The Direct Marketing Association has changed the location of its Oct. 18 business meeting. While it will still be held at San Diego’s U.S. Grant hotel during the DMA annual conference, it has moved from the Presidential Salon Ballroom D to the hotel’s much larger Crystal Ballroom. At deadline, the meeting was still scheduled for 1:15 pm.
The extra space will accommodate at least one additional attendee: According to dissident board member Gerry Pike, IVS, an independent corporate election inspection firm, will be counting proxy votes at the meeting.
The switch to the larger space – Presidential D is 1,176 square feet, compared with the Crystal Ballroom’s 2,664 square feet – reflects heightened member interest in the business meeting. This year, Pike has mounted a proxy vote campaign. Pike is seeking to change DMA board nomination processes. The DMA is mounting a similar proxy vote campaign in support of its proposed slate of directors.
Both sides have aggressively courted members’ votes through e-mail, with the DMA using telemarketing and traditional mail as well. Neither side has disclosed how many proxies it has received.
Buzz within the DM community indicates the business meeting will be more heavily attended by members than in past years.
The DMA’s last proxy solicitation aimed at its members was an e-mail letter sent out to voting members on Tuesday, Oct. 13, from board chairman Kelly B. Browning, urging members to support the board’s slate of directors.
Pike has maintained a constant stream of communication with a list he says he assembled during 30 years of marketing activity and DMA activism. In a Thursday evening e-mail, titled “DMA- BREAKING NEWS: No More Fear”, he addresses what he claims is a concern voiced to him by members.
“[M]any of your DMA colleagues have now given me their voting proxy…But a fear of being black-balled by Management holds them back,” he wrote.
“There is NO reason to fear now...Management won't count the votes,” Pike wrote. “IVS Associates, the leading provider of independent inspectors of election, will be counting the ballots. Management will not be peering at your proxy, [first name of recipient]…IVS are the pros. They've served over 800 corporate meetings. IVS keeps it clean and & confidential.”
Pike told Direct Newsline that IVS’s anticipated presence at the annual business meeting was not the result of his efforts.
“We did not bring the firm in, nor is it our responsibility to bring it in,” he said.
So why is he sure the company will be there?
“There are very few of these [independent election inspector] firms nationwide, and I had called IVS and they confirmed it to me,” Pike said.
All this begs a question. Given the fierce competition among the two sides for proxy votes, the contentious nature of Pike’s challenge, and other business, how will the meeting conclude in the half-hour allotted to it?
“It is my estimation that it will be impossible to do this work in half an hour,” Pike said. “The encouraging aspect of this is that there is nothing else on the schedule the rest of that afternoon, so if it requires more time, I believe schedule-wise, there are a number of hours that are available.”
There may or may not be any board business – copies of the agenda were not available at deadline – but the DMA is sponsoring a series of pre-conference master classes and other sessions. Additionally, the conference’s exhibit hall is scheduled to open at 3:00.
