308: What's A Private Club

Hey everyone, welcome to Private Club Radio, where we go over any and all topics, anything and everything private club related. That's Country Club, city Club, golf Club, yacht Club, athletic Club, all the clubs and this episode is all about what that is. What is a private club? What's the difference between all the clubs and how they work? We're going over the basics. Today it is January 1st 2024. Welcome New Year. I thought let's go over what exactly is a private club, because a lot of our listeners, you all, are in the private club world in some capacity. But there's a lot of people coming in who might be new to the industry. So if we go to the Club Management Association of America, this is their contemporary club management third edition. I don't have the new one out but if we go to their page one, what is a club? A private club is a place where people with a common bond of some type, similar interests, experiences, backgrounds, professions and so on can congregate for social and recreational purposes. By definition, a private club is a place that is not open to the public. An individual must be accepted by the rest of the membership before they may join. Once someone is accepted, they usually must pay an initiation fee and monthly membership dues. Some clubs also have a minimum spending requirements for members, which means they must spend a minimum amount per month or per year on any or all of the club type services. All clubs are not country clubs, so there's a couple of different types of clubs. There's country clubs, there's city clubs, there's yacht clubs, athletic clubs, social clubs. Those are the main types of clubs. There's also university clubs, military clubs. There's a lot of clubs, but these are our main ones. Country clubs are what you would think. A country club is usually in suburban areas, usually as a golf course, tennis court, swimming pools, dining facilities, pickleball, paddleball all of the paddling sports going on nowadays, place where people go gather. There's usually a lot of activities. They are now becoming very family focused, family oriented places of where families can go and have a great safe time and know that everything being done at the club is done to a higher standard, a nice level, and it's all about them, the members and the experience. And now we also have city clubs, which is similar to a country club but usually founded more of cities, more so, usually focuses on dining and social activities. Some city clubs have accommodation, so like the union league club in Philly and in Chicago. There's also other, I think the Detroit athletic club. They also have facilities as well. So sometimes some of the city clubs will have accommodations, but usually it's just more around social dining, meeting rooms, bars, that sort of thing. Now, a golf club, country club. There are differences, there are similarities. Sometimes they're called one and the same. Sometimes some of the clubs have all the names, all of them. It'll be a, you know, tall trees, golf and country club. Sometimes it's just country club, sometimes just golf club. But each has its own way of giving its own style. They usually have their own flair to things as well. But golf clubs is. When it said golf club, that's usually a little bit more focused on golf. I'm not saying all of them aren't serious, but usually when there's golf clubs in the name tends to be a bit more serious on the golf side, not all the time, but usually a lot more golf related things being done. Usually the golf facilities, amenities, professionals tend to be of a higher caliber and level, not saying they're not high calibers and all of them for all all the other clubs, just saying generally athletic clubs tend to be focused more around obviously physical fitness and sports, and with that there's also Lawn and Tennis Club. So there's also clubs specifically just for lawn sports, tennis, things of that nature. Shout out to one of my OG friends amazing people, lee Stahl, former GM of New Orleans Lawn Tennis Club, what up bud? So Athletic Clubs and the names kind of go into exactly what it is. Most people are members of a bunch of different ones because they have each has its own little uniqueness to it, its own little flair. Yacht clubs they tend to be located near bodies of water. Obviously, the yachts, water and yacht club doesn't usually always mean giant, big, mega yachts and things like that. It's more water related. So marinas, boat storages, clubhouses, usually a lot of sailing regatta social events. There's university clubs which are usually associated with educational institutions the Harvard Club, the NC State University Club One of my clients shout out what's good. The members tend to be alumni, faculty, sometimes students, the families, sometimes there's golf, not all the time dining areas, libraries, event spaces, things like that. And then the military clubs are the same thing, just linked to military branches and or veterans. Each club has its own way of how they allow memberships and allow people in. There's very expensive clubs. There's very inexpensive clubs. There's I think people think that clubs are super exclusive and it's a very inclusive community and there's a lot of different clubs for different lifestyles, personalities and people families. So there's usually a application process. You have to know somebody in there to apply and really just to see if you're a good fit. That really what what the club is about. You don't want everybody to be there. It's not a place for everybody and it's not a place for every personality. So I think just because you apply somewhere doesn't mean you're going to get in. Speaking of applying one of our amazing show partners and friends, member vetting Paul Dank over at kennis asg investigations really cool person. They help with that process of the member vetting and making sure the people who are coming into the club are who they say they are and who they present themselves to be. Because when you pay a decent amount of money to be in a place, you hopefully you're in a quote-unquote safe space, a place where you know that it's good people. Obviously people slip through the cracks. That happens. So if you're looking for Ways to enhance your current member vetting process, head on over to member vetting calm, hit up our friend Paul Dank super nice guy or check out our episodes of member vetting here on private club radio. Usually in clubs there's different membership tiers. There's social members. So even though a club might have a whole bunch of different Areas, facilities, capacities, sometimes you can join a club but you don't have to be in love with golf or love golf or even have to pay for it. There's usually different tiers and different Membership styles and types that people can choose based on the access and things that they want to do at the club. So a club is a very personal thing for each individual person as as well. Clubs have amazing staff. They have amazing people, and that's what I love about the club world is its its own. I Don't want to say bubble, but it kind of is, because if you love food and beverage, this is the place to be. If you love hospitality, this is the place to be, but also any other industry. If you love Numbers, like, there's accounting and people who specialize in that, just for the club space. If you love architecture, there's architects who specialize just in the club space. If you love capital, money, finance, there's people who specialize for that in the club space. Speaking of, if your club is looking for recapitalization, One of our other amazing show partners, concert golf partners, boutique owner operator of private golf and country clubs nationwide, amazing clubs. Sometimes clubs just just need a little bit of help and that's what they're there for. And guess what, when you work with concert golf partners, no more member assessments. If you don't know why that is a big deal, you gotta head on over to concert golf partners. Calm, set up a confidential call with Peter Danula. Guarantee one of the most beneficial phone calls you will have for you and your club all year. But clubs have club managers, gm's, a GM's, clubs of different sizes. So depending on the size of the club and the amount of memberships and things of that nature will affect, you know, the different levels and positions at a club. Clubs are never boring, especially nowadays, in order to Keep up and evolve and adapt to the growing types of memberships and the demographics. Clubs are all about having a great time and Making sure it's the place to be clubs. As my friends Tom Wallace says and I love it clubs should be the Employer of choice. It should be the place of choice in the communities. So it's about where people can go have a good, safe time. Tons of events for the Families, for the adults, for the kids, for the people, just all different types of it's it's the place to be. And a good club is that Lots of fun, dinners, tasting, holiday celebrations, themed parties. It's really a place to have fun, to bring your friends, to meet new friends, french, to meet new friends and a great place to spend time. And when we're talking about costs of Clubs and reasons why people join, there's the entire spectrum show, from initiation fees. There's ones that are pretty much nothing up to hundreds of thousands to millions of dollars annual dues. There's clubs that there's none and there's clubs it's Six figures plus reasons for joining. There's the same thing. There's people who join for all different types of reasons, from Needs, wants, desires, status, prestige, recognition, family, tradition. There's people who have been members of clubs for you know their families, for generations and memberships have been passed down. So clubs are adapting, clubs are evolving, clubs are becoming diverse in Always, any and all every ways and it's amazing seeing the growth and transition and the path of private clubs, just even through the pandemic and now onwards of 2024. I love the club community. I Welcome you all to the club world if you are new. This is to super brief, basic overview of just what's a private club. What's a country club? A little bit, and Welcome. If you ever have questions, don't hesitate to ask. We're on all the social medias and sign up for our weekly newsletter at private club radio comm. Once again, I'm your host, denny Corby. Welcome to private club radio, welcome to the new year. Let's make it great. Catch y'all on the flippity flip.