Originally Posted by
rivers
I've just had a quick glance at the ACA website- or as quick as it could be as it's very slow to load. What do you get for the cost of membership? Access to some routes and a magazine? I think in this day and age there are so many other free/cheap options due to online communities such as this one, bikepacking.com, bearbonesbikepacking, Komoot, Strava, Ride with GPS, etc where people openly share their knowledge about different routes around the world, places to stay, places to avoid, must see areas, etc that it isn't necessary. Also, I looked at the cost of some of their organised tours- $1299 for a 6 day self-supported tour? That's insane, and one of the cheaper ones. I spent less than £150 for 5 days away including the train to get me to the start and back. And the UK isn't notorious for cheap trains or campsites..
Many people join to support their mission of promoting bicycle travel and advocacy for safer roads for bicycle touring. After all, many people join Rails to Trails to support trail building, not for material benefits like a quarterly magazine.
I also have participated in their organized tours: I would never had conceived of traveling by bicycle by myself so ACA was an important step for me to get interested in touring. Although other there are other touring companies, they tend to stay in hotels, so don't access locations that can only be reached by camping. Not everybody wants to carry their gear on bicycle tours.