stands directly to the fans. For example, Papa Johns. The Sounders want to be sure this does not become so prevalent hat it gets in the way of the game, though.

– As they moved over from the previous concessionaire to creating their own, one of the keys was keeping a lot of the staff on board. They hope to continue to grow as an organization this way.

– For suites, they are streamlining the menu and making it better.

– They are investing in the back of the house and hope to continue to grow the equipment in order to increase quality.

– The food trucks will continue to be in the North Plaza during the matches

V. Constitution Articles

A) Article 6: Honorary Chairman (First Reading) – Stephanie

→ adds process, removal, and duties to 6.1 of the Honorary Chair. Makes it clear that if we don’t do this, it does not technically preclude us from doing anything listed here, but will make it easier for future councils. By adding (s) to the title, it means we can name multiple people, like the entire team. This puts it out there so future councils will know even when all of us are gone.

→ Why the executive committee should have the ability to remove the distinction, beyond the power of the council as a whole, is that it lets the EC act immediately, instead of waiting until the next meeting, when it could be necessary to act. Like they are convicted of drunk driving, commit some other egregious act.

→ “The executive shall make best efforts to survey the council for input prior to voting outside of a regular Business Meeting. ” added to 6.1.2 in case the executive committee needs to act (see above)

→  Other small tidying up done to ensure language follows rest of constitution

B) Article 8: Supporter Groups (Second Reading) – Stephanie

→ There was discussion on how the language in the article as previously amended lacks definition to make clear who an “affected” supporter group would be. In the end, however, because there is a group coming together to come to a solution for Bylaw 7, most feel it is likely irrelevant.

Vote to make amendments to Article 8 passes unanimously 11-0.

→ Language added to the Article to make clear the Front Office determines Supporter Group sections, not the Alliance Council.

Motion to amend Article 8 is seconded.

Amendments to Article 8 passes 11-0.

Vote to pass Article 8, as amended, passes 11-0.

VI. Alliance Council Initiatives for 2017
The Alliance has collected these initiatives from various sources, including email, social media, in person, and any other way fans choose to communicate with members of the Alliance Council. Undoubtedly, more initiatives will come in to existence throughout the year.

→ Memorializing “The Save” (Nick willing to take lead of Save Project, Cameron willing to hop on as backup.)

→ Hosting MLS Cup & What will happen to Season Ticket Holders (Stephanie is lead)

→ Replacement/Elimination of Bylaw 7 (Supporter Groups) (Martin is lead)

→ High-Level council recruiting (Stephanie is lead, but everyone can help)

→ Constitution (Stephanie is lead)

→ Exploring Non-Profit Status (Martin is lead)

→ Updating soundersfc.com (Stephanie is lead)

→ Budget and Resources (Martin is Lead)

→ Rebuilding Website (Martin is Lead)

→ Visibility and Marketing (Karl is lead. Cameron is on board to help.)

→ To-Do List for the Council (Stephanie is lead)

→ Procedure for Designating Votes and concern that people will not be using the app this year (Cameron is lead)

VII. Open Discussion

→ Kristina plans to touch base with Mikaela on the Scarf Vote, how it went last year, and how it can get better. The Council hopes to streamline the process on our end so it is not as rushed.

→ Season Ticket Holder packages were pushed back because of the newly designed box for MLS Championship and will be coming soon.

VIII. Adjournment

Moved. Seconded. Council votes unanimously to adjourn.

March 8, 2017

By Martin Buckley

We’re trying something new – so take a look – and leave us comments.

Here’s a 3 minute recap of the March 2017 Alliance Council meeting. Short and to the point. Also if you have not seen the “Let’s Start Climbing” video featuring Jim Whittaker that we mention – it’s well worth a view.

https://vimeo.com/207562584

Note: I’ll be switching out the video camera and hopefully have more consistent focus and lighting for next month.

February 22, 2017

By Martin Buckley

A little later than planned – and from a slightly different vantage point.

Last year Karl Picard wrote a great recap of the 2015 Business Meeting – from his perspective in the audience. A similar perspective to that of most of our readers. I’m going to share a little of the meeting – from being on stage.

Firstly let me point you to the excellent video stream of the meeting from Sounders FC. Secondly there is great coverage and comments from Dave Clark and folk at Sounder At Heart. If you were not there – I recommend reliving at least the Brian Schmetzer hype.

Yes – this was the meeting with a special announcement. The worst kept secret of the year – I don’t think there was a dry eye in the house.

Meeting Recap February 7^th, 2017

Photos by Stephanie Steiner

February 16, 2017

By Stephanie Steiner

We kicked off our meeting with a survey of Council members (private voting). The Rave Foundation is being supported and honored by glassybaby. The Rave Foundation will have its own glassybaby (shown to the left) and we are one of the groups asked to weigh in on what we think it should be called. We turned in our surveys and quickly moved along to the food and beverage portion of the meeting.

The February 7^th meeting was the first ever Strategy Session. Strategy Sessions was a new way of working with the Club that was adopted last year. When the agenda was sent out for the meeting, volunteers were sought to be on the food and beverage follow up team. That team is: Martin Buckley, Cameron Collins, Alex Eagleton, and Mike Dollard.

Food and beverage at Century Link Field is undergoing an exciting transition. First and Goal Hospitality is the new entity making all of the choices with regard to food and beverages at Century Link Field. We met with Dawn Wheeler, Ashli Brown, and Michael Johnson. They’re diving into explorations regarding beer and cider selections (and how they should be different on tap vs. in 16 oz. cans), how large corporate partnerships can be respected while allowing the differences in Seahawks fans and Sounders fans to be honored, and allowing the quality and alcohol content desires to be met for two distinct fan bases: whereas Sounders fans tend to lean more toward craft beer choices, Seahawks fans tend to choose beers with lower alcohol content to help them through a game that is hours longer.

We had an extensive conversation about bringing in quality food choices that might be considered “alternative” in other markets but are fairly mainstream here in Seattle: fresh food instead of being high fat/fried, vegetarian/vegan choices, gluten free, dairy free, and so on. There are so many options available, that we shouldn’t be settling for food that tastes terrible or is poorly prepared. We learned that much of the struggle in the past has come from inadequate training, which is being addressed.

Martin’s son, Hugo, a ten-year-old vegetarian submitted his well-written thoughts on Century Link’s food and beverage for us to consider. I love receiving correspondence from “junior counsel.”

Below are some images of the samples the food and beverage team brought with them for us to taste. We’re not showing these to you to make you envious, make you hungry, or make you want to join the Alliance Council – those are simply beneficial side effects of these images.

The team at First and Goal Hospitality, Left to Right: Michael Johnson, Ashli Brown, and Dawn Wheeler.

After the Strategy Session, we moved into our own business. First up: Article 8, Supporter Groups. The first reading of the article change was read in November of last year. This was the second reading with an amendment to change the line “designated seating sections” for clarification. It now reads, “Front Office-designated seating sections.” The amendment and the Article were passed unanimously.

We had the first reading of some changes (for clarity) to Article 6 regarding Honorary Chairperson. It’s fairly easy to keep things going when people continue to serve on Council. But when there are large changes to Council, it can be confusing as to what can or cannot be done. So we elected to add clarifying language to Article 6 about the position of Honorary Chairperson. We’re now calling it Honorary Chairperson(s) to make it obvious that more than one person can hold the title at the same time – this gives a Council the ability to grant a youth team the honor if they chose to do so. We declared that if there ever were to be responsibilities of the role, they’d be managed in the bylaws – this does two things: it shows that there aren’t any responsibilities now, and tells people where they’d find them if there ever are any. Lastly, we declared how we’ll name the Honorary Chairperson(s) or rescind the honor should that ever be necessary. None of these things are changes to the process that we follow, they’re just now spelled out so that everyone understands that this is what to do in the future.

We addressed our list of initiatives for 2017 (it’s a lot), and got names attached to each item on the list. We’ll post those separately so that we can update the post and add to it. Those of us who have already started on our projects updated the group.

We finished with open conversation which was mostly about stars on jerseys – at the time, it wasn’t nearly as heated as it has become: MLS had not yet issued the cease and desist to the partner store which was stitching stars on replica jerseys.

Our next Strategy Session will be at our March meeting and we’ll meet with the Marketing team.

SEATTLE SOUNDERS FC ALLIANCE COUNCIL

MEETING MINUTES

January 10, 2017 – 7:00 PM –  The NINETY

Present (10 of 14): Nicholaus Biela, Martin Buckley, Cameron Collins, Michael Dollard, Darla Langdon, Jeremy Monsivais, Karl Picard, Daniel Roe, Stephanie Steiner, and Steve Wilson.

Via telephone (0): None

Absent (4): Bill Kaczaraba, Eric Flatness, Roberta King, and Kristina Vaughn. (This was a rescheduled meeting, therefore none of these absences count towards Council Member Attendance)

I. Call to order – Stephanie Steiner

II. Roll – Cameron Collins: 10 of 14 Present

III. Introductions

a. Nicholaus tells the council a little bit about himself. He hopes to work on problem solving and messaging with the council. He is interested in helping with visibility. He is also the treasury for the Seattle Chapter of the American Outlaws group. He is a community manager by profession.

b. Darla tells the council a little bit about herself. She decided to join the AC because she wanted to learn more about the club itself, and thought it was a good opportunity to learn about the business side. She is interested in the things that can be changed by using our voices on the council. Not a lot of MLS clubs give this opportunity, so she thinks it is cool that we can do this. She works in the healthcare field by profession.

IV. All Member Introductions

Members of Council who were on last year’s council introduce themselves to the new council members.

V. Elections

PRESIDENT: Karl nominates Stephanie as President. She accepts the nomination. She becomes president by declaration, as there was no challenger.

VICE PRESIDENT: Stephanie nominates Martin Buckley. He accepts the nomination. He becomes VP by declaration, as there was no challenger.

SECRETARY: Stephanie nominates Cameron Collins for secretary. He accepts the nomination. He becomes secretary by declaration, as there was no challenger.

AT LARGE POSITIONS:  There are two positions.

→ Kristina asked Martin to nominate he for at-large because she could not be present. He read a statement on her behalf.

→ Dan Roe nominated himself to be an at large statement. He gave a statement on his own behalf talking about the things he has been involved with as a member of council and what he hopes to do moving forward.

→ Karl Picard nominated himself for an at-large position. He gave a statement on his own behalf talking about what he has done on council and his goals moving forward.

In the first round of voting, Karl Picard was elected to an at-large position.
In the second round of voting, Kristina Vaughn is elected to an at-large position.

Several council members present thanked Dan for his years of service on the Executive Committee of the Council.

VI. Goals & Objectives for 2017

→ Work on the Sounders website with our content and improve our own website.

→ Finalize the Constitution by setting up an outside group with members of SGs to make the procedures. Make a few tweaks to the constitution to make it even better: honorary chairperson, etc

→ should the council move towards getting nonprofit status?

→ Restructuring our Google Group Drive so everything is named with the same format.

→ Grow the council in a smart fashion with people who will do work. Build a community.

VII. Adjournment

Moved. Seconded. Council votes unanimously to adjourn.

SEATTLE SOUNDERS FC ALLIANCE COUNCIL

MEETING MINUTES

November 1, 2016 – 7:00 PM – The NINETY

Present (11 of 19): Martin Buckley, Cameron Collins, Craig Dillon, Michael Dollard, Eric Flatness, Roberta King, Karl Picard, Stephanie Steiner, Brendan Vaughn, Kristina Vaughn, and Steve Wilson.

Via telephone (0): None

Absent (8): Paul Cox, Angelica Germani, Bill Kaczaraba, Thom Kephart, Jeremy Monsivais, Jerry Neil, Jeff Randle, and Daniel Roe.

 

 

I. Call to order – Stephanie Steiner

II. Roll – Cameron Collins: 10 of 19 Present

III. Old Business

a) Honorary Chair Updated

Under the Constitution, the Alliance Council has the right to choose its own Honorary Chairperson for 2017. This decree would name it Brian Schmetzer.

Amendments → Change the section number to just a reference to the Alliance Constitution.

VOTE TO AMEND: 9 for and 0 against. Amendment passes.

Amendments → Add “Honorary” before Chairperson in the final line and specify that he becomes the chairperson “beginning in 2017.” Another councilmember joined the meeting during this discussion.

VOTE TO AMEND: 10 for and 0 against. Amendment passes.

VOTE TO PASS HONORORARY CHAIR STATEMENT, AS AMENDED: 10 for and 0 against. The statement on a new honorary chair passes.

 

 

b) Motion by Cameron Collins to have the floor

Cameron would like to recognize Eric Flatness for all his work on the Council and to thank him for it prior to him moving to Thailand later this week. Eric thanks the Council you for all we have done for him, especially Stephanie. Eric is looking forward to the Sounders hosting the Montreal Impact at home in the MLS Cup final.

c) End of the Year Business Meeting

The Council had been trying to get this conversation going for a long time. We talked to the Front Office over and over about it since March or April. They kept saying it was too early. As previously discussed, Kristina Vaughn had a meeting where the Front Office talked about our expectations. After that meeting with KV, the Front Office kept pushing back the conversation. The Front office eventually did not include the Council in the conversation and they planned the meetiing on their own without our input, despite it being our meeting. The Council is concerned that we weren’t involved in the process for our own meeting. The concern from Councilmembers is whether the Alliance Council is respected by the front office or whether Democracy in sports nothing but lip service?

 

IV. New Business

a) Article 8 & Bylaw 7: First Reading
It was never discussed before that removal of recognition would mean that a supporter group would no longer be recognized by MLS. This language would revert it back to the old language prior to the change. Ultimately, the question is what is the root to a successful passage of this part of the Constitution? Getting something with which all Supporter Groups are happy. Thus, we will be creating a committee with representatives from each supporter group to come up with a new system to make this a non-issue.

Bylaw 7 → Question of whether we want to discuss it as a Council or do we want to let the committee that comes together deal with it. Consensus that we let that committee come up with everything, but we will begin facilitating that conversation.

 

b) EOTYBM Presentation

Martin’s presentation on the alliance council year was presented to the council.

 

V. Adjourn

Motion to Adjourn is seconded and passes unanimously.