Our club is the most basic - we meet at our local state park lake. We have no property at all, being that we sail on in a state park, but we do have a small pontoon boat as a committee boat and a 35hp skiff as a chase boat for racing. We rely on marina docks and dry sail parking lots as individuals who happen to join the club. We have 3 times as many "cruising" members as "racing" members, yet as Commodore, I know maybe 25-30 of our "cruising" members? Sometimes I think we have members who only join for help hauling boats out and using our pressure washers to clean the boats. We try to have cruising events to address the larger membership, because our racers (mostly Thistle, Flying Scot, and a slowly growing Impulse 21 fleet) can pretty much always be counted on to show up for races.
We have a fleet of 6 Sunfish which we lease from the park for a very nominal amount. I have struggled to try and get membership to use the Sunfish, and I have also struggled to try and figure out how to have more kids involved. I think we have finally made it over the hump in 2 ways: first, we have a sailing school at the lake which teaches ASA keelboat classes on a Capri 25, and we have 2 members who teach for this school. They talk up the club and the Sunfish to all students, so we have seen an increase in new members who don't own boats. Secondly, a member made the mistake of challenging me on what our plans were to involve kids. I knew he'd had several drinks too many, and I flipped it back on him, and made him our "Family Fleet Captain." He's done a great job organizing kid's lessons on the Sunfish, getting parents involved, and dragging the Sunfish out for kids on a fairly regular Thursday night basis. There are so many other activities like soccer and baseball, it's very hard to get the kids interested let alone involved. Also, we are on an inland lake, and there probably aren't as many water rats created on Bucks County farms and McMansion neighborhoods as you might find on, say, the Chesapeake around Rock Hall or Annapolis. (I grew up as a water rat in Delaware.) I plan to do everything I can directing the club's activity with regards to requests from our "Family Fleet," with the hope that we can keep some interest going in the kids.
It is difficult not having any property or club house. I've only ever hung out at Cooper River Yacht Club near Cherry Hill, NJ, visited Wayzata YC in MN once, and I see how cool it can be to park at the clubhouse for the day, while a parent or kid sails, and the other parent relaxes, sunbathes, reads, or whatever. When it gets cooler, it's a place folks can hang out and watch sportsball and drink beer. That's another one of our difficulties, there are no alcoholic beverages permitted in the park. Not to say we don't have our "red cups" and beer, but for some people, drinking is a big deal.