330: Educating & Entertaining w/ NCA's John Good

Speaker 1: 0:00

We sat down with the folks at Middleby and they said well, listen, we'll just underwrite it so you don't have to charge, you don't have to worry about transportation, we'll get everybody here. So we were able to open up to the whole membership as actually part of the event, and then we got a couple of the chefs to do a couple of workshops. So now it's eligible for education credit as well. So it's just an off-site education event now, but it's really cool.

Speaker 2: 0:26

Hey everyone, welcome to Private Club Radio, your industry source for news, trends, updates, anything from management, leadership, governance, food and beverage, marketing communications. If it's club related, we have you covered. I'm your host, the club entertainer, denny Corby. Thank you for being here. This episode I get to chat and bring on a good dude, john C. Good speaking of good. He is the director of events, tech and member engagement over at the NCA, the National Club Association, and I wanted to bring him on because I have Joe on. I have Joe on a lot and we're talking about the updates what's going on Capitol Hill, what's going on in the government. But the NCA they do a lot of events, also usually a little bit smaller, a little bit more workshoppy, and they have their conference coming up soon and it is gonna be killer. But John helps run, it is in charge of the events and the tech and the member engagement and obviously has a team as well. But with my entertainment background, I know how difficult it is to put on events and how much work it takes. So I kind of want to give you all, the audience, a little peek behind the curtain and we can learn a little bit about John, his background, cause we've had so many just fun conversations over the years and I just think he's a really good dude. So I just want to talk about that. Part of it is the events, what it takes to put stuff on and his background. A little bit so for those of you who don't know about the NCA and the NCA conference. But basically it's just a really great gathering of GMs and their boards and it really provides an opportunity for leaders in the club industry to learn from each other and build relationships. This conference tends to be a lot smaller and more intimate than a CMA conference and he and I go in chats about that as well. So we talk about the conference coming up. We'll all let it go off in there. But we talk about John's background, from music management, event planning, nonprofit management and all that which has helped equip him with the skills to oversee all of the events, and the technology and the member engagement for the NCA. I'm happy to have them on. I'm excited to have them on. I'm glad for you all to learn about them. So let's give a big, warm, private club radio welcome to our friends from the NCA, mr John C Good.

Speaker 1: 2:57

So I mean, you know we're gonna have a full house for sure, we'll be pushing probably 300, maybe 350 on this one, just kidding.

Speaker 2: 3:07

How many were at Chicago?

Speaker 1: 3:08

About 250, 253. I think we had all told.

Speaker 2: 3:13

I love the way your conference is Like. I love everyone's in the same room. I love the intimacy. I just like. I like that a lot.

Speaker 1: 3:22

I think it's a different model and it's a different way of serving the membership as well. I mean, yeah, we like to be different, we like to make it a little more intimate. We don't like it to be this big expo convention thing Not to diss what CMA does, but they've got to go at a bigger scale and I've done that in my career as a meeting planner. We've done great, great, big ass airplane hanger, expo floors, but you lose a lot of the humanity that way. You don't really get the one-on-one interactions and most of our events we have more networking events than we have education events as part of our conferences, and that's not just to say we party a lot, that's to say that we give a lot more opportunity for people to network and to facilitate building relationships among the attendees.

Speaker 2: 4:07

And who's to say that's not educational Cause? There I mean to me that networking that's education in itself. Just those conversations you probably talked to people as well. It's like you know they say sometimes like the after parties and like you know, we're just two people just chit chatting, like that just brings it all together. It's those like little moments. So it's nice that you've recognized that and brought that into play to allow people to network, connect, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1: 4:38

I think a lot of our members look to our event to be that touchstone where they can sit down with their guys they haven't seen for a year commiserate you know, we're all dealing with the same issues right To sit down and say, well man, what'd you do about this, how'd you do this? And it's a very intimate sort of exchange of ideas. It's a good model for us and I think it's always been that way with the national club conference.

Speaker 2: 4:59

Yeah, I mean, I was just at PGA show and there was like a thousand vendors.

Speaker 1: 5:03

Oh, it's huge.

Speaker 2: 5:05

I did 22,000 steps. Did you wear a pedometer? Well, my apple walk and my wife we have like a step competition so she's always like how many steps she got. So she went radio silent when she saw me walking around PGA she was watching my stats. My dogs were barking but like that's just a whole different animal. Yeah, even just like. I think the relationship between the vendors and the attendees is yeah, and I think it's why I enjoy the NCA is coming from like the magic background. All the magic conferences like little, like things that I've done. They're all similar, they're all smaller. Everyone's mostly in the same room. You chit, chat, you hang out, you build those relationships, those connections. Yeah, so I'm super stoked for this year. How long have you been with the NCA for?

Speaker 1: 6:02

I've been with them for coming on, I guess eight years now.

Speaker 2: 6:07

Which flew by, I mean flew by.

Speaker 1: 6:09

No, I can't believe.

Speaker 2: 6:11

Let's see no, my first conference was 2018.

Speaker 1: 6:14

So 2018, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 24, seven years, so close You're off by 30%. This is why I'm not an accountant. The math doesn't come easy to me.

Speaker 2: 6:30

No, I was just talking with somebody because we were talking about school and math and I was in. I was in the dumb math but of the great ahead of me. Oh well, there you go. So, I don't know how that worked. Yeah, Like me and my friends were like so you're smart, but not like You're so advanced yeah. But then, but then I. Then I got into the class and I was like no, I think I'm really dumb, Cause I you know you like look around at some of the people. You're like, am I really in this room?

Speaker 1: 7:04

All right, well, okay, so funny story. So my, my degree is in music. You know that. Right, it's in music management, which is basically a business minor and a music major, sort of smashed together. Right, it was back in the day when this there were only four of these degree curriculums in the United States being offered, right. It was like JMU where I went, and like I think Miami, north Texas state and like Berkeley were the only places that offered this degree curriculum a BMM bachelor of music management. So I took a class called math for music majors. I kid you not, it was called math for music majors and it was specifically made for our curriculum and what it was was sort of like numeric problem solving. Like, if you've got a gig in Wichita, right, and you've got a recording session, you know, across the bridge in another city, what route do you take so you don't have to cross the same two bridges at the same time. It's like you know what, though.

Speaker 2: 8:02

I like that.

Speaker 1: 8:03

I mean it. I guess it does build the skills you're going to need in your daily application of your degree curriculum, but it was pretty dumb down. I mean. You know, it's not like we're going to be doing any kind of advanced math, we're not going to be sending anybody to the moon, essentially, but I can get to my gig on time and not retrace my steps you know.

Speaker 2: 8:23

But if the gig is on the moon, you're in luck.

Speaker 1: 8:26

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 8:29

I cannot wait for National Club Association 2025. To the moon, on the moon, on the moon. So was is the NCA your first like dip into the club world, or were you doing stuff with it before? How'd you end up at NCA?

Speaker 1: 8:51

Oh, did I end up at NCA? Okay, so let's go back to the beginning. That's a very good place to start. So my degrees in. I'm assuming this is the meat of the show now, right, oh it's, you know.

Speaker 2: 9:06

Yeah, it was a little bit earlier, but yeah.

Speaker 1: 9:09

So my degrees in music management, I entered the nonprofit world. That was my first. My first jobs were doing music production and presentation as a nonprofit organization. So I worked with a lot of the major presenters here in the Washington DC area. I started with the Washington Performing Arts Society with Patrick Hayes if that means any of the Helen Hayes awards and those guys way back in the day back when we were analog, before computers, before cell phones, back then, Eight tracks, Eight tracks and we were. We were presenting performances at places like the National Cathedral and the Kennedy Center for the performing arts and that type of stuff, and then I left. I was writing musicology content, I was writing program notes for the performances that we were presenting, which is hilarious because the entire time I was in college I never turned in a term paper. I never turned in a composition that wasn't, you know, music composition. You know notes notes on a notes on a staff kind of thing. So it's hilarious that my first job was actually writing musicology, you know, ethnomusicology, research papers on major symphonies performed by you know major symphonic organizations around the country. So I was submitting all this stuff to Stagebill Magazine, which was then the program magazine at the Kennedy Center, and they called me up one day and they said, hey, listen, if you can write this stuff, can you edit it? I'm like sure, how hard can it be, right? So they hired me as an assistant editor there and I was then crunching copy for all the performances that came to the Kennedy Center and and my boss burnt out very quickly and within six months I was the editor and I was running Stagebill Magazine not only for the Kennedy Center but we also did the National Theater and we did a lot of the presidential inaugurations right. So did that for a while. And then I got a call from Wolf Trap and a woman that I had worked with back at the Washington Performing Arts Society, a development officer there, said hey, you can write, you can edit, you think you can write grants because we need a grant writer over here at Wolf Trap. So I said, sure, I can do that. So I joined them and started writing their grants, you know, to the National Endowments for the Arts and for the Virginia Commission for the Arts and all this kind of stuff, and that was a great experience. It really was. Wolf Trap was a ton of fun. So where the Kennedy Center is the National Monument for the Performing Arts, wolf Trap is the National Park for the Performing Arts and it's a. It's a synergy between the National Park Service and a private foundation, the Wolf Trap Foundation, and Phyline Schaus was one of the founders, also a contemporary of Patrick Hayes. This is the old guard of arts presenters, you know, in DC, and it was a great place to work. I worked there and I got a call from Blue's Alley. They were looking for an executive director. I'm a jazz musician, if we hadn't mentioned that before. I went over to Blue's Alley and it was just like hopping rocks from one organization to another organization very early in my career, based on my skill set, which was communication, writing, production, understanding all that stuff that has to go into the background, and then communicating that to people who are potential funders, I was sort of the silver bullet in the development phase. A lot of organizations go through this. I'm sure clubs go through it too. When it comes down to membership and marketing people. Okay, we've sealed the deal on the grants, now we need someone to do grassroots fundraising. Okay, now we got the grassroots down. Now we need major donors to be kind of built up, and I sort of moved around a lot of organizations doing that kind of thing and then I got out of the arts. I went to the dark side, as I like to say.

Speaker 2: 12:39

I got out of the dark side Corporate America.

Speaker 1: 12:42

No, not even no for-profit arts. So I was selling entertainment. I came on with a group called Jandavis Entertainment and I was selling corporate entertainment to clubs and corporations, that kind of stuff Not art per se, but a commodity of entertainment music, magicians, national accents, like that and that was great. It was good, it paid the bills. I'd recently gotten married, I was raising kids, you know, had to do all that good stuff, but I didn't really feel good about it. I mean, I wasn't really doing art anymore. I was really just kind of filling a bill for background music and a corporate reception or something like that, you know. And while I was finding work for artists which I do champion that I do want I always champion live music and live entertainment, especially in these days of a lot of recorded, a lot of access to streaming services, things like that you could replace actual musicians doing, you know, practicing their craft. I was always finding work for people. That always makes me feel good and I still, to this day, have an entertainment agency, partly because it's like the mob, you know, once you're in you can't get out, you know.

Speaker 2: 13:49

People still call you. You're still doing that thing, you're still helping people. You still got that stuff Exactly.

Speaker 1: 13:55

I know you're out of the business, but my daughter's getting married and yeah, yeah, okay, I hope you have. So I still have a shingle good management group and I do national acts and I do award ceremonies and you know that kind of stuff. On the side it's kind of few and far between and it's sort of like pizza and beer money. It's not really like a living, but you can't get away from it, you just can't. And it's good to get your feedback in it every now and again. And you know, do something. So that's always fun and I still perform, of course. I mean, you know, in the evenings, pit orchestras, corporate gigs, don't do clubs much anymore because clubs are a young man's game and I don't want to be staying out till four and five in the morning. Come on smelling like you know, stale beer and cigarettes for 50 bucks, you know, or?

Speaker 2: 14:40

whatever, when you say club gigs, you don't mean country club, you mean like, like, like, like the old school clubs, like the night clubs, the night club gigs, yeah.

Speaker 1: 14:52

Now my son has just gotten into that game. He's now a bouncer at a couple of clubs downtown in DC now. So he's a big, big guy in the black Jacket. You know the earpiece, yeah.

Speaker 2: 15:09

Yeah, nothing says you made it like you got in your piece, I reckon. Look at us, I actually, so I love weird stuff, and so for sometimes I like to see what I can just get away with also, so I bought fake earpieces. So it looks like, so it goes like, it's like a piece.

Speaker 1: 15:30

It goes.

Speaker 2: 15:30

But it just ends like it just there's no, it doesn't go anywhere, just goes like the back of your shirt but it clips in and it's amazing you have like a clipboard and in like an earpiece and you look like you're supposed to be there. You can get in almost anywhere. Yeah, not that I have.

Speaker 1: 15:50

Can you please elaborate on that? What parties have you get crashed?

Speaker 2: 15:55

PGA show Kidding. So now 2017, what's going on? So now we're going to get into 2018. How did NCA come along?

Speaker 1: 16:08

Well, okay, so I then got out of. Well, I got into trouble first, so I produced, I founded my own organization called the Virginia Jazz Service Organization and we would help artists within the Commonwealth of Virginia to kind of get their game together and move them to the next level. So we'd help them not only with their marketing kit and their you know how to present themselves and how to manage their business, but we would also write grants for them and, you know, give them the opportunity to create something they might not otherwise be able to do because they're slogging around on the daily grind, you know, doing gigs wherever, and as part of that, I presented a series of jazz festivals at the University of Virginia with WTJU, which is the jazz station down there, and they were the first one was very successful called a Jazz in Virginia, and we brought in national artists to give workshops during the day and then concerts during the evenings, and artists would come in from all over the country to see something. Well, I did one. There was a John Coltrane retrospective and we had Ravi come in and we had, you know, family members and people that he played with in the past and it we had a weather condition that weekend and it just killed my attendance and I took a beating and I had my own personal funds in it and I lost. I lost everything. So let's just say that. So it was like, well, okay, gotta, gotta pay off this debt now. So I took a gig in Galveston, Texas, with the Galveston Island Outdoor Musicals as a development officer again again going back to the skill set that I used before and got out of debt. Right, it was a good paying gig. It was a long way from home, but you know it worked out. And then I came back here and took a job with and then I got out of debt and I came back here and took a job with and this is the joke I went from the music business to the bankruptcy business. It's a natural segue. Every artist goes through it. But I took a job with the American Bankruptcy Institute and that is it's basically the National Association for the bankruptcy industry, for the insolvency professionals, and I did all their meeting planning and I did all the work, because I never really considered it, but it's exactly the same skill set. From doing concert production and promotion, You're dealing with contracts, ticket sales, marketing, logistics, F&B, right, it's all the same skill set and now I can just apply it to doing it with better hours and less temperamental personalities, right. So I was with ABI for, like God, I was with them 16 years doing nonprofit management and events, production, promotion and that kind of stuff, and at the same time I was learning a lot about continuing legal education, because they also have accreditation programs, same as we do in our industry. And it was just, it was a good gig. I left there, came to National Club Association.

Speaker 2: 18:54

Gotcha.

Speaker 1: 18:55

So, and here I'm the director of events and I think they hired me because they anticipated doing more and more events, more small events, as well as the National Club kind of thing, as well as the National Club Conference and some of the larger gigs that we do every year. They were talking about doing more BLI type stuff, right, where they're doing just a small 28 people learning here and here and there, and then never kind of came to fruition. But this was back. Henry Wolmeyer was the executive director at the time, or the president CEO, and, um, we started to find out. Well, we had some staff changes. I can pick that up, you know, I have, I have that skill from being an executive director in my world. I can pick that up and suddenly my you know, my job title started to expand a little bit. So now I'm director of events and Technology. Okay, because I mean we know, right, we know how to handle the tech, we know how to handle AV, we know how to handle phone systems, databases, you know that kind of stuff. And then that got even a little bit more like oh well, if I started doing the webcasts, I started doing a lot more outreach, member engagement, you know, direct distance education type stuff. So now I'm the director of events and technology. Oh, and member engagement too, which is sort of a nebulous thing, but it means that basically I'm Sort of out there banging away helping the industry communicate with one another, making sure that they're involved in our organization, making sure that we're giving them the services that they're looking for, and sort of act as a as an intermediary to all of our staff Communications and marketing and kind of kind of doing all that kind of stuff, cheerleading, as it were.

Speaker 2: 20:35

So I wasn't gonna cheerleading, I like it.

Speaker 1: 20:37

It's a long story, long story long, like you say, but it's basically taking the skill sets that we've developed over the years and then applying them to a different market. It's really not it's really not rocket science. And it's really rewarding because it's doing the things that I love to do engaging with people, communicating, you know, putting on good shows, eating good food. You know, hey, how can you go wrong? And for NCA, it's it's, it's great fun because I'm doing it with people who understand the whole process. You know, gm's. They're doing the same thing at their club every day, right? So I know one. The quality standard has to be here no beans and weenies, right? I Mean that's kind of easy. When someone comes, you say what's your budget for this? Well, regardless of what my budget is, I have to put an event that's going to resonate with the members and or show them something that they can then use at their club, and that's the really cool thing. Like for, for instance and I know I'm scattered, I'm all over the place but at this year's conference, we're doing an event on Tuesday afternoon with Middleby Innovation kitchens, which is gonna be awesome. It's going to be awesome. I went there in December and I did a little advanced work for the conference, did some site visits and went over to Middleby and saw it and it is huge. It's like Disney World, it's like a playground for food and beverage. It's amazing the innovations, the stuff they're doing, the robotics, the new technologies and service things and oh, it's the coolest and we get to spend two and a half three hours over there with them showing us all the cool stuff.

Speaker 2: 22:07

It's great mixing, mingling, learning.

Speaker 1: 22:09

Oh yeah it. I mean I'm really looking forward to that, that part of the event. And we started out selling it as An optional event and we sat down with the folks at Middleby and with Bolter the pair, the Citroën company, and they said, well, listen, you know, we'll just underwrite it, so you don't have to charge, you don't have to worry about transportation, we'll get everybody here right. So so we were able to open up to the whole membership as actually part of the event. And then we got we got a couple of the chefs to do a couple of workshops, so now it's eligible for education credit as well. So it's just an off-site education event now, but it's, it's really cool and I have to tell you, my wife's a chef and they have some cool stuff. They have all the toys. They have all the toys.

Speaker 2: 22:57

Is your wife gonna unexpectedly make a trip down to the show? I didn't know you guys are gonna be here, oh surprise.

Speaker 1: 23:05

Uh well, no, you know she. Usually she used to come with me on gigs, but it's tough because as the lead planner I really don't have any time. I mean, I hit the ground running and I spent very little time in my room at all except to soak my feet and sleep.

Speaker 2: 23:24

I think my time is coming up. Next April, april, april, april in Texas. Last year was in Chicago. That's great, what you know. If no one's been to a NCA conference, what can they expect this year, or if they're just learning about it a little bit more, you know. So let you know, maybe let's let's say what's gonna go on this year and maybe what separates the NCA from other different conferences as well.

Speaker 1: 23:51

Yeah, sure. So I think Maybe the the most notable thing is that it's it's a little bit smaller than a CMA conference. It's a little bit bigger than a BLI, right so so it is really a gathering of GMs and their boards of directors, so the volunteer leadership at all the clubs. It's built for them. It's not built for, you know, the GM and his staff below them. It's really more a meeting of the minds, of the leaders, where they can hone their skills, learn from other representatives in not just the club community but private industry as well, on management techniques and self care and, you know, sort of that C suite sort of to C suite presentations, and I think that's that's kind of what sets it apart. It's an intimate gathering, usually 250, 275 people were looking for 300 this year in Frisco because a little bit larger facility we can accommodate more. But it's really two full days of education and networking with the people who do exactly what you do, but all over the country. So we bring them all together. We also have a track that we offer through. It's a cooperative agreement between our day of programming and GGA partners. They lead a private club governance symposium and it's built just for your board leadership. So no GMs allowed, just the volunteer leadership. Your board Treasurer, vp, come in and talk about what's going on at your club management issues how do I handle this, what's the best way to address this committee issue, that type of thing and you get direct feedback from Henry Delozier at GGA Partners and his staff. The cool thing about that is that our first day of programming is really all about governance. There's not so much, there's not some bold stuff that we'll get in later in the conference, but your board president can come, have a full half-day of programming, go play golf in the afternoon, come back that evening for the awards dinner that night the ECM Awards, excellence in Club Management Awards which is a touchstone part of our conference, also on Monday. So let me just go over the schedule, if I could. So imagine you're flying, yeah, so you're going to fly in on Sunday. The first event that we have is this is a new event this year it's our new members reception and basically what this is is. It gives new clubs, people who've just joined the National Club Association, the opportunity to get their feet on the ground, meet our board of directors, meet our corporate sponsors, meet some of the speakers and start to build networking so they know someone through the conference, so they're not sitting in a corner going I don't know anybody here. Let's do so. We're going to hook you up with a board member who will then mentor you through what goes on at a conference. So that'll be the new members reception. That's going to be at the PGA Headquarters Coaching Center, which is a ridiculously cool state of the art facility. It really is amazing and they're opening it up for us and we're going to have the initial reception there. Then the next thing we're doing is our chairs reception and dinner, and we do this every year, but in the past it's had a limited attendance. We've only we've limited it to about 110 people. This year we are opening it up to all attendees at the conference. So it will be the opening event for everyone who comes to the conference and that'll be there at the Omni PGA Frisco, the hotel there opposite PGA headquarters, and we're going to do it now. So nice, yeah, it's a beautiful facility, it really is, but it'll be an outdoor reception and then we're going to immediately follow that with a night golf outing on something they have there called the swing, which is like a par three course, you know. So just kind of getting the swing thing, you know, sort of start the conference off right. So that's, that's the first Sunday. So tons of fun the first Sunday, just networking, meeting with folks, you know, trying your hand at night golf if you've never played it before, because I know a lot of guys don't have the opportunity to go out at night and do that and then Monday morning we really hit it. It's business the next day. So we start off at 7 am with our breakfast and exhibitor showcase where all of our vendors who are going to be there, and everyone knows these guys, but it's an opportunity to really get down and sit with these guys and spend some time with them, build relationships, problem solve, see new solutions to things that are going on at your club and kind of kind of work that off. So we'll have an hour of that exhibitor showcase along with breakfast, and then we'll start the conference proper. We'll have sessions in the morning. I'm not going to go every through every single session with you, but basically we have sessions in the morning. You can see all these on our website. That's national club, I'm sorry, national club conference.

Speaker 2: 28:14

National cluborg. Yeah, it's national, it's national, it's the cluborg.

Speaker 1: 28:17

I know that, but the conference microsite is yeah, thanks for reminding me where I work. Yeah, no, the conference site is clubconferenceorg, and I'll throw that out a little bit later too.

Speaker 2: 28:31

But you can see, and any better. I just emceed a giant conference for this company and 500 of their top sales people and as I was bringing out the CEO, I blanked on his last name. Ladies and gentlemen, give it up for your president, seth, and he comes out. He's like you forgot to do it. I was like it blank, it was.

Speaker 1: 28:59

Yeah, yeah, no, I've been there. I got the mic about to play something like what tune is this? Ah yeah.

Speaker 2: 29:09

But no, the conference is going to be good. In night golf it's not glowing the dark off.

Speaker 1: 29:14

It's actual night golf. It's like lit up and yeah yeah, the courses there are gorgeous, they really are so okay. So the next morning we'll do Morning of sessions. There'll be that club governance symposium which is a breakout for your board leadership, and then that will run concurrent with the rest of the sessions. That morning we all kind of take a break. For lunch there's a golf outing that afternoon is going to be at Glen Eagles Country Club and they've just done a. It's on the Queen's course there, beautiful facility if we've not played it, and they've just undergone like a 70 million dollar renovation or something. So it's. I mean, it's going to be in top condition. When we get there It'll be beautiful. And then We'll have Some optional events. That afternoon We'll go see the PGA headquarters, that kind of thing. We'll have our annual club pack reception that afternoon. If you're donor to club pack you'll get an invitation to that's my invitation only. And then that evening, which is now our touchstone event, on Monday evening We'll have the excellence in club management awards with McMahon group and KKW and that will be like a 630 cocktail reception and then a 715 awards ceremony and then an eight o'clock sit down dinner. And it's a. It's always a. It's a lovely event. It really is. We've done it for the last two years now and it's really been. It's been great because it's it's the opportunity for us to Really pay homage to the cream of the crop, of the GM's out there who are really doing innovative things, their clubs and serving their their constituencies above and beyond, you know, everyone else. And they then get to put a little ECM after their CCM CC designation less part of their name. So they we sort of induct them into a Rarified group of of exceptional GM's. And and that's always a pleasure to do that McMahon does most of the heavy lifting in terms of nomination process and review and and all that kind of stuff. We just throw the party for him. No, that's not.

Speaker 2: 31:05

It's a great party, though. It's a fantastic party.

Speaker 1: 31:08

Yes, it is. We've had the very good fortune the last couple years to have some really interesting venues to present the party in. In Charleston we had an arctecho theater which I mean it was there. It was on site. How cool was that, and I don't know if were you there at that one.

Speaker 2: 31:24

No, I was there last year when it was at Hogwarts.

Speaker 1: 31:27

Yeah, that's right. At the Chicago Club, yeah, no, the year before it was really, it was really hip. There was this 1920s arctecho theater and it was a regular proscenium stage with a raked floor, velvet chairs, you know, very 1920s feel very opulent. And we were sitting in that and we had a scrim pulled behind the stage, unbeknownst to people in the audience. The ballroom was not divided by a physical wall, it was just that scrim At the back of the stage. So at the end of the awards ceremony we parted the curtains and there's your ballroom, all laid out with, oh, with the floral and the, you know, service staff waiting to attend folks, and it was just, it was like Cool right. Yeah, and then last year was at Hogwarts? No, it was it.

Speaker 2: 32:14

It was at Chicago athletic club right.

Speaker 1: 32:17

Not the athletic club. The. No, oh no, I've got Denny disease. Now I've blacked out listen, listen you nearly club of Chicago.

Speaker 2: 32:32

No, that's where it was at.

Speaker 1: 32:33

Oh no, we were at Union League for the, for the host, and then we were over at the University Club of Chicago.

Speaker 2: 32:40

University Club of Chicago.

Speaker 1: 32:42

So last year's program was at the University Club of Chicago, which has an amazing room in the back for the members. This is, as you said, hogwarts sort of looking places so nice, 3040 foot ceilings, all stonework and and stained glass just beautiful really was. It was really a night to remember. It was, it was beautiful, and the service there is great. I mean their chef Does great work. It's so much fun to work with these guys who are inspired to do this for the club community. So this year we're gonna keep it on site. We looked at a couple different places. I tried to get it over at Dallas Stadium but they weren't available. They're right in the middle of the draft. At the time the facility wasn't open to us, but we'll be doing it there on site. So no transportation. You just roll out of your room and down to the event and come back upstairs, but it'll be in a separate space called that panther pavilion which overlooks their golf courses. Lovely It'll be. It'll be a lovely event, really well. And then, of course, we get to present the awards and then the next day we have the award winners come into a panel to talk about the things that they're doing at their club. Talk about what's trending, what's hot right now in the industry and what they're seeing from their own personal perspective. So that's the close of Monday. Send everybody home happy, well libated, having seen a great show. And then Tuesday morning we do it again, right? So we start up at 7 breakfast exhibitor showcase and then again a whole day of education, and then the afternoon will all bust over to Middle B innovation kitchens for their Amazing presentation on the technology of F&B moving forward. And then we'll come back to the resort and have a big Texas barbecue that night to kind of close out.

Speaker 2: 34:20

And then we'll have a putting turn. It's gonna be so good.

Speaker 1: 34:22

Yeah, it's, it's. I mean, Given the virtue of where we are and the facility around us and just the fact that we're PG headquarters, I think the conference may have a little bit of a golf theme although we're not saying it's a golf theme, but there will be some golf opportunities for sure, but it's. If you've not been to the Omni, it's a brand new facility we're delighted to. We actually bought it on spec before they even finished building it, because we knew it was just gonna be over the top and it is gorgeous. I was just there in December. They'd been open about three or four months and, yeah, it's pretty over the top. It's a lovely facility. It really is.

Speaker 2: 34:58

I'm excited to be going.

Speaker 1: 35:01

We're excited to have you.

Speaker 2: 35:05

Well, sir, I appreciate you and your time. Thanks for getting us up to speed about more about you, your background, because it's a lot of work putting on all of these Conferences and events and you do a lot, so I also want to bring you on to show Let people get a little bit of peek behind the curtain of who More about the NCAA and who is John Seagood? What's what's the C stands for?

Speaker 1: 35:30

Clifton, it's family name. I'm the seventh Clifton in line Seventh. My son is Clifton Scott. He's number eight.

Speaker 2: 35:38

Yeah, hey, I'm just happy you guys aren't like you don't put like all the numerals and stuff. I think. End of the name my dad's a junior.

Speaker 1: 35:47

But he didn't want to name me Edgar Clifton. Like he is, he goes by bud. By the way, edgar Clifton, I think I'd get beat up a lot as a kid of my name were Edgar Clifton. Good, so. I do for sorry, dad, if you're watching this.

Speaker 2: 36:02

If he makes it this far, he deserves a prize.

Speaker 1: 36:07

Well, here let me do just a little more plug, if I could, just for a singer on the end here. Right now we're currently in the early bird registration rate, which means for NCAA club members, your investment is $1,775. If you're a non-member and you're watching this, it's $2,275, but if you join we'll get you in at the lower rate. You can bring your board member or your assistant general manager for the static rate of $1,250. So there's your little bump for bringing your board with us. It's a big bump, it is, it is. And that rate we wanted to have low because we really want the board leadership to come and kind of see how the industry works. Everyone's so isolated at their own club. They only see what's going on in their boardroom and they only see what's going on with their GM and their staff. And I think sometimes it's good to introduce them to other places to see what can they do a little bit better perhaps. What can they? Where are they leading that other people can learn from them? So I think that that's kind of a cool thing. So right now we're in the early bird registration rate. That'll run through March 7th and I would encourage you to register as soon as you can Get your seat, get your room at the Omni, and the website to register again is nationalclubconferenceorg. Nationalclubconferenceorg. Just click on the register now button and you can get all signed up. And, of course, if anybody has any questions about the conference, you know how to, how to. If they need help registering, or if they have any questions about the schedule or anything, then by all means give me a call. My number is 202. I'm going to put it out there 202-684-8749. Or you can email me at good at nationalcluborg. That's good at nationalcluborg, 202-684-8749. Happy to help. That's what I'm here for.

Speaker 2: 38:01

For a good time, baby Good, at nationalcluborg. There you go.

Speaker 1: 38:07

Denny, thanks so much for having me on the show today. I watch it all the time. It's interesting to be in this seat and to be the interviewee as opposed to what I do with NCA, doing all the webcasts as the host. You know which is your job now. So it's interesting to be able to sit here and kind of poke the host. This is fun.

Speaker 2: 38:24

Oh, it takes a lot to poke me. It's a point. It takes a lot. I mean, you see what I look like with this hair and personality and what I do for a living. So it's really it's, it's, it's, it's hard, it's hard. But, mr Good, it has been fantastic. Thank you, sir.

Speaker 1: 38:41

Thanks, denny. Have a good day, everybody, Thanks.

Speaker 2: 38:44

I hope you all enjoy that episode. I know I did. I think there's still time. I think there's still available early bird specials. Early bird specials what am I talking about? Early bird registration rates for the NCA conference coming up in a few months. If you haven't done so already, please rate the show, share it with somebody else. Your support means the absolute world and does not go unappreciated. So without your support we wouldn't be here. So if you haven't signed up for our newsletter yet, head on over to privateclubradiocom. It is straight on top. Pop in your email. We don't spam you. We just send out an email because we put out a bunch of content. We just wrap it all up and put it in there so you can pick and choose what you would like to listen to if you don't get your alerts already on your favorite podcasting platform. But that's this episode. Until next time. I'm your host, denny Corby. Catch ya'll on the flippity flip.