What we’re about
This is important - You must read through the entire "What we’re about" text. You will be asked a question when you join that you must answer. If you don't answer the question correctly after two attempts you will not be able to join.
This group is for women who are permanent residents of the Sarasota/Manatee County area to gather for Sunday brunch, weekend dinners, weekday lunches, live music, wine tastings, and other events. This is a wonderful opportunity to meet new friends, catch up with old friends, and build your social connections. We look forward to seeing you soon! Please make sure your Meetup Profile reflects a current, local address and your full first name.
We are hearing that a lot of women are unable to attend our Meetups as they are filling up quickly. Too many are RSVPing they are attending only to remove themselves from the Meetup. If you are someone who is using this group as a Backup Plan in case something better comes along, or are constantly RSVPing Yes then changing your RSVP to Not Going, you will most likely be removed from the group.
Do NOT post comments about not attending and why! The group is Public and anyone and everyone can read the comments. If you are going away, have a great time. But don't leave a Public Comment telling the world that you are not going to be home for a week.
Below is important, please be sure to read it!
Meetup is an online Social Media Platform. While not like Facebook or Instagram it is an electronic, software based platform; bugs, quirks and all. We use it as intended. We are not anyone's secretary.
We understand that many do not want to use a computer for any number of reasons. You need to understand and know how to read emails, respond to emails, mark emails safe for reading, read and respond to notifications from Meetup and understand how RSVPs work. The last thing you want to do is tell an organizer you don't want to use a computer, or you don't know how to use a computer. This does not negate your responsibilities to this group. We do not personally phone or email anyone informing you that we have received your RSVP, if you are on the wait list, or if you moved from the wait list to the going list. We don't send out personal reminders if you are on an RSVP list, or personally communicate with you in any way. We pay to use the Meetup software and it does all this for us.
Limited Participation - What does it mean?
Some of our Meetups have a limited number of people attending. This is due to several factors.
To be quite honest, many restaurants are tired of reserving tables and people do not show up. It doesn't matter if it's one person or a dozen. Many venues belong to private social media groups where they exchange information about groups with a high number of No Shows and many of these groups are Meetup groups. To combat this they are limiting the number of people that we are able to reserve a table for and in many cases they now want a credit card to hold the reservation. Many have a 48 hour cancellation policy. If we have no shows the charges can range from $20 to the average entree price for each no show. This is completely unfair to our organizers as we have to provide our credit card for the reservation.
Also, there are several restaurants that no longer allow any Meetup Groups in their establishment due to way too many no shows. Yes, we combat this by not mentioning we are a Meetup Group. But we still can only reserve a table for a maximum of 6 people using Resy, Toast or Open Table. In some cases, our organizers have been prohibited from making reservations at specific establishments.
Limited Participation - How it works?
To alleviate the attendance issues, some of our Meetups have Limited Participation. They will be indicated as such in the title of the Meetup. You must have a demonstrable record of of consistently attending our Meetups. This is as much objective as it is subjective. Anyone who RSVP's will automatically go on the Wait List and the organizers will move people to the Going List. This is based on the amount of time you have been in the group (a MINIMUM of 120 DAYS) and your RSVP history for prior Meetups.
Your RSVP history is maintained by Meetup from the first time you joined the group. Even if you dropped out of the group and came back, we can still see your history back to when you first joined. Those with a high number of RSVPs and then changing their RSVP to Not Going will not be allowed to participate in a Limited Participation Meetup. You must maintain a 35% to 40% attendance rate in order to attend a Limited Participation Meetup. The closer you cancel a reservation to the date of a Meetup, the more likely you won't be able to join us at a Limited Participation meetup, even to a several months ban from Limited Participation meetups.
No Shows as they are identified by the Meetup software are an ongoing issue. Yes, life happens. But we can't allow a continuous pattern of Cancellations or No Shows by members. It isn't fair to the members on the Wait List, the Organizers, the venues we use, or the Group. Anyone who demonstrates a pattern of Cancellations or No Shows as defined below will be removed from the group without notice. We reserve the right to not allow certain Members who have demonstrated a prior pattern of *Spaghetti & Meatballs* No Shows to attend our Meetups.
This is our No Show Policy:
A “No Show” is defined as someone who doesn’t contact the host of the Meetup by a Private Message and/or:
- Cancels their RSVP within 96 hours (4 days) of a Meetup and/or,
- Someone who is on the Going List and doesn’t attend the Meetup and/or,
- Someone who is on the Wait List, moves to the Going List and doesn’t attend the Meetup within 48 hours of a Meetup.
If you signed up for a Meetup, even if you went on the Wait List, and don’t attend the Meetup, forget about the Meetup after you committed to attending the Meetup, don’t respond to emails asking if you plan on attending or don’t confirm your participation, you can be marked as a “No Show”. This is the Policy for “No Shows”.
- Anyone who is a “No Show” one (1) time, you will be removed from the group without notice.
- In addition, if you continually and/or consistently demonstrate that you RSVP for Meetups and cancel within 2 weeks of those Meetup you will be removed from the group without notice.
