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Purchase of new bowls for use by barefoot and social players

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The Warragul Bowling Club is one of the oldest sporting clubs in Gippsland recently celebrating its 125th birthday. We have members of all ages including a few in the 90s and all walks of life. The Club competes vigorously in regional pennant competitions both Saturdays and midweek as well as hosting weekly social bowls, invitation tournaments and is a venue for some rounds of the Victorian Open. We also provide coaching and events for school groups and people with a disability. The club is 100% run by volunteer labour with our own members responsible for up keep of the greens and gardens, cleaning, maintenance of the building and staffing the bar. We recently had to replace the roof on our 1960s era clubhouse at a cost of over $70,000. This work was essential to preserve the building but as you can imagine left a large hole in our cash reserves. To encourage people to come and try our game we hold numerous barefoot social events. In 2024 nearly 2500 members of the public came and had a go and loved it. However they did not experience all the modern game has to offer because of the age of our equipment. Anyone who comes to a social event has access to a set of bowls but those bowls are in many cases over 30 years old and have been donated or bequeathed to the club by past members. They are almost all in the old fashioned black, are hard to tell apart and behave quite differently from a modern narrower-line bowl.  Modern coloured bowls would make the game easier to follow for social players and allow people to become proficient enough to enjoy the game in just a few hours. Our hope is that people who try the game, grasp the concept quickly and have some early success are more likely to play more regularly and eventually become members. The club has been able to source bowls like the ones in the photos below. If we order them in the next few months they would be available for the start of next season later in the year. A normal set of bowls retails for around $700 however with discounts for bulk buying we could obtain 30 sets for $6500. Thirty sets would allow 60 people to play 2 bowls pairs or triples. That would be a sight to see. Virtually every rink on both of our main greens full of new players enjoying the best our game can offer. The Club has already raised $2500 so we are looking for another $4000 to make the dream a reality.

New sets of bowls for social players