Storie Titus: 0:16

Welcome back to Market it With Atma, where we give you the tips, tools and strategies to help your business be successful. I'm your host Story, and today we have on the show Ryan and Bridget with DFW Curling Club. Welcome everyone. Thanks for having us. Thank you Now what you guys do is so interesting to me, especially being in. Texas. So can you guys give me a little backstory? What is curling and how did it all begin?

Brigitte: 0:43

So curling actually started back in the 1800s super fun and so it's been around a long time. Obviously bigger in some other countries Canada, very big in Europe but it's kind of near to the US. You know the US men's won gold in curling back in 2018. And ever since then it's one of the fastest growing winter sports in the US. So it's been really cool Wow.

Storie Titus: 1:06

And from what you've told me, you've been doing it most of your life, right, Bridget I?

Brigitte: 1:09

have. I started curling at eight. My dad was my curling coach and then moved to Texas and found the DFW Curling Club a couple of years ago. They've actually been around since 2000. So it's been around for a long time, but the growth has just been crazy the past few years.

Storie Titus: 1:23

That's wonderful. And Ryan, as the communications director, what role do you play in DFW Curling Club?

Ryan: 1:30

Yeah. So it's an awesome role. I love being on it. I started back in 2021 as a member and I've kind of just kept going along and playing and I just my love for the sport kept growing and I was like know what, let me uh join the, join the board as part of the communications uh portion, because a lot of my work is uh in design and uh marketing in that kind of area. So, um, for my role tip specifically, uh, I do a lot of uh marketing material. Um, I've created the logo for the club we did a recent rebrand back in 2022. And then so I'm doing a lot of promotional material, marketing material and it's kind of a group effort. Really being a nonprofit, you know you have to have everyone on board and all hands on deck. So, you know, Bridget takes a little bit, I do a little bit, and we're always encouraging all of our members and board members to spread the word in some kind of way.

Storie Titus: 2:31

Wow, so would you say, that contributed to the recent growth in the past few years?

Ryan: 2:36

Oh, absolutely, yeah, yeah. I think you know, just kind of like with any company or nonprofit or entity you know, creating a new brand, bringing that into the new, this world, you get more growth, more traction in different ways because you're creating something new.

Storie Titus: 2:57

Absolutely so. Both of you kind of mentioned the challenges of growing a winter sport in Texas. The challenges of growing a winter sport in Texas. How have you navigated through those challenges to grow, the club being such a heated area all over Texas, and how do you keep the growth and the interest alive?

Brigitte: 3:15

I think one thing that's really neat is that even though we are in Texas, not a ton of ice, you know, hockey has grown exponentially in the past several years, right, I mean in Dallas, houston, all over the state really. And so when the Winter Olympics came out and again curling kind of was at the forefront of a lot of American households, you know, everyone kind of found it fun to watch. Quirky didn't really understand it. Well, it's grown more, you know, every day, and we are seeing it more on a national level. Nbc Sports, cbs Sports recently had a huge event, and so as curlers, we get all the great questions.

Brigitte: 3:50

So to, I think, as a board and really our members in general, when you talk about anything with the excitement that we do and how much we love the sport, it's easy for people to get excited about it with us, right, they're curious, they want to know more. And the second we say, by the way, you can try it in Texas. Everyone jumps all over it and wants to do it. But of course, the challenge, like you said, we are in Texas Not a lot of ice, not a lot of place to, not a lot of areas to play. We have one club right now at the Children's Health Center in Las Colinas, and that's all we have, and so we're working really, really hard on getting our own space.

Storie Titus: 4:25

That's awesome. Mentioning your own space. You are planning on moving here pretty soon. What area are you guys going to be moving to and how are you guys kind of bringing in the community involvement to interact with?

Ryan: 4:39

Yeah. So we did a big kind of effort to see where our members are in the area and then do kind of a graph to say, okay, this is the area that we want to be in because of our members and basically also like also a place where you know where can we grow that's.

Ryan: 4:59

I think it's important to not only put us in a position where our members can come easily, but also where we can grow as a club. And we did this huge study and we found out that, you know, our central location was still around Irving, but where we're kind of looking now is Plano, right off of George Bush and 75. Nice, and it's just a great location. 75, obviously, you know, if you're in the DFW area, it's like one of the busiest highways ever. So all that traction we're getting, with people coming in and out of 75, people in Plano, plano is a hugely populated area. So we're really looking to the future with this spot that we're going to.

Storie Titus: 5:40

That's wonderful. So with the continued growth, can you kind of tell our audience what audience are you looking for, what age ranges can? Right, and so it is great. But also, you know we do corporate events, we do you know public learn to curls private learn to curls.

Brigitte: 5:55

And what's really neat is again a family can do it together you can do it for you know fun, you know beer league with the friends or on a very high competitive level. Actually, the DFW Curling Club. We are the most decorated curling club in the entire United States and so that also helps us bring you know with the growth and word of mouth. It's also helping us with sponsorships, things like that. That's going to be a huge part of our growth coming up. And, like Ryan mentioned just that Plano area is so big and so growing that we want to share. We want to be central so we can really share with everyone.

Storie Titus: 6:49

Yeah, it really is booming right now. I know a lot of businesses are coming out here from California, from all over, and that it really is a hub to kind of broadcast this.

Brigitte: 6:54

And we do corporate events with Toyota, liberty, mutual, we've done IUT Southwestern. I mean, these are huge companies that they're bringing their executives in just to do team building, and so, once we have our club, one of the things that we are lacking right now is just having a really great area not just to do a curling event but to do, you know, a corporate meeting, to have a luncheon, to be able to do you know that and then get on the ice sort of thing. That's wonderful, and so that's one of the biggest parts about our club how we see us growing is really to have not just the curling space but the event space as well.

Ryan: 7:29

And I think also too, like our, our youth programs right, I think we want to build the sport in general, right? So to do that we have to have a good youth program and by doing that we are going to offer youth programs that will have multiple teams compete throughout the country. But, obviously, you know, practice at our facility and learn the sport.

Storie Titus: 7:53

That's wonderful for Texas youth because the heat really does have a factor in a lot of sports we play, and having this be an indoor sport and such a technical sport is really a growth experience for them. I also was aware that you guys have a Learn to Curl event coming up. Can you tell us a little more about that?

Brigitte: 8:11

Yeah, it's going to be December 29th. We've got, so it's about an hour and a half. We do a small portion of it off, ice, kind of a little bit of get to know curling, so everyone can get the lingo down by the next Olympics and then what we do, because there's a lot.

Ryan: 8:25

There's a lot of lingo. Yes, with every sport right.

Brigitte: 8:28

Curling is like chess on ice. It's like the play before the play before the play. So once you really get the strategy down, it's so exciting to watch, right and so from there then we hit the ice literally or figuratively, not literally and everyone really has a great time. So we just go through the basics of curling you're throwing the rock 150 feet down the ice, you're sweeping, you're doing all the things that you see on TV, but in a really cool, lighthearted kind of time.

Brigitte: 8:55

And again afterwards we have so many people that come to us and go. That was the best time ever. Where can we join? When can we play more? And again, we just don't have that ability right now. But again, like you were saying, it's 8 or 80. It's all levels of athleticism. We also have stick curling, adaptive curling, which is great. Listen, we're all getting older and let's have bad knees. Um, but truly, it's just. It's such a cool sport that everybody and anybody can do and curling has a community that is unlike anyone, any other sport, I really believe. Um, the losing team, when you're done, we'll typically buy a beer for the, or the winning team will buy a beer for the losing team. Growing up in curling, I mean, that's where we had our baby showers. We're at the curling club, that's where we had, you know, supper club kind of thing. It's almost like a country club and it's neat. But again, you've got. You know, everyone can do it and that's what we love so much about it.

Ryan: 9:48

It's such a social sport right.

Storie Titus: 9:50

Yeah, it seems like it.

Ryan: 9:52

It's competitive, but it's also like more of a social sport than anything and meeting new people. I can't tell you how many new people that I've met since I started back in 2021, and how they have affected me professionally and just from a friendship status. So it's just a really cool sport to be involved in as you grow into your professional career and just in life in general.

Storie Titus: 10:19

That's wonderful. So with this event, ryan, how are you having any challenges with reaching a new audience rather than just your niche audience? And, bridget, to expand on that, you mentioned challenges of funds and sponsorships to help raise and keep supporting these nonprofit events. How do you manage those two things?

Ryan: 10:40

Yeah, I think any time you're in a nonprofit situation and trying to garner funds and you know people to get interested in, especially in a sport that's not really popular here, it's difficult, right. But I think you know we have some really great strategies in place that are reaching new people that probably didn't even think they knew curling or thought it was available, right. So we have those tools and we're implementing them to reach a broader audience in the DFW area and not just DFW, really everywhere.

Storie Titus: 11:12

Wonderful and to touch on that, raising funds and sponsorships and bringing those ends will allow you to have more of those clinics and those events to help these kids. Is that correct?

Brigitte: 11:23

Absolutely, and it's, you know, there's so many wonderful. You know they always say Dallas-Fort Worth is such a giving area, right, such a giving community, and so to have a sport that also allows, you know, school-age children to come out. And I mean, we just did a Learn to Curl for a group of 10-year-olds and I mean, although it was slight chaos, it was a blast. And this young man literally is like this is my favorite sport, I can't wait to do it. And it's hard as a club to say I'm sorry, we don't have the ice for you. So our fundraising has really been again. Just, we have to educate people, right, educating people not just about the sport and how fun it is, but truly the value that comes in it, not just with our, you know, our community of special abilities, our children's community. We've actually have a whole bunch of people from the VA that are trying to book an event with us right now in.

Brigitte: 12:13

January, which is going to be great. And so, again, people want to be on board with that. They want to support, you know, just your local community, but a larger community, and I think we can definitely do that here. I think it's all about education. We love to. We joke that we're curling nerds. We love to talk curling.

Ryan: 12:33

She's more of a curling nerd than.

Storie Titus: 12:34

I am. I mean, I really am, Because it has its own language right, it really does Like when you know someone in curling, that's the person you want to talk to, because others just don't get it sometimes.

Brigitte: 12:43

But we are also walking billboards. I'm telling you, if you wear a shirt that has curling on it or a hat that has the Curling Club or USA Curling, we are stopped, constantly, constantly, like is that that Olympic sport. And then it's so easy to engage, but also an opportunity for us to educate.

Storie Titus: 12:58

So, absolutely so, for the other nonprofit niche, sports kind of groups trying to grow unconventional challenge that you may have, that you can and advice you could give them to help overcome those challenges with their marketing, fundraising, community engagement.

Ryan: 13:15

Honestly, just keep pushing right Like keep pushing yourself out there. I think if the more you push yourself as far as advertising and spreading the word, getting to local events, you know all those things accumulate to people reaching out.

Storie Titus: 13:33

Right, just being that walking billboard. Yeah, the walking billboard. Yeah, exactly. So what are the best ways for our listeners to support DFW Curling Club and all that you have to offer?

Ryan: 13:43

Yeah, so you can go to wwwdfwcurlingcom. Check out our website. You can follow us on LinkedIn, instagram, facebook at DFW Curling Club.

Brigitte: 13:55

Yeah, there's so many ways, and you know we also do a lot of off-ice events as well, and as the Olympics get closer, you know we're going to have watch parties.

Ryan: 14:03

You know we're going to have.

Brigitte: 14:04

We partner with some of the local breweries and have you know events there, which is super fun. Again, always trying to be in everyone's face per se.

Storie Titus: 14:11

That is amazing.

Ryan: 14:13

The more social events we can have again, the broader audience we're going to reach.

Storie Titus: 14:17

Absolutely so, Bridget. Are there any last things you'd like to mention or insights for the upcoming facility you'd like to let the audience know about?

Brigitte: 14:25

Absolutely. I would just love everyone to you know what, give it a shot, watch it on TV, learn a little bit more about the sport, because you'll appreciate it so much more once it starts. But we want everyone to try it once, right For sure.

Ryan: 14:39

Check it out, see how it is.

Brigitte: 14:40

But when I say everyone who tries it falls in love with it, I'm not kidding. It's truly such a fun sport. You walk away feeling great, you walk away feeling positive and, again, the community that we have is so great. So we'd love for everyone to just give it a shot, whether it's watching it on TV, cheering your team on in the Olympics, or come in and check out the Curling Club. You can even come watch during our leagues.

Storie Titus: 15:03

So we've got yeah, it's free, it's free. Well, your infectious energy has sold me.

Ryan: 15:09

So I will be giving it a try, because I am intrigued thoroughly.

Storie Titus: 15:12

And I appreciate both of you coming on the show and helping share this awesome sport because it really can appeal to so much more of an audience in Texas and we need that right now, for sure. So thank you.

Brigitte: 15:26

Thank you, thank you.

Storie Titus: 15:32

Thank you To our audience out there. I will be sharing the website link to register for any events they may be having and to just maybe join the watch parties. I'll see you next time on Market it with Atma.