After more than 17 years of various executive roles in corporate America at Ecolab, Jeff Testa chuckles at his simplistic strategic career shift into the golf space as founder of Neighborhood National.
With COVID-19 coming to an end two years ago, Testa’s wife was looking forward to her first Pilates class since the pandemic started. As she was leaving the house, Testa finally built up enough courage to inform his wife of a new venture he had been thinking about for some time.
“She had her foot halfway out the door and I said, ‘Hey honey, I think I’m going put a golf simulator in the garage and see if anyone wants to share it,”’ Testa, 46, says. “She paused, kind of turned around, and was just nonchalant and said, ‘OK.”’
Little did she know that her husband would have the golf simulator ordered by the time she returned to their Greensboro, North Carolina, home.
“I then stuck a couple of yard signs out front, took a couple ads out in our neighborhood newsletter and I soon had 10 guys coming over and using the simulator out of my garage,” Testa says. “That was a stepping off point, and my wheels started turning, and by the end of the year I had 20 people coming and hitting out of my garage.”
And Neighborhood National was born. Testa quit his real job and began beating the drum of his community golf concept.
“I think for lots and lots of people the biggest challenge in the game is the lack of accessibility,” Testa says, “Golf’s a lot of things, but it typically is not convenient and/or affordable for the vast majority of people who enjoy it. And that’s really kind of where I started from. How do I make it way more convenient, way more affordable? That got me into the sharing approach. And from there what I realized is it’s way more fun and there is more business opportunity in wrapping a community around it. The sharing of simulators is just the ingredient to get us there.”
Neighborhood National offers unlimited play for members and their guests, with hosts serving as “golf pros” by using high-end simulators with a community focus.
The concept is pretty simple. There is a $50 fee for Testa to run background checks on all involved, and then around $65 a month for each member to use the shared simulator at the “private club” of choice. Each location is capped at about 20 members with the monthly membership dues helping each host to defer the cost of purchasing the costly simulator.
Five of the nine clubs for the upstart company are in North Carolina, with two in Georgia and one each in South Carolina and Texas.
Four of the North Carolina locations have a waiting list to join and there are currently a total of 150 members in Neighborhood National.
“We limit the membership for a couple of reasons but the main mission is we’re trying to make a member’s golf dream come true,” Testa says. “And it’s never going to be a dream come true if you can never use it.”
Each host sets hours at his or her location and members are permitted access during those hours of operation.
“Everybody’s expectations are managed,” Testa says.
Each host is required to purchase a high-end simulator that Testa approves and set up a location. Most have been in garages or detached buildings, but several are in commercial locations.
“I think people generally are looking for simulators and then they stumble across us” Testa says of the host pros. “Most have followed us for a while and have decided to opt in.”
As the concept grows across the nation, members of Neighborhood National will be able to use various locations when they travel for pleasure or business.
“I have two rules,” Testa says. “Treat the club like it’s your own and don’t be a jerk. There’s a one strike and you are out policy. I’m judge and jury. My spiel to every member that comes on board is there’s a line of abuse that’s out there, just don’t come close to the line and everyone’s fine. If your toe touches the line, you’re out and it has worked really well so far.”
Testa admits he’s not getting rich yet off the concept, but he’s OK with the current financial structure of a 20% revenue share with each club. As an avid golfer, Testa revels in trying to share the game across the nation in a community atmosphere that he believes will catch on.
“In a startup world it’s easy to cherry pick the good things and ignore the bad,” Testa says. “But I would say objectively the new Charleston, South Carolina, location is absolutely crushing it. It’s a function of all the learning and changes I’ve made. I did make some notable investments for myself in figuring out how to manage social media a little bit more, and I did that just prior to the Charleston launch. We got 10 members in just over two weeks of starting to run promos, and I target getting to 20 people in three months, so it’s going exceedingly well.
“I understand people’s hesitancy or reservations to sign up and then to get started. And I’m not completely green or a guy who has never experienced trials and tribulations of creating things before. I understood there was going to be challenges. But I’d say I’m more programmed as an eternal optimist. If you asked me a year ago, I would have said we should be at 300 clubs by now, but I think we’ve got traction. The really cool part for me is that this is just still really, really fun. And that was my biggest thing I noticed coming out of the corporate world is I’m never angry anymore. Yeah, I’m stressed for sure, but I’m not angry. Work doesn’t feel like work anymore.”
And Testa’s goal remains the same.
“We want to become the largest private golf club in the world that literally anyone can belong to.,” he says.