Toastmasters International -

At the Toastmasters 2022 International Convention in Nashville, Tennessee, members were asked what they thought prospective members should know about the organization, and why they continue to renew their membership year after year. Below are a few of their inspiring responses as we move toward membership renewal time. You can hear more members’ feedback on Toastmasters International’s YouTube channel.

“The way the organization presents itself offers us an opportunity as individuals to evolve. There are constantly new things that you can do each year. Even though you are the same Toastmaster, and you might be in the same club, you are going to give speech after speech after speech. You evolve in every role that you play and in every speech that you give. You’re given an opportunity to do it just that much better.”

Anita J. Ramprasad, DTM

“This is one of the biggest communities—biggest meaning biggest in our lives. It always has been for me. That’s honestly the biggest reason why I renew.”

Mike Carr, 2020 World Champion of Public Speaking

“[New members] don’t see their own growth. As a fellow Toastmaster, a fellow club member, the best service we could do, and increase retention, is to point out other people’s breakthroughs—other people’s growth—and I think if they see that, they’ll stick around.”

Darren LaCroix, AS, 2001 World Champion of Public Speaking

“Toastmasters is not a restaurant for you to sit back and say, ‘Serve me.’ What it is is a big, beautiful, bountiful buffet that I tell people, ‘Please, take your tray, go down that buffet, and you be greedy. Be greedy and take everything that possibly can help you grow, become better, challenge yourself. I think the moment that we allow ourselves to become complacent, that’s the end.”

Beth Ramsay, DTM

“Toastmasters has allowed me to look deep within, understand what I bring to the table, and how I can realize and empower and amplify my own voice to help myself and everyone that is around me.”