I belong to two guilds in my area, each has about 200 members. But my real joy is being part of a Friendship group, and I belong to three!
One church group (8 ladies) does only hand quilting, finishing quilt tops for people and donating the income to a cause of our choosing through the church.
The second one is the Philanthropic arm of one of the guilds (20-30+ quilters, it changes weekly), and this one is a hoot! We donated over 750 quilts just last year alone. We are able to longarm quilt most of our efforts (another team effort of 7-8 ladies), about 1400 quilts in 2 1/2 years!
The third is a great group that meets at the Presbyterian church (8 of us) where each of us does our own project, or teams up, or whatever we want to do. And of course we make quilts for worthy causes, about 25 quilts a year.
Guilds meets monthly, have a schedule, and need to take care of business. It's really not the best time nor place to make new friends. The real value of smaller groups outside of the guild is you are able to learn new techniques, make friends, and laugh!