Club of the Month: August 2002

Women Who Do Wall Street

CHICKS: Tell us how you met and how long you've been together as a club.

WOMEN WHO DO WALL STREET: We are a group of 10 women. Most of us live in the same town and know each other from our kids and community activities. Two of us are sisters and two are long time friends. We started our club in January 2002.

What prompted you to start a club?
One of our members heard Karin interviewed on the radio, read the book, got some friends to read the book, and we all agreed we should give it a try.

How did you come up with your name?
We all made some very clever suggestions but decided we liked Women Who do Wall Street because we liked the computer link with WWW since we do so much of our club work online. One of our goals is to be women who visit Wall Street as one of our club trips.

Where are you located?
Eight of us live in the Waconia, MN, area, one lives in Chaska, and one in Plymouth.

Do you meet online, or face-to-face?
We met in person in the beginning when we were setting up our club. Now we meet online for two months and in person the third month when we buy our stock.

How has your portfolio done?
This week we gained so much money that we all took a club vacation up north. :) Actually, we have only purchased 2 stocks, one which is beating the S & P and one which is behind the S & P. We are very optimistic that we are buying stocks at a good price and are confident they have no where to go but up.

What's been the greatest benefit of being together as a club?
We have learned what kind of liquor goes best with Krispy Kreme donuts (reference our online meeting of May 5th, 2002). We also have become more computer proficient and feel we are learning a lot about intelligent investing.

What's been your club's greatest challenge?
Setting up the club was very challenging and we came away from the first couple meetings with our heads full! By doing the hard work thoroughly in the first meetings, we were ready to meet our greatest challenge, so far, which was having a member quit after 5 months. We found that having everything put down in writing helped us through the complications of switching her account to a new member.

Any good club stories?
We discovered a really fun band (Johnny Green and the Green Men) that was going to be up north when we had our first annual club trip to one of our member's lake home. We all got matching Johnny Green shirts (see our club photo) and had our picture taken with the band leader while he was eating fire. The band begged us to go on the road with them and Johnny Green gave us a hot stock tip - only he couldn't quite remember the name of the stock.

What advice would you give new clubs?
Don't play golf when there is lightning and your hair is standing on end. Krispy Kreme donuts go better with champagne than beer. Have fun and don't take it to seriously. Choose a club member who has a lake home.