Firstly, we look forward to seeing you at Colony Grill next week, Monday, December 15th, 2025 at the annual TPFR Ugly Sweater Holiday Party and Beer Tie! (There is NO Beer Tie tonight, 12/8/25). Thank you Miles Townes for preparing the Flyer for the event! At this year's holiday Beer Tie we will have a silent auction for select items, like fly collections, donated rods, and assorted gear, and also a bunch of great TPFR merch on offer for the raffle. Ryan McCarron is coordinating donations, so reach out to him (he works at Orvis Tysons if you don't have his number) if you have anything you'd like to donate for the raffle/auction! Books, anyone?
By the way, this will be the last time that Beer Tie will happen on the 3rd Monday of the month. The Survey results were clear; 68% of you guys would prefer the simplicity of Beer Tie always being on the second Monday of each month, and Casting Church on the second Sunday of each month. The fly shop guys, who often have to describe when Beer Tie takes place, are very grateful that we have simplified their job. I know it will be easier for me to keep track of beer tie and casting church because I have set up a recurring calendar event in my google calendar and track it that way (you should do the same!).
Interestingly, in response to the question, "Which event are you more likely to attend, Beer Tie or casting Church," membership was equally apportioned, with 51.6% responding Beer Tie, and 48.4% responding Casting Church. So that says to me that you guys like both our events pretty well the same! I have been more of a beer tie attender than casting church attender for years, but I've gone to a few more casting churches recently, and they're a lot of fun. If you haven't checked out Casting Church (or vice versa) I encourage you to try it out!
Regarding the survey, 36 people took the time to respond. Thank you so much for your contributions! We learned a lot of great things about the preferences of our membership, in addition to the above insight about Beer Tie and Casting Church. Thank you to those of you who mentioned you would like to volunteer with the club (12 of you!), I'll be reaching out soon - some of you didn't mention your name, please go back to the survey form and make sure you submitted your name and email so I can reach out to you.
Here is what we learned from the survey, and how we are responding to membership preferences.
Venue for Beer Tie, Casting Church, Club Forum
One of the most significant insights from the survey is that only 2.9% of you actually like Colony Grill as our venue. Fully half of you were ambivalent about it, and the rest of you actively dislike the food selection and would prefer a different venue (or had a different objection, why did I put "Other" as an option? Haha).
Accordingly, the TPFR Board is actively looking for a new venue. We have identified Board Room (VA) as a place to test out. So, please TURN OUT for the January Beer Tie at Board Room VA on Monday, January 12th, 2026 to check out the new venue and form your impressions! I will send out a new survey afterwards to collect your feedback.
We will continue to use Fletcher's Cove for Casting Church, even though one survey respondent thinks that it's going downhill. Fletcher's Cove (and the opportunities it affords) is a part of the soul of the club, if you ask me. It fits with our fish local, urban theme, and it has the space we need for instruction. I know it's kind of a pain to get to, but everyone who lives and fishes in our area should know how to get to Fletcher's Cove. By the way, no need to RSVP to casting church, just show up at Fletcher's Cove anytime between 8-11 am on the second Sunday of every month, whether you want to work on something for yourself or help others learn how to cast (which is fun too!).
With regards to online club discussions, it was really interesting that 68.6% of membership preferred google forums for club discussions, and 25.7% thought either the google forum or a facebook group would be fine, so we will stay the course with the google forum! I was a bit surprised, but am happy with the result.
Commercial Involvement
As I noted on the survey, since its founding, TPFR has been a non-commercial community — no advertising, sales, or promotions. But, only 1 respondent stated that they strongly prefer that TPFR remain 100% non-commercial, and everyone else expressed an openness to limited commercial involvement. I think the word "limited" is ultra important to everyone in that description. No one would want the club to be overtaken by any particular commercial interest, or have the commercial tie-ins be obnoxious. Accordingly, the challenge is to figure out how to raise money for the club and awareness for our business supporters in a way that doesn't turn off or overwhelm membership.
I think I've come up with a solution: Clipboards. Well actually, a Greeting Board, QR codes, and Clipboards that will be set up at each Beer Tie. I have created a large Greeting Board to welcome attendees to Beer Tie, and next to that greeting board I will lay out a bunch of clipboards with flyers containing QR codes that allow members to learn about the available commercial resources in our area, take advantage of club programming, and buy merch. More about programming and merch below, so for the purpose of this section, I'll stick to my intent as it regards commercial opportunities.
I want to create a flyer that goes on a clipboard (or clipboards) that allows shops, other clubs, members seeking signups for their destination trips, and guides to advertise their services, and allow members to book or find out more about them. Think about it like a mobile magazine advertisement like you'd find in the back of a fishing magazine. Initially the cost will be the low low price of $10 for a year of clipboard presence. I have reached out to a few friendly shops and clubs already and have received interest and commits - please reach out if you are interested! I intend to fully launch the clipboards at the January meeting.
In addition, but for free, we will continue to do joint events with other clubs, and host guest tyers and VIPs. I'm not envisioning a commercial tie in, this would just be fun value-add stuff. We've never done any "speaker series" type events. The format of Beer Tie has always been pretty free form, which doesn't really lend itself to a speaker series. The clipboards will be easy to manage, unobtrusive, and super helpful, I hope! So definitely spend some time with them when you see them.
In addition to limited commercial involvement for raising revenue, we are going to have a lot more.....
Club Programming
Survey responses overwhelmingly indicated members' interest to go fishing with other club members, in one fashion or another. So I've devised a couple of ways to facilitate: Club Outings and Member Guided Trips. In addition, I have thought of more ways to stimulate club discussions and participation, so read on for some fun new items!
Club Outings
I envision three club outings per year, where a generalized invitation to anyone who wants to get together and fish is welcome to join for the day. My good friend Brook Rolter has been very kind to organize these in the past, and will do so going forward as well. Thank you Brook! Club outings will be announced well in advance, and signups will be collected via QR Code on clipboard at Beer Tie and will carry a suggested donation to the club of $20. (The QR code will link to a google form). The tentative schedule is as follows, if you want to save the date:
— Mar 22, Sunday - Gunpowder
— July 12, Sunday - Monacacy Devilbiss as a casting church on the water and outing. Requires 3 people, confirmed, to help instruct.
— October 17, Sunday - Gunpowder as joint trip with TU FWAM
60% of you indicated that you would be more likely to attend Beer Tie if there was a way to meet a fishing buddy at Beer Tie. So, I envision the "Member Guided Trips" program as setting up people who want to go fishing with a fishing buddy or virtual guide (according to the member volunteer's preference and availability). Regarding the virtual guide thing, my thought is that there have been plenty of times I've been able to go fishing when no buddies were available, but I was able to connect with a friend to "guide" me by text (and google map pins) to spots where I then caught fish. That's my vision for this program: setting up interested members with another experienced member who can actively guide them through a fishing trip, and joining them if they want, but you know, like, if it works out. Schedules are difficult, but the modern era affords certain possibilities. The point is to help y'all meet fishing buddies and get out fishing one way or another. Signups will be collected ad hoc via QR Code on clipboard at Beer Tie and will carry a suggested donation to the club of $10. I'll then connect the submitter to the volunteer member by text or email, and hopefully lots of fishing trips result!
Bluegill Tournament
Bluegills are a perfect fly rod fish, and some people say they were made for beginners. I, for one, will only be offering my services as a member-guide for bluegill excursions, haha. Jokes aside, more than 52% of you have never participated in the Bluegill Tournament. That's a shame - it's a lot of fun. This year's Tournament will be held from June 5-7 with weigh in at Beer Tie on June 8th, 2026. Signups will be collected via QR Code on clipboard at Beer Tie and the $50 entry fee will include a custom Bluegill Tournament t-shirt (I've already created some awesome graphics). In order to accommodate t-shirt orders, signups will close on May 11th, 2026. Competition categories will be "Most" "Biggest" "Smallest" and "Prettiest" like in years past.
Beer Tie: Beginner's Table, Featured Guest Tyer and Demonstration Tyers
We will continue to have Beer Tie as our regular free-form fly tying meeting - Free and Open to All! My personal hope is that in the future we will get more young people turning out. Drinking beer is entirely optional, by the way.
Going forward, we are going to announce "themes" for each tie, just to facilitate giving people ideas for things to tie. Miles Townes is going to create a 2026 Beer Tie Calendar that will let everyone know ahead of time what the planned theme is. Take it as a suggestion only; tie whatever you want.
The long running Beginner's Table programming with Rob Snowhite is set to continue for the foreseeable future! Thank you Rob for your time spent helping our beginner tyers! The Beginners Table will be indicated with a placard going forward.
The Featured Guest Tyer program has been a lot of fun as well and is set to continue under Ryan McCarron's stewardship. Thank you to our past Featured Guest Tyers, especially Brian Bennet for being FGT on numerous occasions! Thank you Ryan for coordinating FGTs! The Featured Guest Tyer table will be indicated with a placard going forward.
A new concept I am introducing is the "Demonstration Tyer." Like for the BT and FGT, I have purchased some placards to indicate if someone is tying their fly "as a demonstration." My thought is to have this be a way for guests to have an "easy in" for conversation. Completely optional, of course, and relatively informal is my thought.
Forum Discussions
One thing that I want to ensure is that there is plenty of activity on the forum, so taking a page from Reddit communities, I plan to have recurring monthly threads, like beginner's table discussion, or where should I fish, for example. I will launch these discussion threads in January 2026. Rob Snowhite moderates the forums, thank you for your service sir :)
TPFR Challenge
One thing I recall from the early days of the club and the forum was a challenge to count how many steps from your home does it take you to catch a fish. This dovetails with the club's ethos of "Fish where you are, not where you ain't" or in other words, fish local. So, I came up with the idea to make it into an official 2026 challenge, with a prize! Steps as follows:
1) Count how many steps from your home does it take you to catch a fish.
2) Report it (and describe your experience) in the thread on the forum
3) Attend 3 beer ties or casting churches
4) Claim your free prize - a custom TPFR Logo patch - at the holiday part next year!
I've already made the patches, they are 3" leather logo iron-on patches. Which leads me to the last topic....
Merch
The survey results indicated a broad interest in club merchandise. Accordingly, I have refreshed our inventory of hats and stickers, available for purchase at the next beer tie (or win some in the raffle!). Don't sleep on the hoodies: the green (for men) and gray (for ladies) T-Shirt hoodies are still on offer as well. If you haven't picked one up, they are the best, so comfortable! (they are a cotton, nylon and polyester blend iirc). Additionally, I will probably do more one-off runs of t-shirts, like I mentioned for the Bluegill Tournament, and maybe one for the Iron Vice event as well. So for merch we now have tshirts, hats, and stickers available for purchase. The logo patches will only be for the Challenge winners :)
Conclusion
Whew!!! I've covered a lot of ground with this message, and thank you if you're still reading. I know it's a lot to take in, but I hope it gets you excited for 2026. This is going to be a lot of work, so please do let me know if you're interested in volunteering to help with any of the above. We are blessed with a large, engaged board of directors, who all care deeply about the future of this club, and whom I have consulted on these topics. Please join me in making 2026 our most exciting year yet.
See you out there, tight lines,
Misha
-- http://www.tpfr.org
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