Summer Camp Roundtable for Coaches and Parents with Ben, Seth, and Kenyon

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Welcome to the Atlanta Tennis Podcast.

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Every episode is titled, It Starts With Tennis and Goes From There.

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We talk with coaches, club managers, industry business professionals,

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technology experts, and anyone else we find interesting.

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We want to have a conversation as long as it starts with tennis.

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Hey, hey, this is Shaun with the Atlanta Tennis Podcast,

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In this episode, we talked to three certified tennis coaches running summer camps in Metro Atlanta.

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Some have more sports than just tennis, which has a larger appeal,

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and one points out his secret summer camp weapon, which may or may not be a giant water slide.

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We break down the dos and don'ts of offering summer tennis camps,

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share some insider secrets for those already offering,

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or considering to offer summer camps next year.

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And of course, some advice for parents shopping summer camps for your kids.

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Have a listen and let us know what you think.

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Thanks guys for being here.

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I really appreciate it, and we will jump right in because today

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we have the brainchild of Ben Hestley, which I think in the Atlanta area,

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if you've ever heard that name, there have been a few things that we can consider as the brainchild of Ben Hestley.

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But in this case, it is what we're calling the summer camp tennis roundtable,

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or the tennis summer camp roundtable.

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We're going to put all those words in some order that's going to make sense, but our roundtable.

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So we've got Ben Hestley with Bullshark Sports.

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We've got Seth at Laurel Springs and Kenyan with UTA.

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And we're going to talk about their experiences this past summer.

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We're going to try to give some advice.

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We're going to try to give some ideas as to what's happened.

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I really need to know what a couple of these games are that Ben's going to talk about.

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So I'm going to start with him because he's got something called Kiffelball.

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And I thought it was a typo, but I'm going to check this out.

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So as always, my name is Sean with Go Tennis and the Atlanta tennis podcast.

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And Ben Hestley is with Bullshark Sports.

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You're a strong proponent of multi-sport summer camps.

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We're all tennis guys, but the multi-sport summer camp, I think, is having a great run.

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And it's got a bigger appeal.

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And at some point, you've got to tell me what Kiffelball is and capture the ball.

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You said that's a-- that might be a game we all already know.

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You just got a unique name for it, but I got to know what that is.

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But assuming there's space at the camp location for multiple sports,

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you mentioned the balance-- well, I want to ask about the balance.

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You mentioned not being babysitting, but also being flexible.

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You got to understand the kids and understand what they want and need.

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What I want from you is, can you talk about balancing that, whether it's not babysitting,

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but also the flexibility, not being so flexible that you end up babysitting?

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All right.

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Yeah, I think, you know, when you have a summer camp, the people come for different reasons.

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Right?

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Especially in my camp, I run a tennis and sports camp.

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I've been lucky at Brocklipp Woods Beach Club to have a--

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we have a huge field in the back of our facility.

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So that lends itself easily to have soccer, wiffleball, baseball.

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I'll talk about capture the ball a little bit.

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We could do a whole camp on capture the ball.

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We play ultimate-- ultimate with Frisbee has been coming a really, really popular sport in recent years.

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And so we do that as part of our camp.

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And so the field lends itself for a couple things.

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One, it gives us more flexibility to have more sports than just playing kickball.

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All on a tennis court, which I do at some facilities that don't have a field in the back.

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You just have courts.

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So we have that flexibility that also allows us to utilize the club while other members are

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using the club.

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You know, I always talk to my kids a lot.

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And they learn this in our camps is that the-- about their awareness and being aware of their

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surroundings and other people's surroundings.

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And you know, tennis is one of those weird sports where you often come on a court with

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a group of kids and you may be playing right next to a group of ladies playing out the match.

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And how are you going to keep your kids controlled and corralled and focused and not acting crazy

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while they're trying to focus on their match?

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You know, if you go to a soccer game, they're all playing soccer.

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Like everybody's playing soccer.

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It's all kids are running scream.

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And nobody cares if they're running and screaming because you don't have four adults over

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here trying to play a tennis match.

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And tennis, you have that.

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So we have to naturally teach these kids how to be respectful and be responsible for

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their surroundings.

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And with the field, the field just gives us a chance to do something else other than tennis.

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And so it gives them a more sports experience, but also gives the club members a chance to

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utilize their facility.

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I don't feel like they're getting interrupted by the summer camps.

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It's a really nice balance, a really good relationship that we built with the beach club.

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But as far as not being a babysitting camp and back to like everybody does come to camp

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for a different reason.

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And you come because you're a really good tennis player and you want to continue to play tennis.

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Maybe you want to come because you really like sports.

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And I find with sports camps, you either come for one or two reasons.

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You either love sports, so you want to do more sports.

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Or you don't like sports.

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And so mom puts you in camp, so hopefully you'll hit some kind of bug and you'll love sports,

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right?

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So you got two into the spectrum.

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I got this super athletic kid who loves playing sports.

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And I got this other kid who would rather be playing video games than sitting in the air conditioning.

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Okay.

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So how do we bridge those two?

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And I think how to not be in a babysit camp is all comes down to your character and your

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culture that you teach.

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And so from right from the day one, one of the biggest things that we do, number one, we

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have a character word every day and we try to live by that character word.

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Monday, all the kids know I've accounted my camps.

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Monday is responsibility.

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And we talk about being responsible for your water bottle.

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At my camps, there's no lunch.

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You have to bring your own lunch.

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So you have to bring your own water.

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I do have water, like a big water cooler that you can refill during the day, but you know,

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you bring your own water bottle.

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So your own water bottle, your own lunch, your racket, your stuff, your sunscreen, you have

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to put on your, we don't put something for liability reasons.

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I don't put sunscreen on children, but they need to be responsible to learn how to put,

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learn how to put something.

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I mean, I have kids who have to teach how to put sunscreen on, you know, because they've

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never done themselves.

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And so teaching them that character piece and in the in culture, walking them in, you

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know, carry your own bag.

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You know, I mean, the tongue and cheek thing, I always say on my own son, who's 11 is I

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say, you know, I'm your daddy, not your caddy, you know, so you carry your own bag, carry

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your own stuff, bring it into the facility, put it where it's supposed to be.

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And so we kind of set the tone right away every day that, you know, helping the kids have

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some sort of self reliance to do things.

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And I think whether they're there because they need to play sports or they're there because

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they love sports, everybody can get around the fact that they're there to play sports.

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That would be better people.

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And I think all of us as tennis coaches, if we talk more probably about, you know, whether

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we look back at our best coaches, we've ever had our favorite coaches, we think more about

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how they influence us as people more than they did teaching us forehand's back ends.

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Yeah, that makes me think of Dave Matthews and think Kenyan brought that up earlier and

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Dave Matthews was for me that coach that really affected me as a person.

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And we had those conversations when I was younger.

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Are you seeing the same experience at Laurel Springs where the kids are wanting to be there,

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but sometimes you got one that's coordinated, one that's not, and the multi sport camp helps

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you set?

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Absolutely.

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I mean, as an H.O.A. facility, we pull from the neighborhood, we want to get as many kids

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as we can locally.

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And we also, you know, we invite non-residents and we tell them, bring your friends and

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all that, but it does come down to having the space.

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And I think as an H.O.A. facility, we also have a playground in a basketball court and

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a soccer field and, you know, we have those facilities to use.

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So it does come in really handy.

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So for the part of the pitch for us was that we were going to be able to use the clubhouse.

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We were going to be able to use the basketball court and all that stuff.

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So it was, and pickleball as well.

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I mean, so those facilities existed when we didn't want them to just sit there all summer

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long.

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Oh man, we're five minutes in.

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We've already said the word pickleball.

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Kenyan, what's your experience?

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As far as the summer came for us, it's been different at times because we have so many different

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facilities and the different facilities give us different access to different things.

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But for us at Blackburn is our number one place.

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And it's because on Fridays, we have two water slides.

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So we have two huge water slides that literally these kids go bananas over every single Friday.

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We also rent a Kona Ice Machine every single Friday.

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So those are the days that are just just bananas.

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But each facility offers a different thing.

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And in that case, you could bring in the water slide.

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I think Ben just took a note.

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He's like, water slide next year.

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We have a double our participation.

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We have donut Friday, but I think I just got the upgrade now.

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Yeah, the upgrade by the Kona Ice.

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I think I can be able to transition from water balloons and popsicles to water slides.

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We can all upgrade.

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Exactly.

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All right, Ben, Kiffelball, what is this?

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Yeah, so this kind of circle is back actually to the balancing the kid that may not want

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to be there versus the kid that really, really wants to be there.

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And then all the kids in between.

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So every week at our camp on Friday or whatever the last day is, we do what we call camp connections.

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And it's just a reflection piece.

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We get all the kids together, whether they're six years old or 12 years old.

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And we talk.

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We talk about, and how the process works is.

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I'll bring sticky notes and the kids have to write one word or short phrase of something they

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either really enjoyed about camp or something that they learned.

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And usually they write down all the games we play, like their favorite game, champs of

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the court or up the river down the river or roll the dice or card shark or kickball or

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Kiffelball, capture the ball, whatever.

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Sometimes they'll write the character piece, sometimes they'll write meeting new friends,

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sometimes they'll have having lunch with Billy.

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That was my favorite part of the week.

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So what we talk about, they put on a sticky note, we stick them on a board, and then we talk

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about the things they enjoyed about camp and what they really get out of it.

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And then we talk about why they like that.

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And every single week, when we talk about why they like Kiffelball and why they like capture

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the ball is the inclusivity of those games.

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Tennis, unfortunately, is exclusive in a lot of ways, right?

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It very, very, very much is level based.

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You know, we have modified balls, modified equipment, but it's level based, right?

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I mean, the red ball kids are not playing the same games.

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The orange ball kids are the yellow ball kids, right?

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The yellow kids, sorry, the younger kids have to play on a smaller court.

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They should be playing on a smaller court.

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I'm not arguing that, but they play on a smaller space and they're like, "Hey, these bigger

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kids get more space, they get bigger space."

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So it's not fair in a lot of ways and it can be quite exclusive, unfortunately.

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But games like capture the ball, Kiffelball, everyone plays.

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And they're inclusive.

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And so that's what the kids like about it.

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So a six year old can be on the same team as a 12 year old.

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A kid who all he likes to do is play Fortnite and sit in the air conditioning all day is now

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playing a Kiffelball on the same team as a kid who plays travel baseball.

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Okay.

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At some point, you're going to describe to me what the play is because now you have to know.

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So Kiffelball is very simple.

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So Kiffelball is kickball.

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My thing, I don't think my, one of my firm beliefs as a coach and as a human being and as

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a parent is that no kid should go through childhood without knowing how to play kickball.

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I mean, you just, I mean, it is sad today that they don't.

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They do not.

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And I can tell you that part of our camp, we coach kickball.

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Like we coach them how to play kickball.

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You know, how do you coach kickball?

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I'm not giving kickball lessons, by the way, but come to camp and learn about kickball.

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So Kiffelball started because it's willful ball and kickball, right?

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So hitting a baseball is probably the hardest skill athletic skill there is, right?

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And then we do it for several podcasts, the people won't argue that, but hitting a baseball

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is probably super hard.

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It is probably the most difficult, sorry, the most difficult athletic skill there is.

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So imagine if you're seven, you don't like sports, you're only there because mom's

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there.

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You played a little bit of soccer.

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And here you're in front of 25 other kids trying to hit a wiffle ball with a little stick.

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It's not going to go very well.

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So Kiffelball is balances, really what I always say is the baseball kids, softball kids and

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the soccer kids.

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So if you can hit a baseball and you can hit a wiffle ball, you can pick up the bat and swing

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and hit the wiffle ball.

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If you don't want to do that and you want to kick the ball, then I'll roll you a kickball

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and you kick the ball.

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So every person that comes to bat has a choice.

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They can either use the bat and hit a wiffle ball or they can choose to use the kickball.

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And I know I'm always the, or me or one of my staff is one of the all time pitchers.

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And so we rolled in the kickball.

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You can switch during your bat.

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So if you get two strikes on you and you want to, oh man, I might swing and miss the third

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and not get on base, just give me the kickball, I'll roll the kickball.

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And there's a whole strategy that comes behind and the kids start talking about, well you

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can kick the ball farther than you can hit it, but you can hit it farther than you can kick

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it or whatever the case may be.

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So that's Kiffle Ball, pretty simple game.

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They're a tag off of kickball.

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Kickball with a ball.

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Capture the ball in the other hand is the kid's absolute favorites game.

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And it is the most inclusive game that we have.

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Every kid gets into it and these kids can be dog tired, ready to go and I'll say, hey guys,

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we're going to play capture the ball for 20 minutes and they all get jacked up.

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So we play in the field at the beach club, behind the courts.

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And capture the ball is, we've all heard of capture the flag, right?

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Capture the ball is, takes it to a different level.

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All right, and I'll actually credit my son for coming up with this.

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I think Turner actually invented this game or he found somebody who did and he's now taking

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credit for it either way.

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He's the one introduced it to me.

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I roll it out.

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We tried a few times at camp and it was a hit and it's been stable for us ever since.

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So you divide the kids up in a two teams.

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You split the field in half.

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So you have like this midline of cones that go through the split the field in half.

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Each team takes their balls, a kickball.

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Each team takes their ball and puts it at their end of their respective field.

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They're their respective into the field.

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And then you say go and they go at it.

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And so you run across and if you get tagged, you have to go back to your side and some

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versions of capture the flag that make you run all the way back to your flag.

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If you get tagged, I just make them go back across the midline.

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That's way too much running because just feel by the way as like 80 yards.

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It's a pretty big field.

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It's a summer camp.

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In a summer camp, it's hot.

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So they just have to go back across the midline.

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But with the ball versus the flag, you can, once you pick the ball up from your opponent's

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area, you can, you run with it, then you can pass it.

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You can even kick it.

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And so you can, as long as the ball doesn't touch the ground, if the ball touches the ground,

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if the runner falls down, I don't want kids diving on each other.

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So if the runner falls down, the ball's dead.

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It goes back to where it came from.

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If the ball's dropped or hits the ground anytime, it's dead and it goes back and that keeps

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the game flowing.

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So one strategy that the kids came up with this summer, because what happens a lot of time,

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we have a 10-foot radius.

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You have to stay keep to a 10-foot radius around the ball when you're guarding the ball.

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So they would run in and get quickly tagged, right?

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So that happens a lot for several minutes.

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And then what a lot of kids figured out this summer is they would run in.

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And this was very incredible.

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All right.

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I think it's an 8 to 11-year-olds doing this.

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One kid sprints in, pooch kicks the ball up in the air.

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The other kid runs down the field, catches it, and then runs across.

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And that's the way they figured out how to get the ball across the goal.

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Haven't we already invented this game?

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Isn't this called rugby?

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Yeah, isn't it pretty much rugby?

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Yeah, pretty much.

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We can't tackle it.

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It's more like touch rugby.

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Okay, okay.

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But yeah, oh, so when they do get the ball, several of the fly, they just have to run

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across the midline.

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They don't have to go all the way back to their fly.

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Gotcha.

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And that's captured the ball.

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That's a simple gaming concept, but one thing to kids like about it and the coaches like is

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it's inclusive.

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Everyone plays.

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Because some kids are really good at defense.

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And like you will see an 8-year-old actually just hunt down a 12-year-old and tag this kid.

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Where at what other game could they actually, could a 8-year-old actually compete on equal

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level with a 12-year-old?

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You know, it's not many games like this.

Speaker: 00:16:52

So that's where it captured the ball is.

Speaker: 00:16:54

It's captured the flag with the ball and it's simple in concept, but the kids love it.

Speaker: 00:16:59

It's super fun.

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They ask, we almost play it every day because they love it.

Speaker: 00:17:03

It's so much fun.

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And I love that the longest conversation we've had about a specific game during our summer

Speaker: 00:17:08

camp so far has not been a tennis game.

Speaker: 00:17:12

And that's a good thing.

Speaker: 00:17:13

I think that makes a lot of sense because I have tried to come up with different ways

Speaker: 00:17:17

to make tennis summer camps interesting.

Speaker: 00:17:19

And it's hard and it's expensive because tennis coaches are expensive.

Speaker: 00:17:23

But if you go out there and you're playing some kickball style games, even if it's pretty

Speaker: 00:17:26

much just rugby, rugby plus capture the flag, I love it.

Speaker: 00:17:30

And kiffle ball the same thing.

Speaker: 00:17:31

Let's keep it inclusive.

Speaker: 00:17:33

Let's let the kids that aren't the ones that are obviously going to be the most athletic

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or the most coordinated dominate the other kids.

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And then you end up having that older kid mentor the younger kids.

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As a team, they help each other.

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And I think that's good.

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I love that a lot.

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And if we look at that, you said the eight-year-old Ben going after the 12-year-old, we're looking

Speaker: 00:17:58

at summer camps less so in the way of a tennis summer camp that I remember back as a kid

Speaker: 00:18:03

feeling like I was the youngest one when I was 12.

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And everybody else was 16, 17, 18.

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But I think that was more targeted toward the tennis player.

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I was down at Emory or somewhere down there where the colleges run a camp.

Speaker: 00:18:17

Maybe more for elite players.

Speaker: 00:18:19

I want to turn to Seth and ask, you said you trended younger this year.

Speaker: 00:18:24

And I assume that isn't because you were expecting high-level academy players coming to your

Speaker: 00:18:29

summer camp.

Speaker: 00:18:30

You mean younger as eight-year-olds versus 12-year-olds is what I'm guessing.

Speaker: 00:18:37

My question is, do you think you can create, and this is a phrase I'm trying to find out if

Speaker: 00:18:41

it's a real thing, can you generate stronger multi-year camper retention?

Speaker: 00:18:45

Is that a thing?

Speaker: 00:18:47

Can you generate stronger multi-year- camper retention with more sports than just tennis?

Speaker: 00:18:53

As Ben's talking about, you can bring some of these kids in.

Speaker: 00:18:55

Tennis, a high-skill sport, and the beginners are going to struggle to get involved.

Speaker: 00:19:01

You can run up and kick a ball.

Speaker: 00:19:02

You don't have to be a great soccer player to be able to do that.

Speaker: 00:19:05

But you can take these kids with more sports as you've done with your red zone summer sports

Speaker: 00:19:10

camps at Laurel Springs.

Speaker: 00:19:12

Does that also help kids stay interested in tennis longer?

Speaker: 00:19:15

Or even maybe bring that kickball only kid over to tennis?

Speaker: 00:19:19

Well, I mean, I think the multi-sport training for athletes in that age is absolutely essential.

Speaker: 00:19:25

I think that you've got to get Ben said.

Speaker: 00:19:28

If you can't kick a ball, good luck hitting it with a baseball bat or a tennis racket or

Speaker: 00:19:32

anything else.

Speaker: 00:19:33

I mean, the spacing and the coordination need to do that is very important.

Speaker: 00:19:37

For us, because red zone just took over at Laurel Springs in January, we had sort of a very

Speaker: 00:19:42

short run-up to get these summer camps off the ground and even launching into our spring

Speaker: 00:19:47

tennis sessions.

Speaker: 00:19:48

We had sort of low numbers in the first spring session and it built into the second session.

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But by summer, we were promoting a ton just to get players, you know, just to get people

Speaker: 00:19:58

on the rosters.

Speaker: 00:19:59

So I think for a lot of the kids, before red zone took over at Laurel Springs, there

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was a pretty big gap.

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There was almost six months of no programming at all.

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There was some contentious things that happened and sort of the position sat empty for a while.

Speaker: 00:20:14

And so we lost a lot of our high-level players.

Speaker: 00:20:17

And I think, you know, and can you come probably speak to that too, where the UTA model does direct

Speaker: 00:20:23

itself toward tennis.

Speaker: 00:20:24

We have a lot of players at Laurel Springs that are up at James Creek a lot, you know?

Speaker: 00:20:28

But I think that also was for us, we used summer camp as a way to introduce ourselves to a lot

Speaker: 00:20:32

more neighborhood kids.

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And so it wasn't just tennis.

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It was about getting anybody and everybody to come and meet us and meet the coaches and

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see the program, see what we had done to the facility.

Speaker: 00:20:43

We made a lot of changes in the pro shop and on the courts and a lot of what we thought

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were improvements.

Speaker: 00:20:49

And so that was really, it was a way for us to introduce ourselves.

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So I think we pitched it to the beginner crowd and we, you know, no experience necessary

Speaker: 00:20:58

and all of those kinds of things are very inclusive and very welcoming.

Speaker: 00:21:01

And so that's also why I think we chose the multi-sport model.

Speaker: 00:21:04

It brought in a lot more players for us.

Speaker: 00:21:07

So you were starting almost in an under new management banner where Ben was more established.

Speaker: 00:21:12

I think you were in your third or fourth year.

Speaker: 00:21:14

So you've been doing it a little while.

Speaker: 00:21:16

I think UTA has been around for thousands of years at this point.

Speaker: 00:21:20

And did you, Kenyan, see the same thing?

Speaker: 00:21:25

But well, now that I say that, you wouldn't have seen the same thing.

Speaker: 00:21:28

Having been around for thousands of years, you wouldn't see the new management, all right,

Speaker: 00:21:33

come try us out.

Speaker: 00:21:34

You guys are a little more tried and true.

Speaker: 00:21:37

What do you see when something like Laurel Springs has that vacuum there?

Speaker: 00:21:41

Do you see the higher level kids come to you?

Speaker: 00:21:44

I would think so as an academy and being able to offer that.

Speaker: 00:21:48

Do you also see the younger beginners coming in as well?

Speaker: 00:21:51

Let me attack it from this point of view.

Speaker: 00:21:53

So we've been around for a little over 25 years now.

Speaker: 00:21:56

But we owned a club for a long time.

Speaker: 00:21:58

So anything that we've pushed on has been new.

Speaker: 00:22:03

So we've had to kind of reinvent ourselves as well.

Speaker: 00:22:07

So anytime that we've gone to Horseshoe Bend or something like that, Horseshoe Bend has been

Speaker: 00:22:11

a lot easier to do a sports camp because there's golf there, there's a pool there, and there's

Speaker: 00:22:16

tennis courts there.

Speaker: 00:22:17

So we reinvented ourselves in a situation like that where that's not something that was our

Speaker: 00:22:21

model before.

Speaker: 00:22:23

We've done the neighborhood thing as well where there's just four tennis courts and that's

Speaker: 00:22:27

all we had access to.

Speaker: 00:22:29

So we were going to do our summer camp from nine to twelve because it just made sense.

Speaker: 00:22:32

So every single model that we've had is going to present a different picture.

Speaker: 00:22:37

This Agnes Sky thing has been a completely different thing from me, but it's been awesome

Speaker: 00:22:41

because in the sense that we're on a college campus.

Speaker: 00:22:44

So a lot of things that we do a lot of times, we'll go on a nature walk, believe it or not.

Speaker: 00:22:48

Now I'm not doing that, but I've got someone that's doing it.

Speaker: 00:22:51

But they love just taking that hour off the tennis court and just walking around.

Speaker: 00:22:57

You brought up the point of is it trending with younger kids?

Speaker: 00:23:00

We oddly, we're trending with older kids.

Speaker: 00:23:02

We're starting to get a lot of twelve, thirteen, fourteen, fifteen-year-olds that really have

Speaker: 00:23:05

never played.

Speaker: 00:23:06

They're the hardest to kind of group because they don't want to be with the kids they really

Speaker: 00:23:11

should be with because they've never really played.

Speaker: 00:23:13

So they've got the skill set of eight, nine-year-old, ten-year-old, but they don't really want

Speaker: 00:23:18

to be with them.

Speaker: 00:23:19

So we've had a lot of, I don't know, if COVID brought that on, but we've got a lot of kids

Speaker: 00:23:23

that really haven't played any sports at all.

Speaker: 00:23:25

And then they're coming in and wanting to play at twelve, thirteen, fourteen, fifteen and

Speaker: 00:23:29

trying to house those kids together.

Speaker: 00:23:31

And that's been an odd thing because as an athlete, it's hard to see a kid that's never really

Speaker: 00:23:38

played sports literally at all come to a summer camp and finding them to want to love a sport

Speaker: 00:23:45

has been actually the most rewarding thing.

Speaker: 00:23:47

I think we've probably done in the past, say, three, four years for me.

Speaker: 00:23:52

That is fascinating because we're seeing the same thing.

Speaker: 00:23:55

I look at my wife often and I say, "I'm not quite sure what's going on here, but maybe

Speaker: 00:24:00

it's just something that's going to happen."

Speaker: 00:24:02

We look at tennis, especially in the United States, is kind of the sixth or seventh sport.

Speaker: 00:24:07

So the kids start with football, baseball, basketball, whatever those starting sports are.

Speaker: 00:24:16

And if they're good at it, they pretty much stick with it.

Speaker: 00:24:18

They never get to tennis.

Speaker: 00:24:19

What I think is happening is there's a little bit of, and I'm not sure if I should say this,

Speaker: 00:24:24

there's a little bit of, "Okay, well my kid sucks it soccer.

Speaker: 00:24:28

My kid can't hit a ball with a stick."

Speaker: 00:24:29

He's a little, you know, in certain demographics, you got little or kids and other demographics,

Speaker: 00:24:35

you got bigger kids.

Speaker: 00:24:36

So my kid's never going to be a football player, so let's not do American football.

Speaker: 00:24:40

And then you go, "Okay, well my kid just wants to play video games.

Speaker: 00:24:43

He's not athletic at all."

Speaker: 00:24:44

So you got those kids.

Speaker: 00:24:45

And then all of a sudden they seem to call us.

Speaker: 00:24:47

And when I say yes, I'm talking about tennis for children, in my case, in my experience.

Speaker: 00:24:51

And we get this 11-year-old that either has never played any sport at all, which is fascinating

Speaker: 00:24:57

because we're sports guys.

Speaker: 00:24:58

We think that's what you do when you're two is you grab a ball and start throwing it at

Speaker: 00:25:02

people.

Speaker: 00:25:03

At least that's what my son's doing at 10 months old now.

Speaker: 00:25:05

But you have that kid that comes in that says, "Ah, yeah, maybe I played a little soccer."

Speaker: 00:25:10

You're like, "Okay, so you're super uncoordinated."

Speaker: 00:25:15

And now you're 13, and I really, like you were saying, "Kenyan, I should put you with

Speaker: 00:25:19

eight-year-olds because that's your skill set, but you're twice their size back to the question

Speaker: 00:25:26

with Seth.

Speaker: 00:25:27

You were trending younger.

Speaker: 00:25:28

Did you see that in the beginners where you had the more uncoordinated or the kids that weren't

Speaker: 00:25:33

good at the other sports just kind of falling into tennis?"

Speaker: 00:25:37

I know, I hope not.

Speaker: 00:25:39

I mean, I hope that's not, I don't want to be the backup sport for anybody.

Speaker: 00:25:43

And I think the skill set that it takes to become a good tennis player is sort of, I still

Speaker: 00:25:48

think, higher than some of these other sports.

Speaker: 00:25:51

But at the same time, I think that it's certainly something we've seen is that the kids are coming

Speaker: 00:25:57

in, can't jump rope, can't literally drop and kick a ball.

Speaker: 00:26:02

And certainly throwing and catching is the most important.

Speaker: 00:26:05

And that's something, I know, I'm going to steal it from Ben.

Speaker: 00:26:07

I mean, playing tennis is playing catch.

Speaker: 00:26:09

And if you can't track and catch a ball, good luck hitting it with a tennis racket.

Speaker: 00:26:13

And so some of those skills, like you said, we, that's second nature to us.

Speaker: 00:26:17

I mean, I feel the same way.

Speaker: 00:26:18

I feel like I've been throwing and catching a ball since I was three years old, but you do

Speaker: 00:26:21

see it more and more.

Speaker: 00:26:23

Which is also why I love getting somebody at 7, 8, 9 instead of 12 or 13.

Speaker: 00:26:28

It is very difficult at 12 to not only group them together, but then to also build those

Speaker: 00:26:33

skills even in an eight or 10 week session.

Speaker: 00:26:36

It's very tough to go from zero to even two or three on that scale.

Speaker: 00:26:42

And in that case, I think maybe we do trend toward the Bullshark Sports and Red Zone concept

Speaker: 00:26:48

where there is multi-sport.

Speaker: 00:26:50

Because just play catch.

Speaker: 00:26:53

Retail parents just all the time.

Speaker: 00:26:54

A parent comes up to me and says, well, why isn't my kid able to hit top spin yet?

Speaker: 00:26:58

He can hardly walk without falling over.

Speaker: 00:27:00

And you want him to have hang on.

Speaker: 00:27:02

This is a very specific skill and a very difficult skill.

Speaker: 00:27:06

I would guess baseball how long, through T ball and all the things before a kid can actually

Speaker: 00:27:12

throw a hit a ball with a stick that's thrown at them.

Speaker: 00:27:16

That's probably not just an easy thing to do for most kids.

Speaker: 00:27:20

He loves that one kid that can just whack the ball and be like, yep, keep him, right?

Speaker: 00:27:24

Don't lose him to the tennis guy.

Speaker: 00:27:26

But in this case, we have the camps that are bringing all those things together.

Speaker: 00:27:32

And aside from the giant water slide, which is brilliant, and I think we all wrote that

Speaker: 00:27:36

down, but not everybody's got the budget for the giant water slide or the liability insurance

Speaker: 00:27:40

in that case.

Speaker: 00:27:42

And in that, we look at how to bring these kids in and how to get not just the coordinated

Speaker: 00:27:48

ones, not just the tennis kids.

Speaker: 00:27:49

And we get the younger brothers and the younger sisters or even the older ones.

Speaker: 00:27:54

Sometimes it's the older ones.

Speaker: 00:27:55

But usually it's the example.

Speaker: 00:27:56

You got a kid in your UTA academy and he's banging balls and he's got the little brother that

Speaker: 00:28:01

he doesn't really love it.

Speaker: 00:28:03

Maybe that's not his thing.

Speaker: 00:28:04

Maybe he doesn't want to compete with the older brother, but he can come out and play a little

Speaker: 00:28:07

bit of kickball.

Speaker: 00:28:08

And he's going to do some tennis and see if he's kind of good at it.

Speaker: 00:28:12

But the multi-sport thing, I think, is really good.

Speaker: 00:28:15

From a UTA point of view, you've caught us up on some of your experience and I appreciate

Speaker: 00:28:20

that you reminded me that you probably do a lot of reinventing and personalizing programs

Speaker: 00:28:25

because you will show up as new management.

Speaker: 00:28:28

More often than I'd picture it just because UTA has been around for more than 25 years,

Speaker: 00:28:34

it isn't just that you've been doing that one thing and you show up and plug it in and

Speaker: 00:28:38

it works.

Speaker: 00:28:39

You really do need to know the demographic.

Speaker: 00:28:41

I can only imagine how different Agnes Scott is from Laurel Springs to the Beach Club,

Speaker: 00:28:47

which can't imagine why it's a Beach Club because there's no Beach there.

Speaker: 00:28:50

It doesn't make any sense to me.

Speaker: 00:28:52

But Kenyan, from the point of view of where you are and what you see, are you looking

Speaker: 00:28:59

to implement more of those multi-sport or is it just these two guys, Seth and Ben, that

Speaker: 00:29:03

are targeting that?

Speaker: 00:29:04

Does that become a UTA option besides just tennis and water slides?

Speaker: 00:29:09

Totally agree.

Speaker: 00:29:11

But Agnes Scott, so for next summer, we have access to more things starting next summer

Speaker: 00:29:16

at Agnes Scott, let's say.

Speaker: 00:29:17

So we'll have access to the indoor pool that they have.

Speaker: 00:29:19

We'll have access to the gym.

Speaker: 00:29:21

So we were able to do things even this past summer at Agnes Scott at the gym that we weren't

Speaker: 00:29:26

able to do before.

Speaker: 00:29:28

We didn't do pickleball, but we did a version of pickleball.

Speaker: 00:29:30

So, just things like when it would rain because normally when it rains at those kinds of

Speaker: 00:29:35

facilities, you have to cancel camp.

Speaker: 00:29:37

So we didn't have to cancel camp.

Speaker: 00:29:39

Those are huge things for us.

Speaker: 00:29:40

So we never had to dial it down.

Speaker: 00:29:43

We could always say that we were going to have camp.

Speaker: 00:29:46

For us, each facility is going to be different in what we are going to be able to do just based

Speaker: 00:29:52

on the land and what they have to offer.

Speaker: 00:29:56

And that's kind of the way that we've attacked it.

Speaker: 00:29:59

The good thing is Ben, where the Beach Club is really close to Agnes Scott.

Speaker: 00:30:03

So we share a lot of the same people.

Speaker: 00:30:04

So people that may have gone to his summer camp one week, they came to our camp the next

Speaker: 00:30:08

week in vice versa.

Speaker: 00:30:09

And we tend to pick up a lot of kids even from Drew Hills Country Club.

Speaker: 00:30:13

They might have done three weeks over there then they came over to us for a week or something

Speaker: 00:30:16

like that.

Speaker: 00:30:17

So we tend to do a lot of sharing in that neighborhood over there, but each one of us

Speaker: 00:30:23

presents something completely different and hopefully no one's bashing one another

Speaker: 00:30:28

on what they're doing because we can't offer what Drew Hills offers because they've got

Speaker: 00:30:33

golf, they've got a pool, they've got land and they've got the tennis courts.

Speaker: 00:30:37

And I think for the most part, they still have the basketball courts still.

Speaker: 00:30:39

They're able to do basketball over there as well.

Speaker: 00:30:42

So they've got all these different things that we just don't have at some of our facilities.

Speaker: 00:30:47

So that's why we try to reinvent what we're able to do.

Speaker: 00:30:50

And then we kind of get together at the end of the summer and say what was the success

Speaker: 00:30:54

and what wasn't.

Speaker: 00:30:55

Obviously, having the water slide, because we used to do that at Chastain, we of course brought

Speaker: 00:31:00

that over to Blackburn.

Speaker: 00:31:02

But this time we just added a second water slide, which was I think our biggest week,

Speaker: 00:31:08

we had 117 kids.

Speaker: 00:31:10

So if that kind of tells you what that week looked like, we had 117 kids with two water slides

Speaker: 00:31:17

and I'm not kidding you, it would take these kids an hour to get back up there to do it again

Speaker: 00:31:21

and they still wanted to do it.

Speaker: 00:31:23

So they would come down.

Speaker: 00:31:24

That's why I don't go to six flex.

Speaker: 00:31:26

Exactly.

Speaker: 00:31:27

So they would come down the water slide and it would take them that long to get back in

Speaker: 00:31:30

line again, to do it again.

Speaker: 00:31:32

Wow.

Speaker: 00:31:33

And in that case, the thing I heard, and it's funny how my brain works from a go

Speaker: 00:31:38

tennis point of view, and one of the reasons I love doing this podcast, and I like talking

Speaker: 00:31:42

to people like you because we've always had this zero sum game mentality, or we thought we

Speaker: 00:31:49

did in Atlanta where my camp kids are my camp kids and don't go to that guy and he's a bad

Speaker: 00:31:55

coach and you don't want the old crusty guy, you want me.

Speaker: 00:31:59

And there's been that competition.

Speaker: 00:32:01

There's been what I call the zero sum game in the tennis world.

Speaker: 00:32:05

And as I set out with Bobby and my wife and we said, hey, let's see if we can change some

Speaker: 00:32:12

of this culture where we're all on the same team and somebody calls me up and says, hey,

Speaker: 00:32:16

I'm in Swany, where should I go?

Speaker: 00:32:18

I want to be able to say, hey, you need to check out Laurel Springs or you need to check

Speaker: 00:32:21

out this place or that place because we're all on the same team because, and I love that

Speaker: 00:32:26

you said you and Ben are close to each other, but you're not necessarily fighting over

Speaker: 00:32:31

the kids. You're offering very different things and at some level, potentially even referring

Speaker: 00:32:36

somebody when they say, hey, Ben, that was great.

Speaker: 00:32:38

I really love the camp.

Speaker: 00:32:39

Is there another one we're looking to do different camps?

Speaker: 00:32:42

And he can say, yeah, yeah, call Kenyan.

Speaker: 00:32:44

And I love that about this kind of conversation because more and more people that we talk to

Speaker: 00:32:50

from a go tennis point of view and on the podcast, it is less of that competitive nature to be

Speaker: 00:32:56

able to say, yes, this is what we do.

Speaker: 00:32:57

The FDA does something different than Bullshark Sports and a little bit different from Red

Speaker: 00:33:02

Zone to where tennis for children, as an example, were a very niche thing and we don't need

Speaker: 00:33:09

to compete in those ways of saying, my kid is my kid.

Speaker: 00:33:12

And where I'm going with this is, I get the kids that come to me and they say, well, Couchon,

Speaker: 00:33:18

I'm going to a summer camp this summer and they want me to do this on the server.

Speaker: 00:33:22

They want me to do this on the forehand.

Speaker: 00:33:24

And I say, great, do it.

Speaker: 00:33:28

Well, that's not what you told me.

Speaker: 00:33:30

And I say, well, that's okay.

Speaker: 00:33:31

It's just a little bit different.

Speaker: 00:33:32

We're all trying to get you to the same place as opposed to, oh, no, no, that's bad.

Speaker: 00:33:36

And usually we don't get anything bad because most of the good coaches in the area were certified.

Speaker: 00:33:40

We know what we're doing.

Speaker: 00:33:42

We're not teaching anything ridiculous.

Speaker: 00:33:44

But to be able to compliment each other and say, no, he probably just thinks you're not

Speaker: 00:33:47

as good as you are.

Speaker: 00:33:48

You may know a little bit more.

Speaker: 00:33:50

Or in the other case, it was he may be starting you with something more advanced than we've

Speaker: 00:33:55

even gotten to together.

Speaker: 00:33:56

So for me to be able to say, go over to SES program.

Speaker: 00:34:00

He's probably going to say things differently.

Speaker: 00:34:02

But he's good.

Speaker: 00:34:03

He knows what he's doing.

Speaker: 00:34:04

He's going to take care of you.

Speaker: 00:34:05

He's going to make you a better tennis player.

Speaker: 00:34:07

And hopefully that retention of coming back because you get that you, Seth, I'm looking

Speaker: 00:34:12

over there as though the listener can see where I'm looking.

Speaker: 00:34:15

You, Seth, get to see that that retention.

Speaker: 00:34:19

We don't necessarily have the 28 courts or however many they've got at Blackburn to be able

Speaker: 00:34:24

to bring in 100 and 100 something kids for a camp that size.

Speaker: 00:34:29

And I think you were in the 30s.

Speaker: 00:34:31

I mean, you're looking at 30 kids per week, something like that.

Speaker: 00:34:33

Yeah, the most kids I had was 30.

Speaker: 00:34:34

I try to cap it in.

Speaker: 00:34:36

I cap my registration at 24 and then I'll allow, you know, sometimes that 24th person has

Speaker: 00:34:44

three kids and she's like, oh, you know, you're your first kid hit the deadline on the

Speaker: 00:34:49

registration.

Speaker: 00:34:50

So I'll let your other two kids get in.

Speaker: 00:34:52

I donate some camp weeks for charities and things and so I always tell them, I said, even

Speaker: 00:34:57

if we're full, I'll let you guys in.

Speaker: 00:34:59

So sometimes we grow to about 30 kids.

Speaker: 00:35:02

30 was the biggest, but we have to keep it small.

Speaker: 00:35:04

Now, I like to keep it small on purpose.

Speaker: 00:35:07

We give a little, you know, some individualized attention and make it more per each week is

Speaker: 00:35:11

a little bit different.

Speaker: 00:35:12

And that's the fun thing for me, but it has to be.

Speaker: 00:35:15

I mean, the beach club has the big field where you could do a hundred kid game of capture

Speaker: 00:35:20

the ball, but you also only have five tennis courts.

Speaker: 00:35:24

You also, you have a pool, but you're limited.

Speaker: 00:35:28

I mean, Lindmore and have 20 staff either.

Speaker: 00:35:30

I don't have 20 staff.

Speaker: 00:35:31

I mean, high school and college kids at a higher, literally on a weekly basis based on when

Speaker: 00:35:35

they're available.

Speaker: 00:35:36

So I don't, yeah, I just don't have the, it's a smaller, smaller facility and so we don't

Speaker: 00:35:42

have the capacity to hold that many kids.

Speaker: 00:35:45

All right.

Speaker: 00:35:46

And before I go to the King of Tennis question, which today on the podcast, I want to keep

Speaker: 00:35:52

it to Summer Camps.

Speaker: 00:35:53

I often ask that this King of Tennis question where we say, hey, if you were King of Tennis

Speaker: 00:35:57

anywhere, everywhere, just Atlanta, whatever it is, is there anything you would do or change?

Speaker: 00:36:02

What I'm going to ask these guys today is Summer Camp specific and I sprung this on them.

Speaker: 00:36:08

So they're going to have to, they're going to have to come up with something good, but

Speaker: 00:36:11

I've got another question that I want to let everybody chime in on, so to speak, because

Speaker: 00:36:18

the listener is often trying to figure out, we, we talking about Summer Camps.

Speaker: 00:36:23

All right.

Speaker: 00:36:24

Great.

Speaker: 00:36:25

Well, how do I find one?

Speaker: 00:36:26

Where do I go?

Speaker: 00:36:27

There's Parent Magazine, I think, does a big list and Alta's net news does a big list.

Speaker: 00:36:31

I want to find out from you, from each of you, how do you promote?

Speaker: 00:36:38

And in that case, what are you promoting?

Speaker: 00:36:40

How do you share with the parents to say, hey, we've got great Summer Camps.

Speaker: 00:36:44

Here's why.

Speaker: 00:36:46

And how do you get that message out, starting with, with you Seth, because you're probably,

Speaker: 00:36:49

actually, you know what, I'm not going to start with you because you're new in where you

Speaker: 00:36:53

are at Laurel Springs.

Speaker: 00:36:56

You may not even know the best ways yet to promote in that area.

Speaker: 00:36:59

I want to start with thousands of years of experience in UTA.

Speaker: 00:37:03

What do you guys do, Kenyan, to promote it?

Speaker: 00:37:06

And how would you share with the parent to say, maybe the best way to find a good Summer

Speaker: 00:37:11

Camp for their kid?

Speaker: 00:37:13

So we've always used Alta net news, so we've used that a ton.

Speaker: 00:37:17

So we've used Facebook, we've used Instagram, so those are all new things for us as the social

Speaker: 00:37:22

media thing.

Speaker: 00:37:23

But like Ben, we've always donated a ton of Summer Camps to the schools that a lot of our

Speaker: 00:37:28

kids go to.

Speaker: 00:37:29

So they could use them as auctions.

Speaker: 00:37:32

So that was another way that we could promote.

Speaker: 00:37:34

But then, as you know, a lot of these parents, they get anxiety driven.

Speaker: 00:37:38

They're ready to sign up for Summer Camp in January.

Speaker: 00:37:40

So we really have to have our stuff together by December and we're ready to go.

Speaker: 00:37:46

So we try to roll out as much stuff as we possibly can roll out in so many different ways.

Speaker: 00:37:51

But to be honest with you, our number one thing for getting Summer Camp kids has been

Speaker: 00:37:56

just getting a banner with the pole and sticking it in the ground.

Speaker: 00:38:00

I think we get more calls.

Speaker: 00:38:02

Yard signs.

Speaker: 00:38:03

I think we get more signups, honestly, for the amount of money that we spend on that as

Speaker: 00:38:09

opposed to what we spend on net news or something like that.

Speaker: 00:38:12

I think dollar for dollar, I think we get just as much.

Speaker: 00:38:15

Ben, you think the same thing?

Speaker: 00:38:17

So you use Yard signs at all?

Speaker: 00:38:19

I've been fascinated with Yard.

Speaker: 00:38:21

It's so old school, but it just seems to work.

Speaker: 00:38:23

It works.

Speaker: 00:38:24

I don't use Yard signs, but I will attest to that same thing that all the marketing, all

Speaker: 00:38:30

the social media and here we are radio ads you could do and billboards and all the different

Speaker: 00:38:38

kind of marketing things that you could think about.

Speaker: 00:38:41

We do a lot of math.

Speaker: 00:38:42

We've kind of over the last three years have built up a mass email list and we have a subscriber

Speaker: 00:38:47

thing on our website.

Speaker: 00:38:48

So if you want to, you can subscribe.

Speaker: 00:38:51

And then any email I send out, I choose if I send the subscribers or not, but I can

Speaker: 00:38:57

send it out to everybody.

Speaker: 00:38:58

Every time my blog goes live, I just wrote a new blog last week.

Speaker: 00:39:02

Every time it goes live, it sends it to the automatic email, it goes to my subscribers and

Speaker: 00:39:06

then it goes on our Facebook page.

Speaker: 00:39:08

But more so than anything else, word of mouth.

Speaker: 00:39:12

It's word of mouth.

Speaker: 00:39:13

I mean, for me, I'm at the small facilities.

Speaker: 00:39:16

I have to keep things small by nature because that's the nature of the facility.

Speaker: 00:39:20

But so I don't want to do a big ad in net news and get thousands of kids sign up, but

Speaker: 00:39:25

I'll put my camps out in January for summer and I'll get to 24 kids and a lot of them pretty

Speaker: 00:39:31

quickly.

Speaker: 00:39:32

I mean, by first to the middle of February, we're booked up.

Speaker: 00:39:36

I mean, there's a few here and there and, you know, but we're pretty much by March, we're

Speaker: 00:39:42

pretty much booked up.

Speaker: 00:39:43

And January, you just took over the facility, Seth.

Speaker: 00:39:46

So in that case, it wasn't like you could have your whole act together the calendar the year

Speaker: 00:39:50

before.

Speaker: 00:39:51

So what did you end up doing?

Speaker: 00:39:52

Well, I'm glad you didn't start with me because I realized that when I turned around,

Speaker: 00:39:55

I turned to you.

Speaker: 00:39:56

Well, and so I mean, it's funny every time I go into a meeting with our tennis committee,

Speaker: 00:40:02

my first question, I mean, I quiz them every time.

Speaker: 00:40:04

I'm like, are you getting my emails?

Speaker: 00:40:05

Did you see this?

Speaker: 00:40:06

What if I asked you when this class is?

Speaker: 00:40:09

Would you know that answer?

Speaker: 00:40:10

And because it was a real struggle to figure out what messages are getting through.

Speaker: 00:40:15

Am I using the HOA database for emails?

Speaker: 00:40:18

Because everybody is unsubscribe from that.

Speaker: 00:40:20

Should I use the Facebook and all of the groups?

Speaker: 00:40:23

My wife is an expert at that.

Speaker: 00:40:24

She was in marketing for a long time.

Speaker: 00:40:26

She's found me a dozen swanney coming, you know, all of the Facebook groups that are applicable

Speaker: 00:40:32

to that area and those groups.

Speaker: 00:40:34

And I use some of that, but I will say exactly what Kenyan said.

Speaker: 00:40:37

I had more success with just a couple of yard signs at the neighborhood entrances and exits

Speaker: 00:40:43

and it was unbelievable the response.

Speaker: 00:40:45

And I mean, that was, you know, we got down to, because I mean, it's, you know, and Ben and

Speaker: 00:40:49

I both have kids the same age.

Speaker: 00:40:51

We're an role in our kids in summer camps in February and March and getting like every

Speaker: 00:40:54

thing set up and getting those calendars together by middle of March.

Speaker: 00:40:59

You know, I was still trying to figure out, are you getting my emails?

Speaker: 00:41:02

Are we, are we even reaching the people in the neighborhood?

Speaker: 00:41:04

Forget about outside, you know?

Speaker: 00:41:05

So a lot of that stuff did come down to, you know, by March, who was just like, all right,

Speaker: 00:41:09

let's get some signs and let's put them up and sure enough the floodgates opened and

Speaker: 00:41:13

we filled up, you know, by end of March, end of April, we were good for the whole summer.

Speaker: 00:41:17

So I think by January, February next year, assuming everybody listens to this, we're

Speaker: 00:41:21

just going to have, it's going to look like an election year.

Speaker: 00:41:24

An election month, we're just going to have summer camp signs in February all over Atlanta.

Speaker: 00:41:28

If you think that's bad, go to, send your kid to sleep away camp.

Speaker: 00:41:33

My son goes to Blue Star.

Speaker: 00:41:34

It's a Jewish summer camp in North Carolina and Hendersonville and he goes for three weeks

Speaker: 00:41:39

in July and literally the day we pick him up from camp, an email goes out to sign up for next

Speaker: 00:41:45

year.

Speaker: 00:41:46

And it's full.

Speaker: 00:41:47

He's already signed up.

Speaker: 00:41:48

This is where we're here in August.

Speaker: 00:41:50

He's already signed up for next year.

Speaker: 00:41:52

That is fantastic.

Speaker: 00:41:53

So Kenyan, you guys with the largest ability to pull something like this off from a UTA point

Speaker: 00:42:01

of view is that that same thing?

Speaker: 00:42:04

He said, hey, look, that was great.

Speaker: 00:42:05

Thanks so much.

Speaker: 00:42:06

You just taken notes right now going back to the partners saying, hey, we've got, we've got

Speaker: 00:42:10

some little changes to make.

Speaker: 00:42:12

Both.

Speaker: 00:42:13

Because I mean, a lot of our kids, we try to flip them to, you know, because we want them

Speaker: 00:42:16

to be there year round.

Speaker: 00:42:17

So because we still have year round programming while summer camps going on.

Speaker: 00:42:21

We only have so much space in that.

Speaker: 00:42:24

So usually our repeat customers are just repeat customers because they're coming back another

Speaker: 00:42:28

week in the summer.

Speaker: 00:42:29

They're not ready to sign up for the following year, not yet.

Speaker: 00:42:33

Right.

Speaker: 00:42:34

Yeah.

Speaker: 00:42:35

So in that case, at least it's letting them know.

Speaker: 00:42:37

Right.

Speaker: 00:42:38

We were, we were involved with the Atlanta Open this year.

Speaker: 00:42:40

We as go tennis and seeing the promotion that they do is an interesting comparison because

Speaker: 00:42:47

you just got different budgets, different people running things.

Speaker: 00:42:50

And they're doing more this year than they ever have, but then I get the email from the Indian

Speaker: 00:42:54

Wells.

Speaker: 00:42:55

And I think, oh man, that is a great concept to be able to say, you know what, there's still

Speaker: 00:42:59

a once a month email going on.

Speaker: 00:43:01

This is a year round promotion concept.

Speaker: 00:43:03

And we're not exactly an ATP 1000 or even a 250 run in our summer camps.

Speaker: 00:43:09

But sometimes it's that important to us to realize, okay, maybe we do need to find out

Speaker: 00:43:14

who's getting emails and who's actually opening them.

Speaker: 00:43:18

My father says nobody reads emails.

Speaker: 00:43:20

So at this point, I put some things in bold.

Speaker: 00:43:22

I assume they're going to glance and whatever they're going to see in a glance, that's what

Speaker: 00:43:26

I assume they get out of my email.

Speaker: 00:43:28

I really don't put too much time into it anymore because we just don't see the open rate

Speaker: 00:43:32

in general.

Speaker: 00:43:33

If we've got 10,000 emails we're sending out, we're getting 9% open rate, that's tough.

Speaker: 00:43:38

So I can't really rely on the emails every time it really does come down to those yard

Speaker: 00:43:43

signs and that's interesting.

Speaker: 00:43:45

We're starting to send texts.

Speaker: 00:43:47

The texts are working better as well.

Speaker: 00:43:48

So for us, I mean, we're, emails are just, you know, we're going to be able to do that

Speaker: 00:43:49

or emails are just, we're still sending them.

Speaker: 00:43:51

So, but text messages are what people respond to these days.

Speaker: 00:43:56

Yeah, I had the same experience.

Speaker: 00:43:57

I, you know, we used court reserve.

Speaker: 00:43:58

That was one of our first things that we implemented at Laurel Springs.

Speaker: 00:44:03

And three months in, I turned on the text and push notifications because it was exactly

Speaker: 00:44:08

that.

Speaker: 00:44:09

I mean, you know, just for adult classes, hey, Cardio's tomorrow morning, two spots left,

Speaker: 00:44:12

who wants them, you know, and that text message generates way more, you know, like these

Speaker: 00:44:16

are the open rate.

Speaker: 00:44:17

You just don't see in it with emails.

Speaker: 00:44:19

What's that cost you?

Speaker: 00:44:20

It's a top of your head.

Speaker: 00:44:21

Yeah, 20 bucks a month, 25 extra.

Speaker: 00:44:23

25 extra a month.

Speaker: 00:44:24

Yeah.

Speaker: 00:44:25

Same concept.

Speaker: 00:44:26

Do you guys use a, a, a, a, a, do you use court reserve?

Speaker: 00:44:27

What do you do for systems like that?

Speaker: 00:44:29

Same exact one.

Speaker: 00:44:30

Court reserve.

Speaker: 00:44:31

We do.

Speaker: 00:44:32

All right.

Speaker: 00:44:33

Ben, do you have access to that at the clubs or do they run the court reservations for

Speaker: 00:44:35

you?

Speaker: 00:44:36

So luckily for me, I have access to them.

Speaker: 00:44:38

And that's one thing that I ask for because it's super helpful because at the beach club,

Speaker: 00:44:43

we got to be flexible.

Speaker: 00:44:44

So it may be if it's, we let the members book first and then I kind of organize daily the

Speaker: 00:44:50

schedule based around what's going on at the club.

Speaker: 00:44:53

So it's helpful for me to be able to have access to that.

Speaker: 00:44:55

But we use court reserve at the beach club.

Speaker: 00:44:58

Limor Royge uses something a little bit different, like, skidaddle or I can't remember the next

Speaker: 00:45:02

exact, exact, exact.

Speaker: 00:45:03

No, it's just a small facility.

Speaker: 00:45:06

But yeah, I do have access to that and it's, and it's really, really helpful.

Speaker: 00:45:09

Yeah.

Speaker: 00:45:10

And in that case, at some point, we'll have everybody back and we'll have the court reserve

Speaker: 00:45:13

versus reserve my court conversation and try to find out kind of how we make those choices

Speaker: 00:45:18

because I think the majority of Atlanta clubs, maybe clubs is the wrong word.

Speaker: 00:45:23

HOAs are using reserve my court simply because it's so cheap, it's practically free.

Speaker: 00:45:29

But court reserves got a lot more from a facility management point of view and I'll be interested

Speaker: 00:45:34

to have that conversation.

Speaker: 00:45:35

We're involved directly, go tennis is with reserve my court.

Speaker: 00:45:41

So we promote them naturally.

Speaker: 00:45:44

They're a partner of ours.

Speaker: 00:45:45

But we've had Ashley from court reserve on and they're getting a pretty good foothold in

Speaker: 00:45:50

here.

Speaker: 00:45:51

And I think that helps from a summer camp point of view, being able to have those little things

Speaker: 00:45:55

handled.

Speaker: 00:45:56

And like Ben said, you're always looking for flexibility and trying to make sure everybody

Speaker: 00:46:01

knows what's going on that keeps those arguments away where every once in a while say,

Speaker: 00:46:08

sorry, I got the court reserved.

Speaker: 00:46:09

I don't have to argue with you.

Speaker: 00:46:10

Just get out.

Speaker: 00:46:11

I've got it.

Speaker: 00:46:12

But the text message is really interesting and I'm curious to see the open rate.

Speaker: 00:46:17

I'd be interested.

Speaker: 00:46:18

I'll call back court reserve and find out from them some of the technical side because I get

Speaker: 00:46:22

down into the weeds and try to figure out how some of those things work to find out who

Speaker: 00:46:26

actually opens them and who unsubscribes and if they have those, if they have that information.

Speaker: 00:46:31

But I am looking at my last King of Tennis question, my last thing as we finish up here

Speaker: 00:46:38

and I will thank each and every one of you.

Speaker: 00:46:42

We already gave you a go tennis hat, right?

Speaker: 00:46:43

We gave you that.

Speaker: 00:46:44

We gave you our little thank you gift.

Speaker: 00:46:46

I ordered a Atlanta tennis podcast shirt and I realized it was probably too soon for that.

Speaker: 00:46:50

So we didn't bother with that.

Speaker: 00:46:53

But we are looking for the King of Tennis and I'm going to ask each of you, I'm going

Speaker: 00:46:59

to go in reverse order.

Speaker: 00:47:00

I started with Ben, went to Seth and then Kenyan in the beginning.

Speaker: 00:47:03

So I'm going to back it up this time.

Speaker: 00:47:04

I'm going to start with Kenyan and looking for summer camps only, even if it's the whole

Speaker: 00:47:10

world, maybe just Atlanta, from your point of view, from a summer camp point of view, is

Speaker: 00:47:17

there anything if you were King of Tennis, you could do anything you wanted.

Speaker: 00:47:20

Is there anything you would change or do?

Speaker: 00:47:24

Hmm.

Speaker: 00:47:25

All right.

Speaker: 00:47:26

Let me see if I can attack it this way.

Speaker: 00:47:30

I think the best thing that we did this summer and I'm curious what the guys here are going

Speaker: 00:47:35

to say when I say this for them, for someone who has year-round programming, the best thing

Speaker: 00:47:42

that we did is we decided to take July the fourth off.

Speaker: 00:47:46

We did not do summer camp July fourth.

Speaker: 00:47:48

We felt that was like a midway point because in the past, every pro, every junior pro is

Speaker: 00:47:54

always acted as though they were burnout.

Speaker: 00:47:58

With that week, not doing that week and then we start back basically the first of all,

Speaker: 00:48:04

it's a game and the kind of that midway point.

Speaker: 00:48:05

So I'm just curious on as far as decision making because I don't think there's any bad thing

Speaker: 00:48:10

you can do for summer camp except tell some kid they can't have water.

Speaker: 00:48:15

I felt like that's the best decision I've made in my 32 years of coach in Tennis is to

Speaker: 00:48:20

take that week off and I also took that week off myself.

Speaker: 00:48:24

And if you wanted to work, it was kind of on you, but you weren't kind of forced to because

Speaker: 00:48:27

most of our people that work for us are employees.

Speaker: 00:48:30

So that was the best thing I felt like I've done.

Speaker: 00:48:32

So if I was king for a day, I would tell everyone to take the week off personally because

Speaker: 00:48:38

it's hard for people to take the week off when they think they need it, but then they also

Speaker: 00:48:43

complain that they're burnout.

Speaker: 00:48:45

So you've got to force them to do some things sometimes and that's the way that we attacked

Speaker: 00:48:50

it.

Speaker: 00:48:51

To balance the fact that you need to survive the summer with, hey, I want to make money,

Speaker: 00:48:56

I want to keep doing what I do.

Speaker: 00:48:58

This is my time.

Speaker: 00:48:59

Some people I think Ben told me he's got a lot of his revenue is in the summer where for

Speaker: 00:49:03

us our revenue drops a little bit.

Speaker: 00:49:05

So depending on the business model and what you do is how you want to handle that fourth

Speaker: 00:49:10

of July, I think that's great advice.

Speaker: 00:49:12

At least that long weekend maybe even do a special, you know, Wednesday, Thursday,

Speaker: 00:49:17

Friday depending on how that falls.

Speaker: 00:49:19

If you feel like you need to work on that week, but from a coaching point of view, to take

Speaker: 00:49:24

that week off as a group, I think that's good advice.

Speaker: 00:49:27

So can you now go back to Seth?

Speaker: 00:49:30

King of tennis, summer camps only, whether it's for the whole world, you get to tell anybody

Speaker: 00:49:34

and everybody what to do.

Speaker: 00:49:36

Is there any one thing you would do or change?

Speaker: 00:49:38

I mean, the biggest thing for me is the enthusiasm of the coaches.

Speaker: 00:49:42

When you're hiring for camp and when you're introducing new players, new personalities,

Speaker: 00:49:47

meeting people, the enthusiastic coaches are the ones you want on camp.

Speaker: 00:49:51

It doesn't matter experience level and all that stuff and burnout is a real thing.

Speaker: 00:49:58

And I think that getting kids in and putting them with a coach who's going to be energetic,

Speaker: 00:50:06

show them the passion for whatever sport they're working on that day, be able to support

Speaker: 00:50:10

them.

Speaker: 00:50:11

I think that's the biggest thing for me.

Speaker: 00:50:13

And I think it always really has been something that I'm passionate about through the certification

Speaker: 00:50:16

processes and all these different things that we do professionally.

Speaker: 00:50:21

I think the enthusiasm of the coaches is always my big priority when I hire, when I'm looking

Speaker: 00:50:27

at coaches for mentors and things like that.

Speaker: 00:50:30

It is amazing what a little bit of an attitude shift will give you.

Speaker: 00:50:34

And for summer camp and when you're dealing with brand new players, that's what it's all about.

Speaker: 00:50:38

And I'll push back and say, okay, I think that's good advice.

Speaker: 00:50:42

I want to know how?

Speaker: 00:50:44

How do I find that enthusiastic coach?

Speaker: 00:50:47

What are you going to say?

Speaker: 00:50:48

Everybody needs to have a great enthusiastic coach or we need in Kenyans case, we need 30 of

Speaker: 00:50:53

them for 100 kids.

Speaker: 00:50:55

We need 30 enthusiastic coaches.

Speaker: 00:50:57

That's not easy to do because you're not necessarily going to keep them on staff all year

Speaker: 00:51:00

long, maybe they're part time people.

Speaker: 00:51:03

Do you have advice on how to find those people, especially if it's part time?

Speaker: 00:51:08

You know, it is difficult.

Speaker: 00:51:10

There's no doubt about it.

Speaker: 00:51:11

And I mean, my camps this summer especially were only limited by my own staffing problems.

Speaker: 00:51:16

And making sure that I was able to get commitments from senior staff and junior staff to be able

Speaker: 00:51:22

to take whatever numbers we had signing up.

Speaker: 00:51:25

And so a lot of weeks, same thing, we were capping camps, not because of interest level,

Speaker: 00:51:30

but because of the number of people we had.

Speaker: 00:51:33

I think the best place to go is to your own players, is reaching out to players that you've

Speaker: 00:51:39

trained, players that you know.

Speaker: 00:51:41

We have a Lambert High School, is right next to us at Laurel Springs.

Speaker: 00:51:46

There are state champions right now.

Speaker: 00:51:47

I've got Lambert Player who works in my pro shop, who does lessons with me.

Speaker: 00:51:52

Things like that are certainly helpful.

Speaker: 00:51:55

And like Ben said, same thing, high school and college kids are, and you can't say, I only

Speaker: 00:51:59

want to hire younger.

Speaker: 00:52:01

And it's not always a great idea, but that's where I think you go first is the players.

Speaker: 00:52:06

And people, not just kids, but people who are enthusiastic players, then can be enthusiastic

Speaker: 00:52:12

coaches.

Speaker: 00:52:13

And so, you know, I mean Kenyans got a head start because of all the kids in the academy

Speaker: 00:52:17

that he can pull from.

Speaker: 00:52:19

Well, and he said it during one of the questions too, getting the kids to work with each other

Speaker: 00:52:23

is a big deal.

Speaker: 00:52:24

And even in the older groups, if you get a 15 year old to tell a 12 year old, you got this,

Speaker: 00:52:29

don't worry, I mean, that goes a long way.

Speaker: 00:52:32

And that 15 year old then feels that pride of coaching and that, you know, there is,

Speaker: 00:52:38

there's that feeling you get when you're helping somebody else.

Speaker: 00:52:41

And that comes from the strong coaching, coaching culture, which we really like.

Speaker: 00:52:46

Ben, we end with you.

Speaker: 00:52:49

King of tennis, Ben Hesley.

Speaker: 00:52:52

What do you do, summer, can, it seems like you're doing whatever you want.

Speaker: 00:52:54

I mean, I asked Patricia Jensen a similar question.

Speaker: 00:52:56

I said, "With you were Queen of tennis and I stopped and I thought, 'I think you're pretty

Speaker: 00:52:59

much doing whatever you would do as Queen of tennis.'

Speaker: 00:53:02

But Ben, you've pretty much had some time.

Speaker: 00:53:04

You've had three years now to figure out your own summer camps and what works and what

Speaker: 00:53:08

doesn't work.

Speaker: 00:53:09

Is there anything?

Speaker: 00:53:10

King of tennis, you do or change?"

Speaker: 00:53:14

Yeah, I think I'm going to kind of well both of these guys, Kenyan and Seth and Seth

Speaker: 00:53:21

Moore about finding staff, right?

Speaker: 00:53:25

Because then when I worked at Drew at Hills for so long and then before that I'd done with

Speaker: 00:53:29

a country club, I'd camp staff for the summer was the tennis pros.

Speaker: 00:53:32

So we just chose, okay, we're going to take two or three pros and you're going to run

Speaker: 00:53:36

summer camp from nine to four or whatever it was and you're just not going to do any, you're

Speaker: 00:53:42

going to teach ladies USDA teams, you're not going to teach any cardio tennis like you're

Speaker: 00:53:46

just going to do camp.

Speaker: 00:53:49

And sometimes we would rotate off and if you had a private lesson or something, we'd go

Speaker: 00:53:52

with three pros for that hour versus four or whatever.

Speaker: 00:53:54

But we would, for the most part, it kind of got where Drew at Hills were, we got pretty

Speaker: 00:53:59

big and we did hire some summer help and they did more stuff.

Speaker: 00:54:03

That was the, that was always the interesting thing is you could hire a college kid to

Speaker: 00:54:07

work the pro shop, do court man gets, oh, and you're going to teach summer camp and help

Speaker: 00:54:11

us run some events and stuff.

Speaker: 00:54:13

Well, I don't have that.

Speaker: 00:54:14

I mean, my camp is nine to four and you get there, you get there eight or eight thirty

Speaker: 00:54:18

but it's over it four and that's it.

Speaker: 00:54:20

There's no, hey, you're going to work four hours behind the bar tonight, slinging drinks and

Speaker: 00:54:24

the, you know, at the club bar, we don't have that.

Speaker: 00:54:28

So how to find, how to find staff is really, really, is really, really big deal.

Speaker: 00:54:33

And for me, it's the same thing.

Speaker: 00:54:34

I have a lot of kids who have coached myself and now they're in high school or now they've

Speaker: 00:54:37

gone and go to college or kids in the neighborhood that I know.

Speaker: 00:54:41

And, you know, almost like a babysitting service, right?

Speaker: 00:54:44

You have a role at X, a babysitter to use for your kid.

Speaker: 00:54:47

It's the same thing.

Speaker: 00:54:48

I hear, here's the high school and college coaches when you guys available or not college

Speaker: 00:54:52

coaches, college kids who will coach for you.

Speaker: 00:54:55

And so I use them.

Speaker: 00:54:56

And I think they're great.

Speaker: 00:54:57

Honestly, you know, hate to say it.

Speaker: 00:54:59

I think the high school and college kids are better than the tennis pros.

Speaker: 00:55:03

Where is this list?

Speaker: 00:55:04

So that's the, that's where I'm getting to with the king of tennis because there isn't a

Speaker: 00:55:08

list.

Speaker: 00:55:09

Everyone has their own list, right?

Speaker: 00:55:11

You have a list of, and I got so many, it was so funny this, this summer I was getting text

Speaker: 00:55:15

messages from parents who got my, my number from other people and they're texting me like,

Speaker: 00:55:24

hey, you, you know, do you, do you looking for staff for the summer?

Speaker: 00:55:29

My high school kid would like to, you know, like to help or whatever.

Speaker: 00:55:31

My college kid would, would like to help.

Speaker: 00:55:34

And do you, you know, do you have availability?

Speaker: 00:55:37

Whatever.

Speaker: 00:55:38

And I would, I would simply because I was a tennis director at a private club for a year

Speaker: 00:55:41

to manage, you know, lots of people.

Speaker: 00:55:44

And my first response would be like, well, yeah, just send me your resume.

Speaker: 00:55:46

I won't take a look at it and see if we can, they're like, she's on 16.

Speaker: 00:55:50

She's never had a job before.

Speaker: 00:55:53

And I'm like, okay, well, here's a kid that, so what do you, you see me, well, look, the resume,

Speaker: 00:55:58

just send me like a little, what does she do?

Speaker: 00:56:00

What, what, what, what does she do?

Speaker: 00:56:01

Okay, she plays club or she plays a select soccer, you know, or have one girl that works with

Speaker: 00:56:05

me.

Speaker: 00:56:06

She's not really a good tennis player.

Speaker: 00:56:08

She's okay, but she's a phenomenal.

Speaker: 00:56:09

She plays travel volleyball or club, they call it club volleyball.

Speaker: 00:56:15

And then she plays for, she plays volleyball for a legs at high school.

Speaker: 00:56:17

She's fantastic.

Speaker: 00:56:18

She's probably one of the best, but she's not a tennis player, but she's great with kids

Speaker: 00:56:21

and she can run a red ball class like nobody's business.

Speaker: 00:56:25

And that's usually where I put them is running some of the younger kids.

Speaker: 00:56:27

I work with more of the older kids and then I kind of wrote, kind of roam around, right?

Speaker: 00:56:33

And that's kind of my, my coaching style anyways, but it works.

Speaker: 00:56:36

Ben's problem is he's got incoming calls for extra staff.

Speaker: 00:56:40

That, that sounds awful.

Speaker: 00:56:41

I'm sorry to hear that.

Speaker: 00:56:42

But let me, I just get to the point, sorry, I was the long-winded, but I think to myself,

Speaker: 00:56:46

what happened to this girl had gone to work at Chick-fil-A this summer, right?

Speaker: 00:56:51

Now she probably had a crush because I think Chick-fil-A is, you know, paying like $25 an hour.

Speaker: 00:56:55

I make it work at Chick-fil-A actually.

Speaker: 00:56:57

You're all fun Sundays and you make like $32 an hour for filling up coax.

Speaker: 00:57:01

We're all available for the joy of it.

Speaker: 00:57:03

But, but what would happen now this girl has, has seen the light of coaching.

Speaker: 00:57:10

She's enjoyed it and for her it helps because this whole year she's got a whole list of,

Speaker: 00:57:14

of kids she can babysit.

Speaker: 00:57:15

That's one like perk for these guys to work with us.

Speaker: 00:57:18

And then the other thing is now she's turned on to coaching and like, wow, whether it's volleyball,

Speaker: 00:57:24

whether it's tennis, where it's just, I'm going to go be a PE teacher.

Speaker: 00:57:27

Man, this is great.

Speaker: 00:57:29

I mean, how many times can you, you don't have this conversation all the time about telling,

Speaker: 00:57:33

like, you know, it's like sometimes with parents of our players, they like thinking, like,

Speaker: 00:57:37

they love us, but like, all my kids are going to be a coach.

Speaker: 00:57:40

Like, why?

Speaker: 00:57:41

It's a real profession, right?

Speaker: 00:57:42

Why not?

Speaker: 00:57:43

It's a real profession, you know?

Speaker: 00:57:44

My kid's going to be a, go be, and I'm married to an attorney so I can't talk, but

Speaker: 00:57:47

my wife's, you know, yeah, you are too, a lawyer, you know, we're smart.

Speaker: 00:57:51

We both marry lawyers so we could be coaches, but coaching is a real profession and but kids

Speaker: 00:57:57

don't know that and even parents sometimes don't know that or don't, or they don't think

Speaker: 00:58:00

that's a realization for their kid.

Speaker: 00:58:02

I mean, for me, I want to be a football coach or baseball coach my entire life.

Speaker: 00:58:05

So my story's a little bit different than most, but most never have that realization.

Speaker: 00:58:09

So if I was King of tennis, I would have some kind of like, create some network and

Speaker: 00:58:14

maybe have like a camp for coaches where, hey, look, if you, summer camp is a real deal,

Speaker: 00:58:20

it's a great way for your kid to make some money and have a great time and be around kids

Speaker: 00:58:25

and do the sports that they love.

Speaker: 00:58:28

And we do this in like, I don't know, January, February, whenever you're kind of rolling

Speaker: 00:58:31

up your, your, your staff for the summer and have these guys come in.

Speaker: 00:58:36

It's almost like a job, we like be a fun job bear, right?

Speaker: 00:58:38

Like, you're like, put the college in high school kids like in through like a mini camp,

Speaker: 00:58:43

right?

Speaker: 00:58:44

You're going to play capture the ball.

Speaker: 00:58:45

You're going to play kiffle ball.

Speaker: 00:58:46

You're going to play some tennis.

Speaker: 00:58:47

You're going to play ultimate, whatever.

Speaker: 00:58:49

And we're all there like, you know, I'm thinking like NFL combine, right?

Speaker: 00:58:53

Like we're kind of looking, we got our notepads and we're just, oh, this kid looks good.

Speaker: 00:58:56

She look at, look how she, look how she guards and captures the ball is awesome.

Speaker: 00:58:59

And so you have all these camp coaches who come and who are running their summer camps.

Speaker: 00:59:05

And then all of a sudden these guys all have a rolodex of camps.

Speaker: 00:59:11

And now we're contacting the parents if they choose to do that.

Speaker: 00:59:15

Now the parents, you know, if you have a kid who's in high school, that's that relation,

Speaker: 00:59:18

we just hold on to the podcast on how you handle that relationship between texting a 15 year

Speaker: 00:59:23

old girl, you know, always put her parent on there.

Speaker: 00:59:25

That's where thing, but, you know, how now these kids are getting contacts and now being

Speaker: 00:59:31

a summer camp coach, which will hopefully segue into being a professional coach when

Speaker: 00:59:37

you're older, that's something that our industry is a tennis industry, not just sport, sport

Speaker: 00:59:43

industry for sure, but tennis industry.

Speaker: 00:59:45

I mean, who are the tennis pros?

Speaker: 00:59:46

They're like 55 year old guys with like replacement hips out there feeding balls.

Speaker: 00:59:51

You know, there's, you know, there's not many 25 year old kids coming out of college,

Speaker: 00:59:55

wanting to do what we do.

Speaker: 00:59:56

And maybe we can through summer camps, we can show them that this is a real, a real lifestyle,

Speaker: 01:00:02

a real, you know, real thing.

Speaker: 01:00:04

All right, so go tennis just found its winter project because I think between go tennis,

Speaker: 01:00:10

red zone, full shark sports and UTA, I think we make this camp a reality.

Speaker: 01:00:14

I think this is a great idea.

Speaker: 01:00:16

I think this helps all coaches in the area.

Speaker: 01:00:18

I think this is definitely a thing we're going to do.

Speaker: 01:00:21

And then eventually we spit them out and send them out to Jorge Capistani and we've got

Speaker: 01:00:25

a whole system going to work.

Speaker: 01:00:27

Well, gentlemen, we are at a time.

Speaker: 01:00:29

I appreciate it.

Speaker: 01:00:30

Thank you so much.

Speaker: 01:00:31

And like I said in the beginning, we will, we will follow up with this because I think this

Speaker: 01:00:35

is the kind of thing we could do if not yearly, at least yearly and be able to follow up and

Speaker: 01:00:41

say, okay, what's, what's up for next year?

Speaker: 01:00:43

How did this year go?

Speaker: 01:00:45

But then eventually try to figure out, hey, what's, what's going on in these conversations?

Speaker: 01:00:50

It's actually helping people.

Speaker: 01:00:51

And if there's one thing that comes out of it, whether a giant coaches camp comes out

Speaker: 01:00:54

of it, which I've written it down, like get this done because I think this is going to

Speaker: 01:00:58

be one of the more important things, even if it's a little thing of saying, okay, is net

Speaker: 01:01:02

news really the place to go for summer camps?

Speaker: 01:01:04

Everybody waits for that, for that article, that article, episode, what is that?

Speaker: 01:01:08

It's a, what do we call the issue?

Speaker: 01:01:11

Issue?

Speaker: 01:01:12

I can never think of that word.

Speaker: 01:01:13

I don't know why.

Speaker: 01:01:14

Issue just seems like a bad thing.

Speaker: 01:01:15

Everybody's looking forward to that issue.

Speaker: 01:01:18

And in that case, otherwise, we're just going to have to make some phone calls and start

Speaker: 01:01:21

to sign a yard sign business in January and help tennis coaches say, hey, if you're looking

Speaker: 01:01:27

for your summer camps, here's your one outside of Laurel Springs, wherever UTA is, you guys

Speaker: 01:01:32

are multiple locations, so you've got multiple options there.

Speaker: 01:01:35

And then in the same way, I don't know how many neighborhoods are going to want yard signs

Speaker: 01:01:39

in February, excited about summer camps, but we'll figure it out.

Speaker: 01:01:42

And that's one of the things go.

Speaker: 01:01:43

Tennis is working on one of the things that the podcast is trying to do is, how do we help

Speaker: 01:01:47

the coaches?

Speaker: 01:01:48

How do we help the parents?

Speaker: 01:01:49

And we make tennis even better than it already is.

Speaker: 01:01:51

Gentlemen, thank you so much.

Speaker: 01:01:53

I appreciate your time.

Speaker: 01:01:54

Thank you.

Speaker: 01:01:55

Yeah, thank you.

Speaker: 01:01:56

Well, there you have it.

Speaker: 01:02:01

We want to thank reGeovinate.com for use of the studio.

Speaker: 01:02:05

And be sure to hit that follow button.

Speaker: 01:02:07

For more tennis-related content, you can go to AtlantaTennisPodcast.com.

Speaker: 01:02:12

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And with that, we're out.

Speaker: 01:02:34

See you next time.

Speaker: 01:02:35

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