From tray bakes to Twitter as the Women’s Institute moves to find new members online

From home-baking to jam-making, members have been polishing traditional skills for more than a century but now the Women’s Institute is looking to bolster membership with the click of a mouse.

The Scottish Women’s Institutes (SWI) is seeking a full-time paid recruitment officer and, in an acknowledgement that times have changed, the successful candidate must have “strong digital and social media marketing skills involving use of Facebook, Twitter and website maintenance”.

Strikingly, the SWI says the vacancy is not open to current members.

The move has emerged after Errol, one of Scotland’s oldest Women’s Institute branches, confirmed it was closing because members were shunning video meetings on Zoom. The Perthshire group was set up in 1919, two years after the organisation’s first branch, then known as the Scottish Women’s Rural Institute, was established in Longniddry, East Lothian. Meanwhile another branch, Arisaig Women’s Institute, in Invernessshire, has closed after 104 years due to failure to attract enough new members. It was left with just 10 members.

“The number and ages of the members made it difficult to constitute a committee and, in spite of all our efforts, we hadn’t been able to attract new members. The lockdowns of last year made matters worse as only half of our members had access to social media and so could not take part in the online events,” said a spokeswoman.

And, after 95 years, Brora SWI in Sutherland has held its last meeting, with more than 20 members in attendance. It suffered a declining membership and an unwillingness among members to serve as office bearers. The only institute still in operation in Sutherland is understood to be Golspie.

Now, to help buck the trend, the Scottish Women’s Institutes is looking for a Membership Development Officer, based in Edinburgh and earning up to £22,571, with social media skills a requirement.

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“The Scottish Women’s Institutes is an organisation that was founded in 1917 as the Scottish Women’s Rural Institutes and recently modernised its image. Membership consists of 12,387 women across 599 institutes covering all of Scotland,” says the advert.

“As the Membership Development Officer, it is your primary aim to explain and engage with prospective members about the advantages of joining the SWI and its relevance to them while working with colleagues to retain existing members.”

However, the advert also says the post is not open to current SWI members, a decision questioned – online – by some members.

Adult members of the Scottish Women’s Institutes range in age from their 30s to their 90s. There are also some junior members aged under 16. Anne Kerr, president of the SWI, said the organisation aims to appeal to women of all ages by offering friendship and the chance to learn new skills.

She said: “Friendship is what we’re all about and one of the bonuses is you get the opportunity to develop talents, crafts and art as well. There’s lots of things you can learn how to do.

“A lot of our younger members find it’s a great source of me-time. If they’re working or they have families then it’s nice to get out and meet up with friends of all ages. Everyone needs friends they can meet up with and let off steam to, someone away from your immediate family who you can sound off to.

“When it’s a different generation maybe you learn more from them than your own generation.

“We’re keen to expand our numbers. We want to encourage people to enjoy the friendship we have from Shetland right down to the Borders.”

She said the membership development officer role is not open to members as it could create a conflict of interest as members have voting rights on the organisation whereas staff do not.

Meanwhile, in England, in another sign of change, the Women’s Institute – which is separate to the Scottish organisation – features its first ever transgender woman as its cover star.

Petra Wenham, 74, is the cover star of the summer edition of WI Life, which is delivered to 200,000 members.

“WI members are not just accepting but actively supportive and are welcoming me to the sisterhood,” she said.