New Club Option in North Carolina 4A

New Club Option in North Carolina

1)      Your beginning point. 

I fully believe there is an opportunity to expand and grow USA Swimming in local areas, such as Davidson, North Carolina.

2)      Describe your belief. 

Currently there are two large swim club in Davidson that are roughly an hour apart from each other. This leave a large gap in distance between the two clubs, meaning athletes and parents will have to travel a minimum of 30 minutes if located between the two clubs. Not including the distance if a parent and athlete want to travel to a certain team. Teams have always existed and been fully functional in North Carolina due to the many opportunities for collegiate swimming. Currently, for this exact opportunity I believe there is roughly a 60% chance of need. Is it highly needed? Not exactly because there are other options, but would it be an option that would be highly favored in the eyes of the public, especially if there are options for younger athletes under the age of 10 to swim.

3)      Identify the prototypical customer. 

A - Currently the need would be between the ages of 11-18.

B – Middle to Upper Class

C – Ages 5-10,

4)      Iteration No. 1: 

 A - When addressed with a 17 year old athlete, I was told that they need would be great, but greater if there were time standards that would eliminated slower athletes from holding faster athletes back from training. They feel the need has been present for the past few years and an opportunity they wish they had. They are currently settling for a swim club team that is 45 minutes away. They believe that placing a training facility between the two clubs would make a world of difference for the athlete’s academics by lessening travel time.

B – The team we are imagining to create would be an elite team that would charge higher costs and fees, thus needing a higher class or more scholarship opportunities. I spoke to another one of our older athletes (18) about the charges and was told how little elite teams there are. There are so many teams that are focused only on income and influx of athletes, that there are rarely younger specializations clubs that would allow national level athletes to compete and train with those who are on the same level. This particular athlete became aware of this need when they became the fastest in their club and no longer had enough competition to continue to push his training. Currently they are meeting their need by being privately trained and training with two different clubs to gain more exposure. Currently they are unsatisfied with the travel time and options that are limiting his abilities.

C – The nature of the need for younger athletes in an elite program is based on recruiting a pool of athletes to continuously feed into a larger program. Recruiting athletes from other programs can become sticky and can leave a bad taste in other clubs opinions, leading ultimately to less competition between local clubs. When speaking to younger athletes parents about producing an elite team with the option for younger athletes, the parents were incredibly in desperate need for a more professional approach to how their children would be trained. Primarily focused on investing into the sport and removing long term injury opportunities. Currently, they are simply doing private lessons, much like the 18 year old athlete, due to the increased awareness of the amount of kids under one coach’s supervision. The parents feel as if they cannot trust the program if the coach has too many athletes. We revert back to the amount of travel for the younger age groups from the parents, lastly. At a younger age, if they are truly invested in the sport then travel time will take away opportunities for them to expand their athlete abilities to other sports. This helps eliminate these issues between parents and athletes.

5)      Reflect. 

A - My opportunity was so focused on just producing a team that I was not aware of how desperately the kids would like more time to focus on school and less on traveling. I didn’t account for the lack of ability to do more activities outside of the sport due to excess travel

B - Although we were aware of a need for a stronger and faster training group, we didn’t realize that it was so desperately sought after that they were going to private lessons and multiple facilities to obtain more opportunities. This simply fueled our want to expand our swim community even more.

C – I was made aware of how many people were concerned with injuries starting at a younger age. I didn’t realize until prompted by the parents to research that injuries can start as early as 9 years old, if trained improperly.

6) Repeat twice more steps 3, 4, and 5. Please be explicit with each step in your blog post.

7) Summarize. 

How much of your original opportunity is still there?

My original opportunity seemed to really grow and prove that there is a need for the team to be between the two current teams. More so than I initially believed it would be.

Do you believe that your new opportunity is more accurate than when you started?

YES! After listening to multiple sources tell me their wishes and concerns with current programs, I find that by amplifying their request we can ensure that the consumers can get exactly what they are wanting to acquire.

How much do you think entrepreneurs should 'adapt' their opportunities based on customer feedback? (In other words, is there a trade-off between adapting and staying firm?)

I believe that entrepreneurs should be flexible, especially when creating something completely new for a community. The sole focus should be what does the COMMUNITY need, versus what the entrepreneur believes it needs. Although there are some instances I believe should stay intact, flexibility is a must to alter what can become the best option. There may even be opportunity to expand in another mannerism (city funding, parental board funding) that may prove to be a better solution to start up the business. It all truly depends on if there is a true need, how to eliminate that need, and the proper options that would be the best solution.