Mess Revitalization

[horatio749]

Hello Everyone,
I have recently become the VPMC at our reserve regiment.
We have always wanted to bring some colour and life to our coy's Jr's mess but have never had any funds to do it.
We would really like to paint, change the flooring and purchase furniture. We are currently stuck with white walls, white tile floor and Public Fund furniture that's throughout the entire building.

I'm looking if theres any resources or anything that the chain of command might do to help us out. Are there any PSP or other programs that support messes for this kind of purchase. Has anyone dealt with this kind of problem before.

 

[George Wallace]

We would really like to paint, change the flooring and purchase furniture. We are currently stuck with white walls, white tile floor and .......

A lot of that is Public Works, and I am sure that with the correct Memo to your CO, a Work Order can be put in to have the walls and floors done at Public Expense, perhaps even the furniture.  Your Mess Membership also can purchase items buy using the Mess Funds that are raised by the membership through Mess Dues.  You have both Public funds and Non Public Funds(NPF) funds to work with, and Non Public Property (NPP) which should be managed by someone in your HQ.  NPP would be all your Unit trophies, plaques, pictures/paintings, Ceremonial uniforms, museum collection, etc.  With all these means you should be able to create a half decent Mess.

 

[horatio749]

I have been told that the use of public works or public funds would result in the same wall colour and same floors and would only be done if the PW deemed it as necessary. So I was kinda scepticle going that route but it never hurts to try.
As well our regiment is split over three garrisons with each garrison or coy having there own Jr.s mess. This makes it tough to use mess funds as there is little left to use once expendatures are covered. However that's a hole nother issue that I am looking into. I was really hoping that someone might have some advice on getting donations or any programs that might be available on the NPP side.

Thanks for the ideas

 

[Veovius]

I have no idea how these things work, but would it be alright to swing by some paint stores and request donations?  I don't know if that's ok in the military, but I'm sure any local paint store would be proud to help support the CF.  No idea on the furniture, though.

 

[brihard]

Decoration does not a mess make. The mess is the members thereof, the cohesion and regimental spirit they share, and the good times and challenges they experience together.

Make your mess a fun place to go to. Encourage members to stay later or more frequently. Have parties. Hell, after a weekend exercise, open up for beer, pizza, and whatever sporting event is on before everyone buggers off back home. Encourage members to bring a couple friends up sometimes. Most importantly, encourage the new kids to come up and hang out, and loosen up a bit with them so they see that they can socialize with the more senior amongst the JRs. It pays dividends in the field, too.

Get members to care about the mess, and it'll come together. Furniture and some paint on the walls are really just icing on the cake.

Minor note regarding the paint specifically- slim chance of getting a paint store to donate that much. Most retail places oeprate on tight margins, and will be reticent to donate to what is essentially a private club- and representing yourself otherwise wouldn't be completely honest. Generally speaking, one bucket of paint will do 400 square feet in one coat. So that'll be a bucket per coat per 25 linear feet of wall. If you're painting over white with a darker colour you'll want to get a good tinted primer; it'll probably save you two coats of your actual paint. Dark paints need more coats than light paints because light paints cover over better, but tinted primers are excellent for minimizing this. Hope this helps a bit.

*sigh*... Yes, I used to work in a paint department. FML.

 

[Pusser]

I have no idea how these things work, but would it be alright to swing by some paint stores and request donations?  I don't know if that's ok in the military, but I'm sure any local paint store would be proud to help support the CF.  No idea on the furniture, though.

No you can't do that.  This falls under "sponsorship" and there are some pretty tight rules on that subject.  Your support base should have a sponsorship coordinator (probably part of PSP) who can guide you on what you can and cannot do.

As for putting in a work order - that works.  Whoever told you that you would have to have the same colour scheme is mistaken.  As long as no additional funds are required, there is some flexibility as to what colour you get (i.e. you can't be limited to any colour as long as it's white).  However, if the mess has been painted within recent memory and you haven't yet finished what is considered the lifetime of a paint job (this is defined), then you may be out of luck in getting it done soon.

Humourous Anecdote:  years ago when I was in a JR mess that shall remain nameless, we wanted out bar area re-painted.  We submitted a work order and were told that it would be at least years.  So, we went out and bought some paint and painted it ourselves.  As soon as CE found out about that, they arived within a week to re-paint it.  ;D  True story.

 

[Bluebulldog]

Horatio,

I'm with the reserve arty, here in Southern Ont.

Your profile has no info on what unit you're with, nor where you're located.

If you PM me, maybe I can help out with the paint. Providing you're in Southern Ont. I manage a LOT of buildings, and have quite a stockpile. Colour selection varies, but I may have a couple of 5 gal pails that can be tinted to suit your fancy.

 

[horatio749]

Hey Everyone
Thanks so much for the replies

Brihard,
Thanks for the info and I totally agree on your idea that paint and furniture are not what makes a mess however we are trying to make the mess a little more inviting. The entire mess membership feels that a little colour would go along way so I have been tasked with trying to do it with the little to no funds available.

To those who brough up sponsorship thank you very much to alerting me that this may not be possible. My next step if the COC didn't work out was to dry and elisit some funds/sponsorship from local hardware suppliers however I believe I will be speaking to PSP in trenton before I even think of contacting a local buisness.

Sounds like this isn't as easy as my HCOL made it out to be.  guess I will have to keep digging to see what the best option for this adventure will be.

 

[Fishbone Jones]

You always have the possibility of doing the work and enjoying the fruit of your labours. My experience has been, most ASUs don't care what you do to your Mess as long as you don't turn it into some sort of black light mosh pit.

Better to beg forgivness, than ask permission.

Blame it on the guys that just retired and left no forwarding address

 

[Jarnhamar]

painting the mess is great but there are many other things you can do to revitalize it IMO.
It's hard work and something I'm dealing with too.

How I see it;
You're competing with Xbox, school/homework,  facebook, the internet not to mention other bars. I think 'back in the day' there wasn't much to do so Mess's saw more use.
Here's my ideas.

Try and do away with rank as much as possible in the mess. Treat it like a warrior-lodge, brotherhood kind of environment. Try to foster a warrior mentality, make the young guys with no experience understand that they are the future of the Canadian Forces.
Mess's have lots of old crap and clutter hanging around.  We're looking at taking all the old pictures awards and stuff and placing them on a single wall.  Don't do away with the past and traditions but don't be afraid to put new stuff up.  I'm looking at making a wall for all the old photos and making another wall for pictures of all the members of the mess who have deployed overseas.  Take the guys best "hero pics" and put them up.

For the remainder of the walls put up pictures of current serving members doing cool or stupid crap.  Update the pictures basically.
Go on facebook and once a month creep everyones profiles and when you see a goofy or stupid pictures that one of members put up print it out, put it on the wall and the "mess member of the month" has to take a random shot of alcohol or something else embarrassing.

Sneak in some professional development. Put up the principles of leadership or steps of battle procedure. Guys are gonna mock it and ridicule it, but every now and then ask someone a principle of leadership- they get the right answer and they get a free beer.

Leave little bits of mess related UFI.  For example I was reading today and came across a webpage talking about how ancient spartans were trained from 7 years old to 20 to be these super soldiers- only if the soldier wasn't excepted into the mess by the mess members he would NEVER become a full spartan soldier. Write on the paper "why is that?" when you see a young soldier reading it, ask them what they think.

Have mess functions.  It can be anything from a trip to the war museum (whatever) and then back to the unit for a pig roast (which is what we did and it was kickass) to just opening the mess for a dozen guys who want to watch the hockey game.

Play a round of paintball one Saturday, or a ski trip or even get some dudes to go watch a war movie.  The reg force work with each other every day, they go on ex for 2 months at a time and have lots of bonding time. Reserves on average spend 12 hours a month working together, maybe a weekend thrown in. Thats not a lot of time.

It's all about making everyone feel welcome. Watch out for Afghan vets taking over the mess with warstories. Get a few of them together and they start talking about this fire fight or so and so watching someone blow themselves up. The guys without tours will for the most part sit back and listen as they don't really have much to contribute. They end up not feeling like a part of the in crowd and surprise Thursday night after training instead of hitting the mess their heading home because they don't want to sit around hearing the same stories repeated every week.
Warstories are great but find ways to lead the conversation away from it and into something everyone can contribute to.




Painting is great, especially if the place looks like a hole but if you put a lot of time and effort into the place but don't include other ways of attracting members to stay at the mess all your work will be for nothing.

 

[pbi]

Horatio: I belonged to Reserve JR and WOs/Sgts Messes back in the 1970s and 80s, and I was the PMC of the PPCLI Home Station Officers' Mess in 95-96, and I have to agree 100% with the posters like Grimaldus who are advising that what matters most in a mess are the people and their spirit. (That's why Messes got going in the first place) I have seen old, worn-at-the-edges Messes that were happy, partying places with great spirit and a healthy bar profit, and I've seen brand new spick-and-span Messes that were like funeral home waiting rooms. Paint and furniture do not make the difference: people do.

In my experience, what will be the decisive factor (like most things in the Army...) is leadership. This means that, starting with the CO and RSM, anybody in a leadership position at any rank encourages Mess membership to attend (even if its only for an hour, or for one drink), and most importantly set the example.

Caveat: I'm categorically NOT talking about pressuring people to drink alcohol: I grew up with that in Messes, but it was stupid and can lead to trouble. You also have to take a look at what type of events have been successful in the past, and try to do more of those and less of things that nobody likes. This sounds like a no-brainer, but you'd be surprised how this doesn't happen.

One thing I have seen done very successfully is for Messes to be open on unit armoury training weekends (if your unit has these): this will take some reasonable degree of control to make sure you don't mix booze and training, but it can be great. Example: Classic War Movie Night on Saturday, with a couple of kegs and some pizzas.

On the Public vs NPF work: be very careful. Talk to both your ASU/Bde NPF Administrator, and the CE Section that supports your unit. They can help you understand what can and can't be done Public vs Non-Public. Be careful about assuming that was done in one Mess can automatically be done in another. As an example, here in Kingston at the Fort Frontenac Officers' Mess, parts of the Mess are maintained and upgraded publicly, and parts must be done with NPF funds, and you have to know which room or facility in the Mess you're talking about. The situation over at the RMC Mess, or up at Vimy Mess, or up the street at the PWOR Mess, might not be exactly the same.

Finally, I'd be careful about the practices of rentals and encouraging a large Associate membership. Both will almost certainly bring you in lots more bucks (that was how we kept the Home Station Mess out of the red), but both have the potential to cause problems for the Regular members, who may find themselves having less and less control of their own Mess, but unable to risk the financial loss involved in controlling the problems. There is a fine balance, and it's not always easy to find.

Keeping Messes alive these days is difficult, in both the RegF and the Res. There is a ton of social competition out there that can make it hard for Messes to survive, but keep the people in mind first and you'll be OK. Good luck.

Cheers