This is a topic I am most interested in myself. I have found that recruiting new members is a hard one to do. That is because of the generational gaps that we all meet with in the field of recruiting. The age of the person(s) is such a gap that when you are recruiting, you have to go from an 8yr old to someone that is between 30yrs old and 60, 70yrs old. The different maturity levels is the hardest thing to compensate for while in discussion.
On the other hand grabbing the potential recruit and showing them how to tie their first decrotive knot ie(diamond knot) simple enough, and they actually tie it after several tries, they are either hooked, or not. The average age of the Guild is predominately and gracefully about 30 to 60yrs of age. I believe that to be a liberal, deductive guess at the average age.
We must consider this situation to be important, for if we wish the Guilds around the world to continue and strive forward to the future, we must find creative, clever ways to recruite new members, or the Guilds will dissolve away with each member that passes away. In that matter, with each memeber that passes away, there goes their experience and knowlege of knot tying. I have this perception of experience from when my great grandmother passed away, ie(she knew how to make biscuts from scratch that were out of this world.) She never shared the secret reciepe with anyone in the family. Now, she's gone and no one in the family can make those fabulous biscuts anymore. So, if we don't recruit and share what we know about knot tying, knot tying will be lost forever.