Our alarm bells go off at any commercial entity that wants to collect and retain personal information in order to patronize them; unless there is what we consider an apparent need we decline. And if they insist on having it without having such a need - no problem... we take that to mean that they don't want our business.
Some examples of what we would consider 'apparent need' would be applying for a job or applying for credit. If we are asking someone to trust us to do a job for them or pay back 50 or 60 thousand dollars, we can understand them wanting a bit more than our word. But there's absolutely no reason Home Depot needs my phone number in order to accept $2 for a box of nails.
Other than a.) they have no valid need for it and b.) it's really none of their businesss, as has been mentioned, most places have incredibly poor data security. Add to that the fact that clubs tend to have a fairly high turnover rate in employees and the risk factor grows.
Probably one of the few desires that is shared by just about everyone in the Lifestyle is that of discretion... and now clubs want information that will not only allow someone to potentially 'know your biz', but that could also easily fall into the hands of identity thieves.
Interesting concept.
