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November 24, 2025 13 mins

What if the most impactful thing your club could do this season… didn’t cost a dime?

In this episode of The Private Club Radio Show, host Denny Corby shares two powerful — and surprisingly simple — ways club leaders can make meaningful connections with members during the holidays.

It’s not about big budgets or fancy activations. It’s about human moments. Gratitude. Intentional outreach. And yes — asking your staff to take the photo.

Inside, you’ll hear:

  • Why Thanksgiving is the perfect time to re-engage quiet or “missing” members
  • A small hospitality habit that creates big emotional ROI
  • “Miss You Week” — a low-effort, high-impact campaign you can run right now
  • How dessert and check-in calls could turn into your club’s most-loved traditions
  • Why member memories matter more than your club newsletter ever will

Whether you're a GM, department head, or hospitality pro, this episode is a warm reminder that the smallest gestures often go the furthest — especially when paired with purpose.

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Transcript

Episode Transcript

Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
SPEAKER_00 (00:00):
Hey everybody, welcome to the Private Club
Radio Show, where we give youthe scoop on all things private
golf and country clubs frommastering leadership and
management, food and beverageexcellence, member engagement
secrets, board governance, andeverything in between, all while
keeping it fun and light.
Whether you're a club veteran,just getting your feet wet, or
somewhere in the middle, you arein the right place.

(00:20):
I'm your host, Denny Corby.
Welcome to the show.
We have Thanksgiving coming upthis week, the rest of the
holidays coming up the nextcouple of weeks, and before we
know it, it's going to be theend of the year.
And I want to share with you twosimple things, both that are
small and tiny on paper, butthey scream, we see you and we
care about you to your members.

(00:41):
One is checking on the memberswho have gone quiet, and two is
helping the members who show upactually capture their memories.
That's it.
If you are listening to thisright now around Thanksgiving,
first of all, you're a hero.
You have so much work coming up,and I hope you get to spend time
with your families, workfamilies, home families, all the

(01:03):
families, but more importantly,your home families.
So I don't know if you'relistening to this on the way to
the car to work, on the way tothe club, drinking a coffee at
the gym, answering a text,mentally counting how many
turkeys you have and you'rewalking.
I don't know.
But you have so much going on.
So I promise I'm not going togive you homework.
I just want to give you twoideas, two thoughts to take into

(01:27):
this week and the rest of theyear.
The first is if you haven't doneso already, carve out a little
bit of time and check in on yourmembers who you may have not
seen recently.
Maybe not, I'm not saying aweek, two weeks, three weeks.
I'm thinking a month, twomonths, maybe even three months.
The ones who maybe used to cometo Wednesday dinners and now

(01:48):
have gone silent, the ladiesgroup players, the people who
come to the gym, you know, youcan tell and see who's been
around.
And if not, guess what?
A lot of us have amazing clubsoftwares.
You have your members firsts,you have your Jonas's, you have
your North Stars, you havewhatever you use, you have the
ability to go in and see usage.
So go in, see who has not usedthe club, and start maybe a mini

(02:11):
campaign.
Nothing crazy.
And I want to tell you whatprompted this thought in this
episode because I was chattingwith a GM friend of mine
recently.
And this is a club where Ipersonally know members and
clients, and we keep in touch.
So when I was chatting withthem, I asked how these members
were, and they said, Ooh, Iactually haven't seen or heard

(02:34):
from them in a little bit.
And I mentioned to them that Iknow for a fact the husband had
a decent health issue, scare,some things that have happened,
and her jaw dropped.
And it wasn't a cold or uncaringjaw drop or anything like that.
It was just because we all haveso much going on, and sometimes

(02:56):
you just forget things, people,whatever.
It slips through the cracks, andthat's okay.
So many things are flying at youand coming at you on a daily
basis, especially around thistime.
And they told me, I'm gonna goreach out, make sure they're
good, and just check in onthings.
And after that call, I got I gotthinking.

(03:17):
If I know one family who isgoing through something at a
club and maybe not using theclub as much, how many others
are quietly dealing in this?
How many, how many other peopleare quietly dealing with this
and going through this?
And this is has to be happeningat other clubs.
So find that list, find thosepeople and reach out.

(03:40):
Maybe even with the team, I knowwe're all busy, do a little, a
little campaign.
Maybe if you get a list,hopefully it's not many because
hopefully a lot of your membersare using your clubs, but let's
just say it's that time of year.
And granted, you know, I knowsome members move and have
different clubs that they go to,so that's a whole different
thing.
That's a whole separate, youknow, uh, we're not talking
about this here.
This is more re-engaging,getting, making sure our people

(04:02):
are okay and checking in onthem.
And you can even divide itamongst your leadership team.
Who's to even say it just has tobe you?
Hopefully, there's not like alot of people.
So if you have to sprinkle itout a little bit, um, or maybe
you want to do a biggercampaign, and it's, you know,
you have some people who maybehaven't used the club for a
while, and then maybe you haveones who haven't used it for

(04:23):
three months, two months, amonth, whatever, and you have
different touch points or adifferent approach to each one.
But regardless, the job issimple.
Just reach out like a human.
Hey, it's Denny from the club.
You popped into my mind.
We haven't seen you aroundlately.
Everything okay, everythinggood.
You know, I'm always a fan ofgiving them a reason to come in.

(04:45):
Hey, next time you come in, orwhy don't you come in next week?
Desserts on us.
Hey, we know you like, we got afresh bottle of whatever in.
Why don't you come?
Bottle's on us, or the firstclass is on us, the first drink
is on us, the appetizer is onus, maybe a handwritten note to
those people with a drink ticketor a token or just something
that just brightens their day.

(05:06):
Nothing huge, just enough tosay, we really do care about
you.
We see you, or actually, wedon't see you, we want to see
you.
Please come come and see us.
And you never know whatresponses you might get.
Hey, we've been crazy withsports, we've been helping with
the grandkids, we've beentraveling.
Awesome.
Those are all just points toknow and just information to

(05:27):
have.
Because you might also get, oh,my mom's been sick, my wife just
had surgery, I lost my job.
You you don't know what's goingon, and clubs are a place of
caring, so let's care.
Because that could be heavystuff, and this is where clubs
can really shine.
Personally, I think so.

(05:48):
And this is the kind of thingthat turns membership into
relationship.
Oh, and hey, if you are lookingfor fun ways to create really
cool memories for your members,I do a really cool magic mind
reading and comedy showspecifically designed for the
club audience.
That's a great time.
It's super engaging, a lot ofcrowd work, a lot of banter.

(06:09):
If you want to learn more, headon over to dennycorby.com.
Perform for well over 350 clubsat this point, I think over 400.
So if you want to be in goodhands, holla at you, boy,
DennyCorby.com.
And just real quick, here's adumb idea.
I'm just full of them.
Uh, if anybody talks to me onthe phone, you know, I just
throw out random ideas andsometimes there's there there's

(06:30):
there's a good one.
Uh, but I thought about whatabout like a miss you week?
It doesn't have to be like anadvertised thing, it could be
like an internal club thing.
Like, what about like a miss youweek?
Pick a random slow week you knowyou might have, whether it's
December, January, heck,February, who cares?
But pick a time and hey, come inthis week, enjoy a complimentary
dessert on a whatever it is.

(06:51):
I just thought that was a cool,a cool idea.
Another idea is, hey, and itdoesn't have to even be you, the
GM or whoever you are at theclub.
It could be a group effort.
Why not maybe give a name or twoto chef?
Right?
The bartender, somebody thatthat person maybe connects with.
Maybe you know that one memberwho hasn't been coming in loves

(07:12):
food and loves the chef andwhatever.
Maybe have the chef call.
Maybe you know the one bartenderand the one member always click,
they're always laughing, talkingabout sports.
Hey, maybe have the bartendercall the member from the from
the club phone.
Hey, you come in to watch thegame on Thursday?
I got your seat reserved in ayou know, cold cocktail waiting,

(07:34):
whatever it is.
I don't know.
I don't know.
Really simple, really human.
All right, that is part one.
Now I want to talk about thesecond part, which is memories.
Because while some members aremissing, we have a whole bunch
of them who are about to pourthrough your doors.
Thanksgiving, Christmas parties,holiday parties, kids home from

(07:56):
college, grandparents coming infrom out of town, whatever, they
are utilizing your club.
And the club is about to becomea foreground or background.
It's good, it's gonna be groundfor a lot of memories.
So I want to give you a funchallenge that costs absolutely
nothing, just takes a little bitof time for you and your team
and is totally in your control.

(08:16):
Now, confession time, me and mywife are horrible at taking
pictures together.
Every trip we go on, oh man, wehave to take pictures.
Every time we go out, we have toget a picture together.
And the next thing we know,we're home, we're in our
jammies, cuddled up with thedogs, and we're like, we did not
get a photo together.
We just came back from vacation,and that literally happened.

(08:37):
We have a few good photos, butwe should have more for how good
we looked the whole time.
No, I have 10 pictures of thesushi, but two of me and my
wife.
So now imagine we have ourmembers, we have our families,
we have our members' friends,our members' families coming for
coming to the club.

(08:58):
And I know this is not just mebeing, I know a lot of couples,
a lot of families, they justthey're just sometimes bad at
taking photos.
So here's just an idea to talkabout to your staff, to your
crew, to your bartenders, toyour servers, that when you have
people come in and they'relooking good and you can tell
they look good, even if theydon't look good, you make them
feel good.

(09:18):
But maybe at the beginning,maybe in the middle, maybe the
food's running a little bitlate, maybe at the very end, you
just say, You guys look reallygreat tonight.
Give me your phone.
Let me take a picture of you.
Take that little proactiveapproach, take their phone, take
pictures of them.
They're never gonna be mad, butthey might be really happy.

(09:39):
And it might not be right now.
It might be a week from now, amonth from now, two months.
You don't know when, but asthey're scrolling, they might
stop and look at that photo, butoh, that was a that was a fun
night.
Oh, that was a great meal.
Remember, oh, that was so muchfun when Bob and Phyllis came
with us and blah, blah, blah.
It's not waiting for someone toask, it's just doing it.

(10:00):
Could even be the host as asthey're as they're walking in
and they and they look great.
Oh my god, you guys look amazingtonight.
Give me your phone.
Let me take a photo, stand bythe tree, stand here.
Or even if they're it doesn'tmatter.
Hey, before you guys leave, letme take a photo so you guys can
send it in the family group chator whatever.
I don't know.
But you're picking up what I'mputting down.

(10:20):
Because that also got methinking, too.
Remember the lost art of whenyou would go to a restaurant and
when it was your birthday orsomething, they would take a
photo with that digital cameraand they would print it out and
give it to you.
Maybe we can bring that back.
You can get really great, reallygreat, cheap, quick ink printers
that print on good paper, thatare Bluetooth, that you can

(10:42):
have, you know, you can have apicture in seconds.
Or you can take that picture anddo something with like a maybe a
nice card or something too.
Doesn't matter, that's a wholeother conversation.
But you get where I'm going.
And if you really want to bringthis full circle, which I think
is always fun, is if you combinethe two.

(11:03):
So you run that little campaign,you reach out to some members
who maybe aren't as engaged withthe club, you you know, what for
whatever reason, and you getthem to come in and you take
their picture on their phone,obviously, but maybe you can get
that picture, or maybe the staffmember, the GM, maybe they take
a picture on their phone, maybethey airdrop that picture to
you.
Hey, we would love to add thatto like the newsletter.

(11:24):
The thing is just getting thepicture.
And maybe you run a littlecampaign, and maybe it's
something a week later, two, whoknows?
I don't I don't know where whereI'm going with it, but maybe
it's we notice when youdisappear and we notice when
you're here.
And it's just like and it's apicture, and maybe you do
something in Canva and you printit out.
I don't know.
It's just saying, we appreciateyou, we're thinking about you,

(11:47):
and we want to go above andbeyond.
You matter here, beyond yourdues, beyond your tea times,
beyond your F and B minimums.
You matter here.
You're using data to find outwho is missing, and then you're
using presence to say, look atthis beautiful moment right here
in front of us.
Let us help us capture that foryou.
This is the stuff that makesclubs irreplaceable.

(12:11):
And what's crazy is that there'scompanies and businesses that
people spend nowhere near theamount of time and money on and
with that do things like this.
And us at clubs, we have theability to go above and beyond
and do so much.
So let's do it.
So, real quick, find members whohaven't been there for a minute,

(12:33):
reach out, let them know you arethinking about them, and if and
when you get them in, or justyour members, take the moment to
capture those moments for themon their cameras.
And if you want, you can dostuff with those pictures
internally uh for a really coolcampaign.
So that's it.
Make it a great season, takecare of your people, take care

(12:54):
of your staff, take care of yourmembers, take care of yourself.
That's it.
And as we're wrapping up 2025here going in going into 2026,
if you are looking for some funentertainment for your club, a
really fun member event night,let me know.
We got the Denny Corbyexperience.
There's excitement, there'smystery, also there's magic,
mind reading, and comedy, a tonof laughs, gasps, and holy

(13:16):
craps.
If I can help you create somememories in your club, let me
know.
Reach out, dennycorby.com.
That's this episode.
Happy Thanksgiving.
Until next time, catch y'all onthe flippity flip.
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