New Name, New Status for CODA

he Craft Organization Directors Association (CODA), best known for the landmark “CODA Survey: The Impact of Crafts on the National Economy” which was published in 2001, has decided to change its name and formalize its organizational status all in the same year. In deciding on a name change, members indicated that “Craft Organization Development Association” more accurately reflects their membership and goals after almost two decades of growth. The organization’s formal restructuring is simply an idea whose time finally has come.

According to current CODA managing director Linda Van Trump, for the past 16 years the organization used the address of the then director for their ever-changing mailing address, and operated “under the umbrella” of whatever organization was hosting the conference each year. “We would use their Web site, their e-mail, their facilities,” explains Van Trump who lives and works in Arkansas. “But now it’s time for CODA to have its own presence.”

The organization directors started meeting in 1986, but it wasn’t until 2002 that they saw the need to incorporate and apply for non-profit status. “We started as a breakout session at the 1986 [American Craft Council] show,” says Carol Sedestrom Ross, director of craft marketing for George Little Management LLC, and past CODA chair.

Members say CODA held its first conference in 1989 and operated with some support from the ACC for most of the years since then. Strategic planning facilitator Craig Dreezen of Dreezen & Associates in Massachusetts says the move for formal status and name change came about in part because members may want to “expand its collaboration to [include] other organizations that want to tap into the constituencies” of CODA members.

In implementing these changes, the first order of business for the strategic planners at the CODA Conference, recently held in Pittsburgh, was defining the purpose and the future mission of CODA. According to its publicity materials, CODA was founded to support the work of craft administration professionals of state, regional and national craft-related organizations.

Members at the strategic planning meeting reaffirmed this goal, noting that although they talk to other members at times throughout the year, it is the annual conference which highlights CODA’s primary purpose with networking, peer approval, affirmation, and discussion of common goals as well as a concentrated look at different perspectives. Paula Owen of the Southwest School of Craft in Texas puts it most succinctly, “I’m here because, even though I don’t see them all the time, these are my colleagues.”

As a result of the discussion surrounding these conclusions, the planners formally defined CODA’s mission as serving organizations with education and professional development to foster public appreciation and understanding of craft.

“This is a straightforward statement of what we do,” says Alice Merritt, executive director of the Tennessee Association of Craft Artists.

Dreezen explains that the mission statement conforms with the decision to change the word “Directors” to “Development” in CODA’s name and the group’s desire to expand membership to organizations such as museums, schools and galleries.

The entire membership voted at the 2002 conference to incorporate and pursue 501 (c) 3 non-profit status and Van Trump and other members have spent the past year organizing the detailed information needed for the application now underway.

Other initiatives CODA members plan to pursue in the coming year include a new publicity brochure and an e-mail newsletter, a Web site, and a catalog of exhibit spaces and booking processes around the country that organization members can use as a resource for their traveling exhibits. “The catalog of exhibit spaces is important, but the top priorities right now are the Web site and the new publicity materials,” says Van Trump.

Members elected along with Van Trump to oversee the restructuring and initiatives include: Board of Directors Chair, Tim Glotzbach, Kentucky School of Craft, Hindman, Ky.; Vice-Chair, David Willard, Arrowmont School of Arts and Crafts, Gatlinburg, Tenn.; Secretary, Ann Lancaster, Houston Center for Contemporary Craft, Houston, Texas; Treasurer, Mary Strope, George Little Management LLC, White Plains, N.Y.; Nominating Chair, Dana Singer, Society of North American Goldsmiths, Missoula, Mont.; Membership Chair, Andrew Glasgow, The Furniture Society, Asheville, N.C.; and Past Chair, Carol Sedestrom Ross, George Little Management LLC, S. Lake Tahoe, Calif.

While members agree that Phase II of the CODA Survey is a high priority, that initiative will have to wait until the current business structuring is complete and may be on the agenda in 2004 or 2005. The host for next year’s conference is Steve Lanier of Louisiana ArtWorks in New Orleans, La. Conference host in 2005 is Fran Redmon of the Kentucky Craft Marketing Program in Frankfort, Ky. For more information about CODA, contact Linda Van Trump at (870) 746-4396 or Lvt.coda@mvtel.net.

-Mary E. Petzak is the editor of The Crafts Report.