We currently have 3 professional brewers in our club. I sincerely hope they remain active as I think it brings a lot to the group. By summer there may be a couple more. For our club only competitions, we have decided that anything brewed by anybody, anywhere with a total batch volume of 20 gals or less is acceptable.
We like to encourage as many entries in competitions as possible, and why not let the Pro-B's use the competition to get feedback on their experimental brews?
On the other side of it, we've got members whose home set ups would be the envy of any Pro. Should they be disqualified because they've got more "professional" gear? Not for this club! We'd rather show them just what can be done with an old blue cooler.