“The Lorient nautical club (CNL) needs you! » To cope with the rising costs of equipment, its president Alain Le Bellour opened an online collection to finance part of the expenses of the Lorient club which has 760 members. Explanations.
Why are you calling for donations?
We have observed that CNL expenses are increasing, in particular because of inflation, and our revenue is not keeping up… There is another phenomenon too, it is the cost of nautical equipment for our competition center. It has increased by around 30% in five years, which is a lot! And what’s more, with the arrival of foils, we are changing materials and prices too. We benefit from subsidies. Local authorities renew them, which is very good, but they do not take inflation into account and their financial difficulties lead us to seek diversification of our revenue.
Read also: The Lorient Nautical Center is one of the largest clubs of the French Sailing Federation
What is the club’s budget?
The CNL has a budget of around one million euros. That requires anticipation! Subsidies represent approximately 15% of our revenue. Most of the revenue comes from participant registrations for all our schools, regattas, CNL organizations for the various races and private partnerships. There are also recipes from the club bar.
As the CNL is an organization of general interest, we can receive donations and in return provide tax receipts which allow tax deductions. For an individual, 100 € paid amounts to giving only 34 €.
-Will the money from donations be allocated?
Yes, we have planned three signposts. The first for the hand-sailing section. The second for the competition pole for which we need quality equipment but also coaches. The third for the support of our high-level athlete, Yun Pouliquen, who is in the French team on IQFoil, a foil windsurf board which is aiming for the 2028 Olympic Games in Los Angeles. We recruited him in April as a high-level athlete. We have help from the National Sports Agency, but it is not enough to compensate for his salary and expenses. For him, we are missing €10,000 per year.
Donations can be made on the website www.helloasso.com, by searching for Center Nautique de Lorient.
Senegal
