(upbeat music)

Welcome to the Atlanta Tennis Podcast.

Every episode is titled,

It Starts with Tennis and Goes From There.

We talk with coaches, club managers,

industry business professionals,

technology experts, and anyone else we find interesting.

We wanna have a conversation as long as it starts with tennis.

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

powered by GoTennis.

Check out our calendar of Metro Atlanta Tennis events

at LetsGoTennis.com

and be sure to register for the GoTennis Fall Festival

coming up on November 9th at James Creek Tennis Center.

It's gonna be awesome.

And now let's get into our recent conversation

with Jeff Chandley.

Jeff has been the director of Tennis at Atlanta Athletic Club

for the past 16 years and plans to retire at the end of 2024.

Many consider this position

as one of the most highly sought after jobs in Metro Atlanta.

And this conversation covers Jeff's background

as a tennis director,

how he landed at Atlanta Athletic Club

and what he believes has been the key to his success.

Have a listen and let us know what you think.

(upbeat music)

Who is Jeff Chandley and why do we care?

Yeah, well, I don't know if you really care,

but yeah, I'm the director of Tennis here

at the historic Atlanta Athletic Club.

I've been here 16 years.

I've been the director of Tennis the whole time

and for three years was the director of athletics.

It's also before that I was at the landings club

in Savannah, Georgia for 10 years,

director of tennis and athletic director also

and then saw a grass country club before that for eight years

and became the director of tennis

and the director of athletics there.

And it really kind of just started my career

in Nashville after college.

I was a football player through high school,

had football scholarships,

but it had been injured quite a bit.

And my junior year of high school,

I decided I was gonna take up tennis

and I fell in love with it and in high school

and played my senior year for our freshman football coach,

tennis coach and had to have somebody pay for my college.

So I talked my way onto a junior college team

and ended up playing on two national ranked teams

and then was blessed enough to get the Nashville Tennessee

where I played for Trebekah Nazarene College

at the NAI School there in Nashville.

And started my career shortly after I graduated from Trebekah.

I was really blessed to be able to get under the teaching arm

of Peter Van Lingen and probably not known here in Atlanta,

but Peter was an incredible player from South Africa

was Davis Cup player for South Africa,

had wins over Ash and Stan Smith.

And I spent five years with him teaching

and the guy was so far ahead of the game.

I mean, guys are teaching modern tennis now.

Peter was teaching that and I was learning from him

on the teaching side for five years

and he was so far ahead of everybody

that he was teaching the modern tennis back 44 years ago.

So it was very impressive to be under him.

Peter wanted nothing to do with the business side of tennis.

He didn't wanna run events, he just wanted to teach.

So I was, when I finally started answering the questions

or in the clinics before he did,

I knew it was time for me to maybe start looking around

and I had pretty much paid my dues.

Lucky enough, I had built a reputation enough in Nashville

that I got hired over at Maryland Farms

by a new director that came in.

It's a great club.

It was eight indoor courts, 16 outdoor courts

was an athletic facility, didn't have a golf course.

And that director left shortly after I got hired,

I didn't push him out, but anyway,

and I talked to the GM and the owner at that time

and said, "Give me a chance to be the director of tennis there."

And they pulled the strings and let me do it.

And was my first real director's job

in finding out about what the business side of tennis was.

I remembered my first day that being the director,

went straight to the accounting department,

set on the guy Sofa and just said,

"Tell me anything about accounting for a country club."

'Cause it's so much different

than what I try to do with my checkbook.

So I was able to stay there for five years,

got the Virginia Slims of Nashville there,

which was a $150,000 event.

Worked with Steve Duffel, who's big in the Southern tennis

USDA Southern.

He was the owner of the tournament,

but just gave me a lot of opportunities

to meet a lot of players on the tour

and really kind of learn about the tournament side.

And then from there, went on to Sawgrass Country Club,

where again, I learned what it was like

to be in a private country club, tennis committees

and committees and the hierarchy of what golf means

to a private country club.

So I was able to kind of cut my teeth on that.

But that's, you know, married to beautiful wives

that understands the hours that I got to put in,

to, you know, I got three great kids.

Two out of college, one that's finished in college right now

at this advanced old age of mine.

And just blessed to have been in this profession for

the 44 years.

Both the PTR and USPTA member, and now a PPR,

Certified Pickleball Pro, which is a trend.

And now my new title here is Director of Racket Sports

and not Director of Tennis anymore.

So the world is changing for us in tennis a lot.

But that's kind of who and what I am or Dintry.

- I love it.

It's the beginning to end.

So can you give me the quick version

when you went and played in college,

you played not far from where I played.

I played at Lipscomb in Nashville.

- Oh, yeah.

- I was nearby.

So you've mentioned it.

- Oh, yeah.

- Clubs and I still have a few friends that are my age

that are in those clubs still teaching in the Nashville area.

- Okay.

- I think of that.

And I left college and I know Bobby did too

with tennis teaching not on the radar.

It was not for us.

That was not the plan.

And I think a lot of guys do that.

We kind of somehow fall into teaching tennis.

And I don't know that other professions feel that way.

And maybe more people do it than I think.

You graduate with your law degree, go be a lawyer.

But maybe most people graduate with their useless

philosophy degree like I did and kind of have no idea

where to go with their life.

And maybe that's what you get when you get a philosophy.

- I was there with you.

Let me tell you.

(laughing)

- Okay.

- Okay, so I had a so-called business degree.

(laughing)

- Yeah, I'm a minor in communication.

So where is that gonna get me?

Well, if you're from Nashville,

you may have heard of Nashville or Village.

And it was a, and I was working behind the pro show.

I was working at Redcap, which was packing boxes

at night and then working during school

and then working at Nashville Village

with Peter van Wingen.

And he came to me one day and he goes,

hey, do you wanna learn this business?

Now I'm just behind the desk, pro shop guy

making court reservations.

And you know, again, didn't know what I was gonna do.

And I said, sure.

And he goes, I'm moving to Westside Athletic Club

over near Bell Meade.

And so I said, okay, you know, let's go.

And really what I found out is my father

was in the building business

and he was building a house with his farmer

that he realized that I had some experience in building.

So it was kind of, I would teach a little bit

then go over to his house and build on his house

and then come back and teach.

But he was the one that really just said,

there were a couple of people in my life

that have been instrumental in me getting into the business.

When I fell in love with tennis in high school,

a guy named Don Cully, who is a member

of our little Mars Town Country Club in East Tennessee.

And he goes, you seem to really like tennis.

And I had no money.

And he said, I'm gonna let you use one of my cars

and I'll pay, you go find the best pro in Knoxville

and I'll pay for your lesson a week.

And so, I took up on that.

So that was very instrumental in the...

- Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait.

A guy gave you a car and paid for your tennis.

- Just to use, just to use the car.

He didn't give me the car.

(laughing)

Yeah, now, he...

- Who does that have to Jeff?

- Oh, yeah, I'm telling you.

It's just Don Cully, I'll never forget that gentleman.

- Yeah, and I never took any of his nice cars.

He had a pickup truck.

And I always took the pickup truck.

And he had some really nice cars,

but I always just took the pickup truck.

And I found Tommy Mosier over in Knoxville.

And I don't know if that name rings about with any of y'all.

He was a legend in Knoxville at the Knoxville Racket Club.

But I remember then, nothing against Tommy.

He's passed away now, but I can remember, here I was this kid

that didn't know how to dress in a private country club,

tennis facility, and the whole time that he was supposedly

teaching me, he was looking around the court

and watching what was going on on all the other courts.

And I'll never forget that and swore that if I ever got,

well, later on in life when I was teaching,

I was never gonna be that pro,

because it was, even though I was paying him.

So that lasted two whole lessons with Tommy before I realized that.

And then of course, Alan Smith,

who was the athletic director and tennis director there

at the Treveck and Nazarene College.

Again, Saul is playing in a regional junior college

and wanted to know if I wanted to come to Treveck.

And so, so I got Don Kelly, I got Alan Smith and Peter Van

playing in that were instrumental in me getting into the business.

That was longer than what you wanted to hear, but that was his.

- No, but that's, I think that's a great thing,

because people need to hear that, especially that young coaches,

Bobby and I talked with the ideas we've talked to,

Kappa Stanny, we've talked to guys at the different colleges

where I first met Scott Hutchinson and he said,

I graduated with a tennis coaching degree.

I'm like, that's not a thing.

What are you talking about?

- Yeah.

- But it is.

And those are the kids, when Scott was, you know,

same age as you, junior and high school was like,

I think I can do this, that sounds like fun.

He had that path and that was, you know,

I had to somehow get sucked in or whatever it was

that happened to me.

- Sure.

- And, but to hear that and to take some of these,

maybe young players that don't realize,

doesn't mean you have to be Jeff Chandley.

I'm talking to you, young players, right?

You don't have to end up at the best country club

in the world, but you can make a decent living.

You can figure out all these things.

You can join the business side if you want to.

We talk to all kinds of people that are ancillary to tennis,

not necessarily teach in tennis all day.

And then you got others, we got a partner in art

and it would go tennis, Rob Carver.

That guy is on court when he's awake

and it's just what he loves to do and that's great.

But there are different ways to do it.

And I appreciate that story.

So you're at Atlanta Athletic Club

and my whole career, I confuse Atlanta's

Atlanta club with Atlanta Country Club.

Now Bobby, Atlanta Country Club is 10.

- It's 10, that's where 10 is 10.

- Yeah, Atlanta Club is Jeff.

Now you're in John's Creek, right Jeff?

- Correct, correct.

In John's Creek.

- Give us the quick, how cool Atlanta Athletic Club is.

- Wow, well, again,

- This is a quick version.

- Yeah, there is, well, it's a lot of history.

1898 that it was started downtown as an Athletic Club.

It actually started with tennis first

and baseball and basketball at the Athletic, no golf.

So we always brag that tennis was a part

of the Atlanta Athletic Club before golf.

But then again, you have the history of Bobby Jones,

you have the history of John Heisman

as one of our athletic directors.

In fact, his contract, $50, I think it's $50 a month.

Was his contract with the Atlanta Athletic Club

to be the athletic director here at the club.

So there's a rich history of this club

and from not just the PGA side or the USGA side

but also from the, we had the, before I got here,

the AT&T challenge that was a huge event

which I'm still so sad that I never came to

when I was in Nashville or whatever

and missed out to finally be here at this club.

But it is, and I'm not saying this

because I'm a member or part of the senior leadership team

here at the club, but this membership is incredible

and has been so supportive of what we're trying to do here

as a team from my staff.

And they're seeing the fruits of that

and the fun that we have in the culture,

really the culture in the sense of community

that we build here at the Tennessee.

It's a really, really a cool place

but you can take all the history and which is awesome

and which is just glad that I'm a part of that.

But the culture that we've built from a Tennessee here

in that sense of community

when people walk in the doors of really, really cool thing.

It's fun to come in to work every day.

I don't ever drive it.

It's not like some clubs I've been there.

Yeah. Oh yeah.

Oh yeah.

I think we all have at some point thinking,

I don't know if I want to be here anymore.

I'm not excited to come to work.

Oh yeah.

Oh yeah.

I mean, it's what, got on Mike Leach told me

when he came down and took over the Pontabedra Club down there

and he goes, it is a J.O.B. Not F.U.N.

But this has been fun.

This has been fun and I've always looked at it that way.

I don't think I've ever dreaded it,

but walking in the door.

But a lot of it has to do with the team

that I get to work with and that we've put together

and they're drive and they're their dedication

to what we've got planned

and what we're trying to do here in that whole sense of community.

So.

Yeah.

And Bobby, I can see you just being patient.

[LAUGHTER]

You use it all my life.

You know, you use it in my words.

You know, culture.

You know how I feel about this.

That's our job.

You got to build the culture.

And as we talked, I don't think we were on yet.

We were talking where we were getting our technical difficulties

worked out.

Sometimes it takes a little bit to massage,

to get the right staff, to get the right group,

to get the culture moving in the direction.

I took over a club similar to what you're saying.

Went in to work with a friend and two weeks later,

the friend was gone.

First people associate that you put the knife marks in his back

and I was like, no, I was coming here to work with him.

And no, but it was a different culture.

And a lot of things were going on beside behind the scenes.

I had no idea.

And it took a while.

It really took a while.

And I'm thankful for the people that gave us the opportunity

to go through because all the people

who made a quicker decision.

Now we're 10 years into it.

And everybody's like, wow, glad we stuck in our 11 years

into it, glad we stuck it out.

Yeah.

I still have one of the emails from early on

as a reminder that not everybody was a fan.

So yeah, that's tough.

Yeah.

And it's interesting.

This later part of my career and you send your hand pros off

to be, we talked about Andrew Manelli or Mike Robertson

or Jeff Hedges, these guys that have gone on to be directors.

And it's always interesting when they call me after the first 6, 8, 9 months.

And they go, I don't think I can do this.

And I'm like, once it becomes your culture, once it becomes,

Mike Robertson talked to me about this a little while ago at TPC Sugar Love.

And I said, once it becomes your program and all, you'll see how it--

you just got to be patient.

You'll see how it all works out.

And all those guys have been successful because they stuck it out.

But I can tell some horror stories about the first couple of years

of being at each club.

And again, the politics that goes along with it

and what people try to do to move you out.

But if you believe in what you're trying to do

and you've seen success in the past, then

you know what it takes to get a program or what a successful or a healthy program looks like.

Then you can kind of map it out and just stick to your guns and your A. OK.

Well, it's interesting. You bring up-- because historically, as you said,

the Atlanta Athletic Club has always hired outside people from out of state.

And the initial reaction within the state is, oh, well, they don't understand

out there.

But listening to you, it is a great idea not to know either.

Because basically, I feel-- and as we talked about the years that up,

I guess I've been doing this at that level for about 25 years now--

you go in with your-- it was always about building culture.

But our job is change.

We are about a lot of managing people.

There's so much tennis in Atlanta between out the USDA, T2.

The need for us to do events is minimalized.

But that doesn't change the other side of it.

So it's really a different skill set that is required.

And I think that leads to a lot of-- there's

a big differences we see in all business between the sales leader and the sales manager.

There's a head pro and the director.

And I think a lot of unfortunate, a lot of the hiring people don't see that distinction.

And it's a different hat.

It's definitely a different hat.

And again, I don't think I said this.

I can't remember if I said it or not.

I didn't start playing tennis like a lot of these guys did when they were four, five,

and six years old.

I picked it up when I was the summer after my junior year of high school.

And so my playing skills are not up to speed with a lot of the players that have been playing

all their life and played tournaments.

And even though I played tournaments and ended up playing college.

So I really focused on the business side.

And then of course under Peter Van Lingen teaching side.

Because you've got three pillars.

You've got your business.

You've got your teaching.

And then you have your playing skill.

And so I've always been able to focus on the business and the teaching side.

And I think those are my two strongest points.

But I, and again, I've been through three general managers at Sawgrass, three general managers

at the Landings Club, three general managers here at the AAC.

And I've seen the directors of those clubs.

They always hire the opposite of what they just had.

It's all, it's a fact of life.

I mean, it's just the opposite of what they had.

Chances are when I finally retire, they may bring in a player.

I know they did that at the Landings.

They brought in, you know, immediately brought in a NCAA champ.

Didn't last but a year.

You know, then they brought in another NCAA champ that lasted a year.

And they went through and they ended up with a great guy down there that is more in line

with the business side, the teaching side and all of that after 10 years.

But I've seen it happen in every department.

They hire the opposite of what they just had.

And it's all left and all.

We've all thought it.

Yep, white, yeah.

Same thing.

If the restaurant was down, the next general manager was going to be a restaurant background.

There was no question.

Oh, yeah.

And every chef that comes in is even though you spend a million dollars on changing out the

kitchen a year earlier, and the chef comes in and it's like, what we all think we're going

to have them.

You know, it's, it's, this isn't going to work.

So yeah, we're all experts until we're not experts.

But I've just seen that happen so many times.

So, so Jeff, the young, if you're going to talk to that younger self of yours, to be

able to say, okay, well, you're going to be the guy now bringing in the younger coaches.

And you're going to want to hire that culture.

If you're going to be able to talk to me as a young coach or talk to the coaches out there,

to be able to say, okay, this is what you want to be.

This is, this is how you want to groom yourself, how you want to be ready for a position like

this.

You'll say, I want to, I'd love to work at a country club.

And what does that actually look like?

Because just coming off the tour is, in my opinion, not even a third of what gets you a job to

be honest.

Because that's not the same thing.

Yes, it's one of the three.

But I think it's the least of that is how good are you at playing tennis.

And directors seem to know that, but not all the head pros seem to know that.

Because a lot of the head pros seem to be former players.

But to look at those main points and saying, are you interested in learning the business

even if you don't already?

Is there that path?

One of the things I appreciate about the Wilson to the eels of the world.

And you mentioned TBC Sugarloaf with, with Robo, sorry, I don't even know his real name,

my grab.

My grab.

Yeah.

Um, I'm kidding.

He's on one of our tennis teams and we, we played.

Oh, okay.

Yeah.

We're going to be calling Robo.

Okay.

But he's, he's a guy that's, that's going to get it.

And he's going to bring in the right people.

And he's going to be successful because he figures that out.

But I think back to the Wilson's eels and the Darryl Lewis's that helped me evolve while

I was there.

I think the guys that don't work in the clubs, they really don't get that same feature because

they don't have that mentor, the director helping the head bro and the head bro helping

everybody else.

I assume that's part of your culture.

Oh, yeah.

Oh, yeah.

I mean, it's, we keep him involved.

I want.

I'll teach you everything I know as long as you want to know it.

You know, and that's the key is you have to, I will lay it out for you.

I can, you know, drag the horse to the pond, but you're going to have to be the one to

drink.

And so there's, there's a huge opportunity here at the club or any of these clubs that,

if you want it, I can help you get to it and, and, and show you how to get there.

But, you know, I share everything.

Our, our financials on a monthly basis.

We go through those types of things we talk about in our weekly staff meetings from not just

the tennis teaching side or the, or the league side, but what's the business side looking

like.

I offer them every, every pro to send them to a court seminar, play court seminar, you

know, to go out and, and learn about from the ground up how, how a play court is made

and why it's, why it's groomed the way it's groomed and all of those.

And some of the things you need to know, you know, researching hard courts, go out and watch

them resurface the hard courts.

You just have to experience these things.

But the key is, is if you want it under my two lead, if you wanted, I'll be glad to spend

as much time as I possibly can with you to show you how it's going to take to get you

to the next level.

Or I will introduce you to somebody.

Again, we talk about Mark McMahon and his certified racket.

What is it?

Certified racket.

Executive certification.

Yes.

And, and Carmen's gone through it.

My associate director and I have Lance, my pro over men's tennis going through it right

now.

Great program.

I mean, I've been able to, to see Carmen develop quite a bit from what she's learned from

that.

But that's, that's a $3,000 investment into one of my.

It's not cheap, but it's not overly expensive.

It's reasonable.

No, but it's what I've seen is the criteria and the curriculum better.

The curriculum is really solid and Mark and I taught.

But I think, you know, I wish I, I had to learn that on my own.

But I think that's a good tool and an opportunity for a young pro.

If somebody will invest the money into it or they should invest it themselves, that they're

really serious about getting into this profession at this kind of level.

That's a good test of money.

We'll have to put the link in the show notes or something to make sure Mark knows that

you're seeing good things about that because that's always good.

Well, I've been very impressed with what he's, what he's done with that through Carmen and

Lance has just started his series with that group this past month.

So we'll be following him through it.

But I love to see a pro, young pro that maybe didn't know how to teach like I did and, you

know, when I first started to go, okay, just sit on the side of the court and watch all

five of the pros teach to learn to get a feel for it.

But it just takes the pro wanting it and doing things that necessarily he may not be getting

paid for, but to get the experience.

And that's paying your dues a little bit.

And that kind of speaks to Bobby.

I see that I see the smirk.

But that's not a common, I don't even want to say it's a feeling, but it's not a common thing.

You talked about experience.

And we all say, I've got 10 years of experience.

I should be ready for a thing.

But somebody said to me the other day, they said, right, but what experiences have you had?

You've got experience.

Did you just teach a bunch of lessons over 10 years?

Because that means you're really good at that.

Can you give me some experiences?

What have you experienced to make you feel like you're ready to be able to do a thing?

Because getting a director's job is no small tax.

That's maybe not now.

No, not now.

Maybe you kind of head pro your way into it.

But as we all know in Atlanta, that doesn't happen very often because we like to bring in

outside talent.

Well, you got to stay relative outside these gates.

I mean, you know, one of the, one of the, again, hate to use the word four pillars, but

one of them is image enhancement.

And how do you enhance the program?

But then also you need to enhance your image outside of these gates of the Atlanta Athletic

Club.

Be known through the GPTA, be, you know, show up at the seminars.

We host the USPTA winner workshop.

Great.

You know, it's a great up one.

I don't have to send my pros to travel.

But two, it's held right here, you know, on our facility.

And we have the opportunity to learn and, and then to move on, you know, on a national level,

getting involved, volunteer with the USPTA or PTR.

And, you know, just kind of rock and roll, but that's, that's important about getting your

name and your brand out.

I think that was a, that was a thing that held me back.

And unfortunately, Bobby and I weren't talking much at the time.

We had met, but I didn't have, I didn't have him as the mentor that, that I kind of view

him a little bit now in a way is for him to look at me and say, Sean, you, you need to be doing

these extra things.

And I, and I say, whether it's paying your dues or just doing your due diligence, some

of those extra things that nobody wants to do anymore.

We all say, well, I just got to get home and walk the dog or we have different priorities

to be able to say, Sean, you needed to be GPTA.

It's not that expensive.

But if you're not part of a club, some of those expenses are on you and you start doing

the math on, well, I got to feed my family or am I going to go to, am I going to

take a week off in late September and go to Florida for the, the world conference, whatever

it is?

Like most people can't do that.

Now, that's the, the thing, I mean, we want to start understanding Alta, why are you doing

a tennis teaching convention in late September in the South?

That just most of us can't go.

So understand those things makes a big difference.

Obviously, I think, but to be able to understand those things younger, and if we talk to that younger

coach and say, yeah, they're going to be a late night or two.

We're going to be on, on a GPTA call as of recording, you know, tonight we're going to be late.

Now, a lot of people drive at home and a lot of people, I'll be putting my son to bed while

on the call and just trying to get the work life balance, but also really realizing you

need those extra things.

None of us are getting paid for that.

No.

I mean, we don't want to talk to each other and learn from each other if we really do want

that next thing in our career.

Well, and that's, yeah, it's so true because therefore while, I mean, we pay, I'm blessed again

to be at the Atlanta Athletic Club and we pay the dues for our staff and I would pay

the $75 for the GPTA and then nobody would go.

So then it was, okay, you're going to pay.

And then if you hit these hurdles throughout the year, then I'll reimburse you for the $75.

And just said, you know, I'm tired of just you having GPTA on your name tag and you're not

doing anything with it and I'm paying $75.

So, so we kind of reverse that and just said, hey, you have to write an article, you have

to do this, this and this and then I will reimburse you.

But the whole work life balance right now is just an animal because it's, I hate that

phrase because it's not anything I knew.

It's not anything I knew growing up and luckily, again, luckily I have a wife that understands

that this is not a Monday through Friday, nine to five job.

My kids, even though I was very involved with the kids at school because I could take off

in the middle of the day and go take them lunch or volunteer.

But there's a lot of this, give me 40 hours a week, which is unheard of.

To give me 40 hours a week and sometimes we struggle getting 40 hours a week in and I'm

paying salaries and less in commission.

It's frustrating.

It's, that's the toughest part of this job right now is getting people to work, you know,

without if they want to raise, go teach one more lesson a week.

That's the best way to get a raise.

That's better than the 3% I could give you on your, you know, stipend.

But go get another lesson and there's the best raise you can possibly get compared to

what I could give you for free.

So yeah, it's, that's, it's, if you want to get the hair on the back of my neck up, start

talking to me about work like balance.

All right.

We're, we're, we're balancing.

We'll create a lot of people and we'll figure out who wants to get a raise.

It's not going to change.

I mean, it's the culture right now.

We need to be able to, we need to be able to deal with it.

Luke Jensen told us at one point he's like, these 20 somethings in their phone.

He's like, you can't fight it.

You're just, you're going against the tide here.

So you just got to work with, just move the needle, just figure out.

And maybe that's what I mean by we can't get together and fix it because it's not a problem

to be fixed.

It's a lifestyle and a scenario that we just need to understand and to be able to manage.

It's longer just the baby boomer understanding the millennial that that seems easy now in

retrospect.

Mm-hmm.

My wife is in that, she has an advertising agency that she listened to and I, I wish I could

quote her that she was at a seminar and they brought in a professor that specialized

in how to deal with the different the Gen Zs, the all the baby boomers and how you're going

to have to communicate through it.

It was incredible.

And again, I wish I had said on this and I actually tried to get the club to pay for this

professor to come in because it's, it's a lot of what we're dealing with.

How do I talk to a baby boomer or a Gen Z or, you know, so it's, it's a new culture.

It's going to be a struggle.

Yeah.

And from struggles to successes, if I were to say, hey Jeff, what's, what are some of your

successes in the way of how you do what you do and say, hey, here's, here's a bit of a,

a key.

Here's how you talk about culture and Bobby's all in with that, whether it's playing music

or making sure that your coaches go to the GPTA meetings or the team, the team building,

whatever you do, you've got to do the following exercises.

I don't care.

Whatever, whatever you do seems to be working.

So I know you may, you may not have on the wall.

Here are three keys to success, but could you, could you share a little bit of why you think

things work so well there?

Well, I do have four keys to success.

And I've already mentioned one of them and that's image enhancement.

You know, we'll, we'll specialize in our instruction.

We focus on our maintenance and we focus on our customer service.

Those are the, those are the four, four things that we pretty much lean on and lean into on

a daily basis.

And if we can keep those things in check, so you've got your image enhancement, of course,

so we already talked about that instruction.

We want to be the best instructors and, and a wide, you know, I specialize in a certain

group.

Armored specializes in a second group, certain group.

Wendy is, is great with beginners, kids and, and beginner women, you know, Enoch is, is

funny and great players.

So all the good players want to hit with Enoch.

So we, we try to make sure what we hire is to plug into the different facets of our membership,

you know, what they're going to need.

And, and so that's the instructional part.

The maintenance part is key.

You know, a club and people that pay $120,000 just to walk in the door here and, you know,

a couple thousand dollars a month, expect this place to look and feel like $120,000 initiation

fee club.

So we, we're very mindful of what the facility should look like.

I started at the landings club, a standards and audits program.

And it, we, we set standards for each tennis court and what a tennis, hard court supposed

to look like, everything from the top of the net all the way to the, the wind screens to

the surface, the net post the entrance, all of those things, play court, indoor court.

And then my tennis committee goes out every quarter and I have an audit sheet.

It's a pass or fail.

And so the tennis committee goes out and audits, audits each court.

So I'll give a member two courts to take some all of 30 minutes or four courts, just depends

on the, we call them audit parties because I always have beer and wine and some cheese there

for them to get them there.

Yeah.

Yeah, exactly.

And so that's, that's a day, you know, and then the staff will do the same thing on the

off months to go out and audit set a courts.

So the maintenance side and then putting together a life cycle plan for everything that,

you have on your, that you're in charge of when I first got here, I took pictures of everything.

And so I run through those pictures every year to make sure that I've taken care of the

issues, but a life cycle plan is, is an important part of keeping a facility up and going.

So that's the maintenance side.

And then the customer service side, again, becomes that, you know, we're the bartenders

of the world over here at the tennis department.

So we know so much about this membership and we want to make sure that, that when they

walk in the door or they're greeted, they're taking care of one of the things I always stress

with my staff is you just don't know what they're walking through that day.

You know, it could be an issue, you know, just something in their life that may not.

So let's make sure when they leave or they have a good time or that we're sympathetic to,

if they're a little disgruntled that day.

And, you know, it can, it can trap you, but you got to, you know, just step back and go,

what are they walking through that day and just, you know, just kind of protect them.

And that's part of the customer service.

I mean, it's again, hiring the right person that has that mentality.

You can train them to do anything.

But if they have a customer service mentality, then you're golden.

They're worth every dollar and then some.

So, and I'm lucky that, you know, I, my pro shop supervisors, that type of person and,

and we'll take on in the job.

I'm feeling that's not luck.

Well, yeah, you're involved in that hiring.

Yeah, I mean, well, but, you know, again, sometimes you, you know, well, no, I'm going to say it

was luck because she came from the locker room.

Well, ladies locker room and wanted it again, culture is everything.

I don't care how many employees of the club want to come over here and work at tennis, just

because of our culture, but she's been, she's been a diamond.

So, just proud of her and what she's taken on.

And any responsibility of the club just took over the pro shop.

I owned the pro shop before and I leased it out to Yerser.

And the club is, you know, the world is turning.

You remember when the pros and the golf pros owned the shop, well, the club took over the

golf shop after our past director of 25 years left.

And so now the club owns that and they wanted to do it at the tennis shop.

So it took about a year and a half.

And I was, I knew that it would be good for the membership.

So, so she's taken on a lot of that responsibility and it's been, it's been great.

Nice.

Those transitions sometimes take a while, but they're important.

So Bobby, I know you've got probably seven or eight questions.

If you got one or two, you want to pick your favorites.

And then I'll hit them with King of tennis and we'll, uh,

I think you brought it up just real quick.

I don't think anything is by coincidence.

I think, you know, part of it is a lot of it.

Most of it is the culture that is created.

One thing that, and it's again, we always go into it.

What's the next discussion?

And it's the future of tennis and where is tennis lacking is, you know, the new guys coming

in.

I love to talk to Jeff Moore about and I share a similar background that tennis wasn't

my number once for it.

And I think that really attributes to the fact why 58 years old, I still love hitting them

off.

I did play as long, you know, so it wasn't the pressure of the life.

So I still enjoy it.

And I think that brings a different look to the other guys, the guys that get hired right

off of the tour or high level clubs, players might not be soon, don't have the customer service

because, hey, you got to be selfish to be successful.

So now you're taking somebody who is inherently selfish and saying, no, no, you have to be responsive

to somebody else's needs.

That's tough.

That takes time if you feel the person has got the ability.

And in today's mentality, today's world, that's not the way they're trained.

You know, they're doing you the next thing.

And that's my only, you know, what I would want to talk to Mark about because I went to

grad school, I remember, you know, we're getting out of, well, we should be getting a job

that's, you know, there's much money for our degree.

I'm like, well, if they're not offering that and you want the job, you have to decide whether

or not you want that job or not because economies, the simple business, economies of scale.

Yes, we have an advanced sports marketing master's degree, but anybody wants that job.

So somebody's going to say yes to it and go bust their butt and work their way up when

you're going to sit there and say, well, I was worth more.

So it's tough.

And then the other thing that made me laugh is, and this is the saddest point.

I think this is a simple matter is that we, and again, I think we were talking about

before we actually started to roll the old school Atlanta.

If you want to be a director was go see Cindy Jones and you know, we brought up Matt Grayson,

we brought up Wilson, Tineo and the tree that came up.

Everybody went, if you were going to stay in the profession and you didn't get lucky like

me, you had a different mentor who had just, you know, right time, right place, right?

I got to be a rising star and didn't abuse it.

You guys, you know, that those, that doesn't exist anymore.

You know, it's not you want to go see Matt or you want to go, your Cindy was the place to

go.

And at, you know, at that time Cindy, you know, you could go to TPC, you could go to Country

Club of Roswell, you could pick the job.

No, that was Cindy.

That was Cindy.

That was Cindy.

And we don't have that anymore.

And that's what scares about the kids because they come out and I got this degree.

I'm ready.

Still not ready.

You love more than you did before.

But still not there's still and there's another pillar that's got to come into play.

So you're going to have to go work on that pillar.

Yes, you're further along.

You're more horrible than you were, but don't think you have any of the answers.

This is still number one.

I tell people, you want to do a good tennis instructor show up five minutes early.

You'll be great.

You want to be a better show up 10 minutes early.

Set up.

Have everything waiting for the people.

They'll be amazed because you don't understand what they're coming out of most of the time.

Wasn't that guy?

So if you can be just a little bit better and the simple things, you're in a great starting

place.

So now in commend to the job, you have been a pleasure.

I could see.

I mean, not what I expected at all.

I got into, you know, but we've been around each other in different places.

But man, really great to talk to you.

I get it.

Thank you.

And continued success out there.

I miss.

I wish you were there when I said we talked about I was out there for a little bit with the

old senior tour.

And I had to put up with a predecessor who had pretty much checked out.

And it was always fun.

They were to play Streeted as stupendously and, you know, unbelievable.

And walking around the history.

I think we had a, you know, the PGA championship was there one year, which made getting there

to paint.

But oh boy, great time.

So.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I was really, really.

I've been a part of a lot of great tennis tournament, but to be able to be a part of the

PGA in 11 2011.

It was quite a show.

Yeah.

So this has been good for me.

Yeah.

Thank you for the opportunity.

No worries.

Thank you.

We appreciate it.

Keep up the good work.

And Sean, I'm sure.

Maybe maybe is a strange thing to say.

Maybe Jeff is the new Cindy.

There you go.

Well, my fear is, I agree with that, but I think Jesse for not going to stay.

That's true.

I think they're going to get his door.

Yeah, that's the hard part about it.

Metro Atlanta.

There aren't too many of those jobs.

Right.

Now, you know, the, the job and they're going, you know, they're going even, they're taking

away more than they're giving.

I mean, you know, there were, there were more clubs when I started.

I could count probably five.

And we mentioned three.

I think we mentioned three of the five right off the bat, you know, or four in TPC.

And I would even say TPC probably isn't at the level of the other three.

But it's, you know, it's, yeah, the guy, it's more HOA driven in.

It's, you know, it's sad to say eventually you get what you're paying for.

You know, if you're, you're looking to take a little shortcut, save a little money, I

get it.

Well, that's going to affect your culture.

That's all.

Well, and I always tell these young pros part of my success.

And again, it's that I've been able to move towns.

Yeah.

Now, if I was, if I was a young pro and thinking that I'm going to move up the chain in Atlanta,

that's going to be a tough one.

But if I'm able to broaden my, my thought process of I would go here for a head pro job or a

director's job in whatever town and start, you know, cutting my teeth there, then go do

it.

But if you have that ability to do, go do it because my success again has been every jump.

It's been a much better job.

But if I had tried to stay in the town, you know, all the, in Jacksonville and Ponta Vigia,

all the pros came out of Flagler University or college.

And I was the first one that came from out of town.

And then Mike Leach came in from here and took over Ponta Vigia Club.

And then I was like, if you were sitting around waiting for those jobs in the town, that's

a long haul.

But if you can tell yourself, this is the career and it's great to go to new towns and, you

know, experience the culture and all.

But it was really, really good for my career to be able to change, to change jobs in different

towns.

And I don't like that.

I forgive the religious reference, but we're in Georgia. I can get away with it.

There's no profits in the homeland.

It has resonated with me often because sometimes I go in and I see, and I, somebody who knew me

when I was a 25 year old idiot in the industry and making a name for myself, maybe not in the

best way.

If I had said, hey, you know what, maybe I had pro job in Nashville where I don't have that

history.

I don't know if somebody realizing that I was young and they just look at the body of work

and needs to make that move and maybe just realize that if you come back in a few years and

say, oh, maybe he went out and matured a little bit and came back.

Bobby and I have stuck with Atlanta.

So we've got history and everybody knows it.

And that's part of the part of the deal that we navigate while we're here.

You were smart enough to be able to leave and end up where you needed to be next.

I think that's the thing to be able to do.

Yeah.

And you got to, if you're married and have kids, you got to have a spouse that'll go, let's

go.

You know, again, I mean, it's, if they're, you know, my wife, again, her advertising agency,

none of her clients are in Atlanta.

Well, they are now, but, but at that time, so she could, everything was virtual because

she would travel a little bit.

So she's the thank God.

She just go, hey, let's go.

It's better for you.

Yeah, having the family that understands the helps there.

So I want to, I want to jump into our last question, Jeff.

Again, I, we appreciate the time with it's always fun.

We always learn something.

I think Bobby and I are in one of the best positions that you can be in Atlanta because we get

to talk to anybody and everybody and we learn so much and we've learned so much over the

last few years.

But one of my favorite ways to learn is asking the, what we call the King of Tennis

questions.

Thank you, Jeff, for you working of tennis, whether it's the whole world or just Atlanta

or just your club at any level, professional, social, whatever level of tennis.

Is there anything you would do or chain without getting in too much trouble is I would, I

would revamp the USDA from a national.

Okay, trouble here.

And again, it's where I am in my career right now and it's, I'm not expecting to get any

awards or any paths on the back.

But I, I think that it's time that, that the USDA has always fallen behind and not been

the leader that it should be.

And you know, this whole cluster that we had with the USPTA and PTR certification and,

and what it was meant to be should have happened 30, 40 years ago, like the other federation's

had.

And when we see the drop off and American tennis players on the tour or just playing and,

and there's a reason for that and, and I think the USDA dropped them all on that.

You know, and, and again, you go.

And I have not been down to the national campus, but it seems like most of the coaches down

there are foreign coaches, not American coaches that are bringing up our kids, which is fine.

Don't get me wrong.

I think some of the best pros coming in for teaching pros are the foreign because they know how

to work and they're willing to work.

But I think we've, we've really need to, if I could, I, and I don't have the answer how

I would revamp it.

I just know the frustration.

I was going to push because if you're king, you have to know how to do it too.

I can't just say do it.

So if you don't have the answer now, what I will do is I'm going to call you next week.

I can't.

I'll put more in the answer.

I'll put more of the answer in.

I, the first thing I would do would be the grass-rich program.

I would spend a lot of time on, you know, we, we, I try to teach my pros all the time.

It's a pyramid.

I want a thousand red ball kids.

And I'll take 500 orange ball and 300 green ball.

And then I'll deal with the others.

That's a pyramid that we need to have.

If we don't have the feeder group.

You know, if we, if we just focus on the top level kids and that's what was happening here

at the club when I took over, all the effort was was on five or six kids.

Where the rest of them were, you know, not getting the, they were the five or six really

good players.

And the rest of the kids were not getting the attention they should have and we lost,

you know, the program was really small.

But the, the USDA from, we have to start fresh.

We have to start with the beginners, both adults and the, and the juniors and

build the program up that way.

Our biggest program has been tennis 101 here.

And it's, you know, we've introduced probably, I don't have the number off the top, probably

350 brand new tennis players to the game.

And we're keeping them about 70% retention.

And so we're getting in them involved.

As soon as they get through 101, they go into 201, then they get into, you know, C8.

And so I had one team that went from 101 to state championship in USDA 2.5.

So it's a cool little thing.

But again, off of, off of what we've done here, I would, I would spend a lot of time on

the beginners and introducing people to the game.

Pickleball is, I just spend a boatload of money on eight football courts.

A boatload, we converted our stadium court to eight pickleball courts.

It reminds me of tennis 40 years ago when it didn't matter who you played with.

It was a little more social in the levels to, you know, easy to get into the game.

That's why we got to, that's how we have to make tennis for these beginners.

Yeah, that's a great point of view.

And I think you're speaking Bobby's language there too.

But Jeff, I appreciate it.

Like I said, I'm calling.

How are you going to do your King of tennis?

But I think that's okay.

You're here, mid, maybe that is the revamp.

And maybe that's just just a fine.

I'm going to stick with that.

Yeah, it's marketing 101.

The more people you have at the bottom, the more you'll have up on top, right?

Exactly.

It's always a hard part of backdoor.

But it also, it speaks to your four pillars though.

Because as you said earlier, you have somebody who likes to wear it.

I think this is the big problem with, you know, when you bring in the superstar player,

they don't want to coach the beginner.

So, and do in the really, like you said, the leaders should decide, do we really need a

pro to teach a beginner?

We need somebody to get them excited about the game to take, to see where their next step

is.

Like, we try to do with our junior program.

Sean runs our 12 and under.

And I want them to see what's next, next to them and what comes after that.

So you see where you want to get in, you decide where you want to go.

And either I think through lack of resources, unfortunately, or bad judgment by the leadership,

you know, that doesn't necessarily translate.

And it's tough.

It's tough.

It's not an easy thing to do.

But thankfully, if somebody in a position like yourself who can do it and as doing it

is going to benefit the game.

So in the long run, we're going to be okay.

Well, there you have it.

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