On Running a Nudist Group

Perth Nude Friends had it's 6th retreat last weekend. It was at a new venue, and was our first two night retreat. It was also my first time organising the catering, which had always previously been delegated to another member. I'm happy to say that the weekend was a huge success. We had 16 attendees, including four new faces, and the feedback we received has been overwhelmingly positive. I'm incredibly grateful to everyone who came for making it such a great weekend, and for being so helpful with running it. The venue was amazing, on a beautiful rural property with a swimming dam, and a big indoor space for us to hang out. We managed to break even on our budget whilst keeping the attendance fee minimal. It was far less difficult to organise than I imagined, and with everyone's help, I felt like more of a participant than an organiser. So again, a big thanks to everyone for making it such an enjoyable weekend.

Events like this are so important for the nudist community. It's easy for us to feel isolated, practicing a way of life that is outside of the mainstream. We need these kind of opportunities so that nudists can come together and create friendships, and be able to truly experience social nudity. No matter where you live, there should always be a group (or several groups) ready to welcome you. I started Perth Nude Friends to provide that opportunity in my local area, and would love to see more similar groups spring up. 

The nudist world is filled with clubs that are expensive to join and often exclusive about who they let in. On the other hand, nude beaches don't always provide a safe space that's comfortable for first timers, and for meeting new people. Free, informal groups provide that middle ground, and are a vital entry point into the nudist world. I think this is especially important for young people. Our group has a very even spread of ages, which just goes to show that there is indeed an appetite for nudism among younger people, if we as a community can only break down the barriers to entry that skew our age range so much.

Creating such a group can seem daunting, and honestly, if you'd told me three years ago that I would create and lead a social group nearing 100 members, I would have laughed. I'm a shy, socially awkward introvert. I often have difficulty expressing myself in speech (you might find this surprising, since I'm not so bad at writing). I get anxious meeting new people (although I've improved a lot from my experiences in social nudism). The first few events I organised, my heart was racing in the car on the way there. I'm not the kind of person you would pick as a group leader. Yet here I am. How did I do it? Kind of by accident, and one step at a time.

The first step was simply to put myself out there. Being active in the nudist community on social media and sharing my experiences gave people a way to connect with me. I never imagined I would create a group, I just took every opportunity I could to meet new people. It was scary, and went against my usual instinct to keep to myself. But I was passionate about promoting nudism, and keen to make new friends. I met a lot of people, many of whom were first time nudists. It was by bringing these people together that the group first started to take shape. In the beginning we just did a few beach days, organised through social media. As we got more people, it became harder to co-ordinate, so we moved to Discord to keep ourselves organised. Then I created our website so that prospective members could find out more about us, and to decouple the application process from my social media accounts.

We started doing more different kinds of events. Board game nights, pool parties, camping, and our most popular recurring event, our retreats. Of course I couldn't have done all this myself. I relied heavily on my friends in the group to help me figure things out, and to keep the group moving in the right direction. Our members generously open their homes to host our board game nights, pool parties and other social events. It was one of our members who devised the idea of the retreats, and organised the first two of them. It's by learning from others and trying new things one at a time that I've been able to make the group what it is today.

Of course there are challenges, as with any worthwhile endeavour. There's a small amount of admin work, and running our discord server does require some moderation work. There's organising that goes into running events, but less than you would think. The good thing is that our members are also passionate about nudism and want to help make the group work. One of our moderators does most of the work running the discord server (hi Ralph 👋), and our members host most of our get-togethers at their houses. My main job is processing applications and co-ordinating with others to organise events.

This is all to say that running a nudist group is not as difficult as you might think. If a socially anxious dork like me can do it, anyone can 😅. You don't have to jump in at the deep end, just start small and scale things up as needed. There's a huge appetite for this kind of group out there, and people will be more than happy to join in and help, if only someone is willing to step up and make it happen. If you're looking for a group in your area but it doesn't exist, why not be that person?

If you're interested in starting a group, I'm more than happy to offer my knowledge and experience, as well as my social media reach to help kickstart your group. I want to see the success of Perth Nude Friends replicated in cities across the world, and that's going to take a team effort from the entire nudist community.