How They Crushed It

Bonny Gothier | The Power of Reinventing Oneself, Filling Voids in the City, & Authentic Connections

• Direct Mortgage Loans • Season 2 • Episode 4

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Bonny Gothier shares her journey of reinventing herself from a dental hygienist to a successful businesswoman in the pickleball industry. She emphasizes the importance of passion, hustle, and never stopping learning. Bonny also highlights the significance of connection and authenticity in business, as well as the need for human connection in today's society. She shares her experience of opening Baltimore Pickleball Club and the strategies she used to grow the business, including word of mouth and corporate events. Bonny's story serves as an inspiration for anyone looking to reinvent themselves and find success in their chosen field.

Direct Mortgage Loans (00:

00.046) Business is just an expression of things we love and we happen to be lucky enough to make money from it. can't fake passion. Reinventing yourself is very important. From dental hygiene to pickleball with a bunch of stops in between. I love learning. I never want to stop learning. You can't teach hustle. If you have a will and a strength and a commitment and you're willing to sacrifice, I think you can really become anything and do anything. And here's to that everybody, you're never too late to reinvent yourself. Exactly. I love that. Welcome everybody to season two, episode four of the How They Crushed It podcast. Today's guest is my friend Bonnie Goethier from Baltimore Pickleball Club. She's got a great story, a really, really great story and journey in her business life that's worth hearing and a lot of great principles that we want to talk about. Plus, I love pickleball and she's the pickleball expert, so we'll get into a little bit of that too. So check it Welcome everybody to season two, episode four of the How They Crushed It podcast. I'm excited today about a guest whose business I've attended many times. I've got Bonnie Goethier. I didn't want to mispronounce it. Bonnie Goethier from Baltimore Pickleball Club in Timonium, Maryland. And I'm pumped to talk to her today. And obviously you wore green because of the pickleball theme. Absolutely. See, we didn't talk about that before we got on camera. the theme. Yeah, Bonnie's got a great business that, like I said, I do play pickleball poorly, slowly. I'm not an A player by any means, but I love it. And she's got a great story and we're pumped to talk about it. So Bonnie, we always start with a little bit of rapid fire questions. And because you are business, you know, you're in the pickleball business. First off, I asked Google this morning, you know where the term pickleball comes from? Yes, I do. Tell us, because I just read about it and it was obscure to me. It's quite a controversy. And actually on Google, there's times you'll actually get. some variable Well then tell me because I know what I just read. Variable stories. So they'll talk about how there was this family that created the game from not having their badminton equipment. And they brought out kind of other types of paddles and they only had a wiffle ball. So it was a very thrown together type of sport that these families that were vacationing, maybe on a lake or somewhere, threw together and made it happen. They had a certain size available at the court.

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16.958) and they did a little hodgepodge of equipment and ideas, mixing kind of together a badminton, tennis, ping pong, which is really the three elements of pickleball. Yeah, I always tell people it's most similar to pickle, ping pong to me. Right, though that's a skill. If you have ping pong, it can really transition well. So they threw together these kind of random rules and equipment, and they had this dog named Pickle, but the dog actually came by. much later than that game that they created. So one of the gentleman's wives said, this reminds me of the pickle boat in rowing. And the pickle boat throws together many different elements. know, the rowers that are kind of in the back and pulling things together for different reasons. So she just reminds me of a hodgepodge sport. It reminds me of the pickle boat, hence came pickle ball. However, later they did get a dog and named the dog Pickles and everyone for years and you'll still hear this story. In fact, I attended a national pickleball camp and one of the coaches told us the story that this sport was named after this dog and it wasn't. So it truly is not after the dog, the dog came later. It's a long story everybody. I was shocked. I thought it was just like a funny name. I thought it was a funny name. There had to be a funny story. And I love that there's controversy. Yes. So Bonnie, our podcast is called How They Crushed It. So we always ask everybody, do you drink crushes at all? Love crushes. And what's your favorite flavor? Grapefruit, but I do skinny. So I don't do the simple syrup. I mean, and I think, I'll be honest, I don't think anyone makes the way Maryland does. I'm a little biased. am as well. okay, skinny grapefruit. That's great. Never a pickle crush? You know, we've talked about that at the club and we can go into us having a bar, but never a pickle crush. Not a bad idea. I think you have to do it at least once. I know you have Prosecco and pickle. Yes. Sometimes on Sundays, but a pickle crush would be funny.

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17.742) We always ask people about their crush preferences here. So we've had all kinds of great answers. great drink and it reminds me of summer. Totally, me too. It's still summer of 2024. My one question I ask everybody, especially women, are you a Swiftie? I am not. Okay. I'm so sorry. Look at Tiffany off camera. She's... Sorry. Sorry, Jeff. Don't cry. I'm not It doesn't hurt my feelings. There's no problem. I have to say if I know maybe three or four of her songs total, I would be lucky. I mean, think she's an amazing artist. It's just not something I've ever gotten to. Not my thing completely either. yeah, my son, Tiffany's friend, my son tells me to get on the right side of history. So that's what he told I think we are. think we're like dinosaurs. I don't know what's happening to us. Amen to that. We're not going to go down that. We're not going to date ourselves here. Yeah. Bonnie, we usually get into kind of how I ease into this with everybody is tell us your story a little bit. You know, this is Podcasts primarily to help people get good business principles just good things that they can apply to their business no matter what industry they're in and you're in a little bit of a different industry than anybody else we've interviewed so Talk to me about your story and how you got into business in general, you know, don't know the answer So I love you know hearing different people and how they went from little Bonnie into being a business woman And your business is doing great not going one. You're crushing it. Tell us about that. Okay, great Well, I'll try to make this short and sweet, although it's We've got plenty of digital space on Tiffany's camera. good. Thank goodness. my first out of college experience was I'm going to have a career, your parents want you to go to college, do something with your life. So I said, I'll become a dental hygienist. So my first career was a dental hygienist. So I did that for about six years and my back really started hurting. Back in the day, the technology wasn't really there and I just felt plagued physically. And one thing I kind of did to treat myself back then was I got my nails done. And this is probably in 1990. And in Baltimore and the greater Baltimore area where I was born and raised, at that time, there was no nail salon, if you can imagine this, because now we have them in every shopping center. I bite my nails, but I know for my wife. mean, and just look at real estate. I mean, it's in every shopping center, every mall in the nation, really.

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37.984) You can't usually go within a two -mile radius without hitting a nail salon in very populated demographic, heavily populated area. So I said to myself, there's a void. And I think what you're asking me is, with business, what's important for me? Find the void. Find the void in the market. Try to fill the void. So saw that there were no nail salons, I took a trip to California, there was one everywhere, in every shopping center, in every mall. Why don't we have this on the East Coast? So I come back to Baltimore, I go to a Melbourne's But you're not, but hold on, let me hit time out for a second, because find the void is something, you gotta be a true entrepreneur to think like that, which we'll get into that, but you weren't a business person yet at this point. No, I was literally a consumer. A dental hygienist is typically the path of a budding entrepreneur. Exactly. Okay, keep going. Although I did read a lot of motivational things I attended when I was younger, like a Tony Robbins seminar. So it was hidden inside of you, you just had to let her out. I think it was deep there and you know, I said, and really just the fact that my back had hurt so badly and I thought I need a career but I'm not sure I really picked the right one in college. And I think, know, reinventing yourself is very important and you can reinvent yourself. many times over in life and I hope that never anyone gets discouraged from that. I think there's people every day that live in jobs and they look in the mirror in the morning and think, I don't want to be here going to this job. So if you have a will and a strength and a commitment and you're willing to sacrifice, I think you can really become anything and do anything. You hear that everybody? Never too late to reinvent yourself. Exactly. I love that. So I did, I started doing this research and I said, you know what, I went to a Melvin Simon property, which used to be Golden Ring Mall back in the day. There was an old mall. It was one of our first malls in Baltimore. And I leased a space and I opened a nail salon. In Golden Ring Mall? In Golden Ring Mall. my gosh, that's hilarious. In the early 90s. And I want to tell you that everyone said, you are crazy. This is, you'll never make enough money doing nails, you know? And I said,

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40.428) You know, I believe in this. Women want to be pampered. Women want it to be easy, mainstream, accessible. That's important for a business. It has to be accessible. It has to be visible. There has to be high traffic. in service types of businesses, at least, you know, that's important. So I leased my first space and I said, this is working. It's immediately started to work, which I knew it would. And you do have to believe in yourself. I think that's an important key. and anything you do. And I said, I'm gonna go for a second location. I went over to Towson Commons and I opened one there. I went over to Parkville, I opened one there. I went to What year is this? This was from 90 to 90, maybe 98, I think I did this over a period of seven, eight years. So I ended up, I'll make this long story short, opening five, I put in skincare, tanning, and in one of the locations I had hair services. it started to move from California over from the West Coast to the East Coast and get very inundated, very populated in the business. So I sold out. I was the 17th largest nail and skincare salon in the United States at that time. I sold out to my competitors, which were the people that were coming over from the other coast and undercutting the prices, which sometimes happens in business. It gets populated. And actually I believe that's gonna happen in pickleball, to be honest with you. I see a trend happening that way. The market gets saturated, availability becomes very, very big, the locations are everywhere, and prices sometimes get driven down. So anyway, then after the skincare, I decided, well, I really feel like my calling is counseling, mental health. I really did a lot of work with motivation. We're jumping. No, I love it. Dental hygiene. to nail and beauty maintenance to mental health. Okay, keep going, I love this. Went back to school, got my masters in mental health counseling. Practiced in that for a few years and still kind of do a little bit of pro bono stuff. Never really went out and did private practice. My daughter, one of my daughters followed in my footsteps. It was something I just had this urge to do. I love learning, I never wanna stop learning. Another recommendation for entrepreneurs, business people, or anyone, never stop learning.

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00.812) If you never stop learning, you have the ability to reinvent yourself. Absolutely. I think it's one of the pillars. amen. I love it. staying motivated and discovering where your talents are and how you can make them bloom. So I went back at my master's and then my husband said to me, we've worked really hard in our lives, why don't we spend some time in Florida? So we went down to Florida in the winter. We found a community we loved. We ended up buying property there. And guess what they had at the property? I'm guessing with your green outfit, it's pickleball. Yes, very good, very good. So I got introduced to pickleball. I was originally a tennis player. I had some micro rotator cuff tears, which actually, interestingly enough, a lot of my clients have. Which the full stroke of tennis? It does, and it also the vibrations of the tennis string. A lot of times when you're cutting and you're cutting with your weight out in front of you with the racket out here, it tends to vibrate the rotator cuff. So it tends to really bother that injury tennis. Pickleball for me, it didn't bother it as much. It might be the type of injury I have, because I've heard people that can't play either with their injuries. I did fine transitioning over. I transitioned over in this community, made some really great friends. And this is really where the seed of Baltimore Pickleball Club happened. I had all these friends, we would winter there, come back in the summer, come back in the summer and, I mean, I'm sorry, yeah, back to our hometowns, go back in the winter and talk about what do we do all summer. Well, they all got better than me. And I'm like, how are you guys improving and I'm staying the same? Well, we play all summer at our indoor clubs and we have a pro and we have, where are you doing this? And they're in Connecticut, New Jersey, New York. We have many clubs. you don't have clubs in Baltimore. And I literally wanted to cry because I - can tell you're competitive. I haven't seen that side of you yet till right now. Just a little. Okay. Just a little. so I love Baltimore. I did move away from Baltimore to Pennsylvania with my husband for 17 years. We had a horse farm. It was an amazing experience, but I never got Baltimore out of my heart. And one of the things I love about the Atlas Group, the restaurants and Alex Smith is he always writes, Baltimore needs it. And that's kind of one of his hashtags. And I always -

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17.71) identified with that, that our city is a great city. It's a beautiful city, it's underrated. And I thought, we deserve this. Why does Connecticut have it and New York and other places and we don't. I love it. So I come back, I start looking at property because my husband is a real estate developer. This gets really interesting, Dean. You'll love this. As someone who's been to your club, and my wife's been to your club, she's probably watching this a lot more than I have. Go ahead. So I started looking at properties without my husband's help because I had done this before. I was an entrepreneur. I had a business plan. I used the real estate developer when you can just do it yourself. Exactly. So we started searching out some clubs and I would look at different properties. Didn't like this location. Didn't love that location. I just wanted just right sweet spot. You know, one of the properties I really liked, I called the broker and actually this happened to me twice. we're not interested. Pickleball's a fad. Pickleball's going away. You're not interested. I have the equity, I have the business plan, I have the will, and I would like to look at this property. we're not interested. Wouldn't even show me the property, the one firm. The second one I called and they brought me in, I looked around, they said, you don't really think Pickleballs have had? And this is about, we opened a year ago, so this is about four years before we opened, or three years. So I looked actively for three years in Baltimore County, even in the city. And I just was absolutely bewildered that these brokers didn't take me seriously and saddened by the fact that they couldn't do the market research to realize that this was an absolutely exploding sport all over the nation and that we were on the losing edge of it. clearly you, mean another trade of all entrepreneurs, you persevered. Persevered, kept looking. Finally, I did have to get my husband involved. because he knew the broker of where we are now. We're at St. John's property in Timonium. And he said, great, let's do it. Let's look at this property. And it was an old retro fitness building. Yeah, I didn't know what was in there. We've been in that strip. We shopped for our dogs right down the road from the pet store there.

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28.934) And you know, went in, I said I can make this work. Unfortunately not as many courts as I really wanted. We might eventually expand to some outdoor courts there in the parking lot. working on that. Four courts at Baltimore Picklebox. Four professional tournament grade, which is very important. Tournament grade courts. By the way, I don't want to go off on a tangent. What makes it tournament grade? Color, know, typically color when you go. Surface. And surface very much so. Surface, it's very expensive to develop these courts. They have like a cushion. slightly cushioned layer underneath, many, many multiple layers that take days to process. And where I had the experience and the knowledge was I competed in tournaments all over the country before I opened. So I knew what I was looking for when I went in and wanted to develop a club. And I also wanted to make it a very elite kind of specialized club where it was about socialization, community, and about making Baltimore better. Well, it's a great place. Look, you didn't tell me. It's not not just four courts in a warehouse, everybody. It's gorgeous in there. There's couches. There's high top tables. There is beer and wine. Beer, wine, Prosecco, White Claw. You know, we don't do the hard liquor, even though we have a liquor license. I didn't think that would medley well. I didn't really see the necessity. I didn't know that. we do. And there's a certain regulation where if you have hard alcohol, you have to add some food to the menu. And I didn't really want to get into food. I don't really I know a lot of pickleball clubs in the nation. like to serve the food aspect, but I think you have to really make that a highlight and I wasn't really willing to do that. I wanted to kind of concentrate on what I really knew. Understood. Yeah. But the bar is a nice, very nice social aspect of the club. Gotcha. so talk to me about you. You've got this business. So now you opened. You've got this business. You've got to grow it. You've got to put word of mouth out. Talk to me about, you know, how that, I mean, the launch of a brand new business. Talk to us about it. Yeah. I mean, that was very interesting. We, you know. We are locally owned and funded. So there was no, there are other clubs in our community that are funded by different investors all over the nation. So this is a locally women owned business. And therefore it was a little. Time out, it's you and your daughter, correct? Yes, my daughter who also is a physician's assistant for MedStar, but she took on this adventure with me.

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46.636) You've given her the, hold on, in my notes, you've given her the lesson about reinventing oneself sometimes? yeah, exactly. She came a little begrudgingly, like, well, you know, but she loved pickleball and the family loves pickleball. So she was kind of all in, but at the same time, she does have a career. So she's a hustler. She's a hard worker. And I always joke around because I work for her. I really, I work for her. She's the brains and I'm the brawn. I've told my kids many, many times, so you can't teach hustle. Nope. You have to make sure somebody's got And you know, you can recognize, I believe you can recognize it a mile away when you've got some hustle in you. And I do think, you know, one of our big family mottos is lead by example. My husband and myself have always been infirm believers is that you can tell your children all you want, what they should be doing. But if you show them something else, you know, never smoke, never smoke, don't smoke. And then you smoke. Well, wait a minute, dad, mom, you smoke, you know, no, that's right, lead by example. So, you know, they watch every little thing, every little innuendo, that comes from the psychology side of my knowledge. So do, and by the way, not just kids, employees follow. Absolutely. Employees, those that you interact with in business, whether they be customers, they all follow. I agree. They want to see that you're leading by example. I agree. mean, what is it? I love saying, you know, walk your talk, you know, really mean what you say and say what you mean. I love Yeah. So that's something that's important. so hold on. talk to me. You get four courts. The doors open. Nobody walks in the first day. I mean, talk to me about that. Yeah. So we did some advertising early on in magazines and we put up an Instagram account, Facebook account, got a few Facebook kind of groups coming in, you know, where who's interested in learning about pickleball. And we did that in the local area and community, kind of nurtured those groups at first. I hired a great pro. We're very blessed. We have a wonderful pro named Trey Fidler. He's really just a powerhouse, sweet guy, great personality, high energy. And he was already very integrated in the pickleball community in Baltimore County, Baltimore City. So there was a lot of promo happening with him as well.

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59.374) We didn't do any big other than I believe we were on like a wedding site. I think it's called the knot, know for type, you know kind of targeted, you know, we really knew that an aspect of our business I hope I'm not getting off track would be no corporate parties. Yeah, and So we did some basic like email blasting, you know and kind of going around and talking to some businesses in the community about you know corporate team building things like that and we knew what would happen is all this would have tentacles You know, so there's also, had a lot of support in the pickleball community as well because I had played here for years. So just in the pickleball community, there's an app called Team Reach where you can go on and you kind of know what everyone's doing. Now you can't really go in there and advertise, but just, I went in and I was on all these groups and I would just go around to the group and is what I'm doing, you know, and would love for you to be a part of it, you know, and a lot of people that play in the rec community, the recreational community don't necessarily solicit a private club, but there was a lot of that as well. Well look, when somebody reinvents themselves into new businesses like yourself, you've gotta reinvent a marketing plan because all different, these different things you've done all have different ways to successfully market and sell and grow audience and grow eyeballs, for lack of a better term. So I love that when you say the word tentacles, that's one I've used plenty of times, you gotta give it a chance to meander out there. So like, how long did it take for that word of mouth to start really creating? eyeballs and success for you guys. Right, not long. Not long. I have to say a part of that is I calculated the weather change. So we opened in September where you start to get wind some some rainy times. And then before you know it, in October, it starts getting chilly. By the way, everybody, pickleball is a ton of fun outside, but stinks if there's wind. Exactly. Because it's a wiffle ball. It's no it's terrible. It becomes you're chasing a ball and you're not really using your skill. So that was very know, methodical that I knew I wanted to open in the fall. And that was important to me. And immediately, I think the key to our club is from the minute you walk in the door, we have front desk staff always there willing to greet you, talk with you about the sport, share with you our kind of visions and our offerings. And many clubs do not run that way. You walk in, you might have to prod or find someone somewhere and we knew we wanted to be high service.

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22.798) And that I think is what really blossomed our business is the sheer word of mouth. Walking in, making sure that the customer, the client, the player had the best experience possible. Walk your talk everybody. I love that because it's true. I've been to your place. People greet. I'm always greeted. I feel very comfortable walking in there. Now granted, I've been there a bunch of times now and I understand it, but there is always somebody greeting me and they remember who we are. We work on that. For one reason or another, I give my daughter a lot of credit, Alex, she's been amazing with hiring just the right people. And typically what we attract in, and I think this is another different aspect, we tend to attract in people that love pickleball. So many of my front desk people came to me because I love the sport, and I think I want to be part of what you're doing here. And we were just eerily lucky, I mean, in an odd sort of way. mean, I'm getting kind of like birdie with it, but you make your luck. You know, and we made our luck by really treating people well, paying people a good salary. You know, my pro has full benefits and we'll be doing profit sharing soon. Hopefully we're going to be working that out. I think it has to be a win -win. I've learned this from a lot of the people we've interviewed in a lot of industries. You can't fake passion. somebody can feel it. mean, you know, Phil, who runs Bullseye Running, he's a runner. He's into running. His people are runners. They can't sell running if they're not into running. Exactly. Same thing here. Yeah. Yeah, and I would say, I think with the exception of one lady who cannot wait to start pickleball, and I can't think of anyone else that works in our company that doesn't love the sport, that isn't crazy about it. mean, pickleball is kind of a fanatic sport, you know, it's really funny. You're either kind of all in or, you know, maybe a dabble, but it's mostly the all in people that I cater to. Totally, totally, totally. Look, this is fascinating. I could sit here talk to you all afternoon. Believing in oneself and never stop learning and learning to not learning, allowing oneself to reinvent. That's something I've heard from a lot of the other entrepreneurs I've interviewed, which is letting the world come to you, which is similar to letting yourself reinvent yourself. know, kind of let the world tell you what you should be or where there's a void. It's kind of all interrelated. Sure. I believe that. Absolutely. And that's what I hear. you saying, found, I mean, you're a dental hygienist and you...

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46.412) let's fill a void, that was a big leap. It really was. really was. Standing on my feet, working on teeth to what's the void in the marketplace and how do I fill it? I don't know that that's a normal jump for a lot of people. And once I think I had done it once, I think it became a little easier the second time, although it was quite a leap of faith because I'm in a very populated area, it's a high rent, and it's not an easy nut to crack, but it's one that's worth it. And I knew that if we put it in a good location, and made it the right atmosphere, it would work. It's not an extremely lucrative business overall, know? Pickleball is a low price point product, so you have to hustle a lot of numbers through and get innovative with your offerings, which we do with the bar and the corporate events are going extremely well. It is a very different and fun thing to do. So that's a business to business sale. so like, talk to me about that. How are you marketing that differently than just word? Is that any different than just word of mouth about people that want to show up and rent a court for an hour? We kind of used our connections quite a bit with that. So if we kind of have our ears pricked for a customer that is in a certain business, we will say, hey, are you aware that we do corporate events? This is what we do. So in other words, let's say, I'll give you an example. I had a doctor and his wife in the other day and they were just playing around the courts and we were chatting when he was taking a break and he was with Johns Hopkins and he said, know, it's really a fun place. It just has a great vibe. I hear that a lot. It was a great vibe. I've been there. That's great. 100%. We play music. lot of people, you some people say like, oh, don't know if I want to hear music when I play pickle. I've had that for maybe 1%. 99 % love it, they just love the feeling. It's just... Ignore them. Exactly, right, right. So anyway, he's like, that's a great five. And I said, you know, we do corporate events. I don't know if you ever want to do anything with Hopkins. He's like, oh my gosh, I can't believe you just said that. We have this resident program that's graduating. Let's do this. He went over and booked it right away. We had 50 resident doctors that came in that were graduating their program. They turn over in what, June every year? So he brought in, know, Libertories is actually

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01.998) prefer caterer. they, if you - had Nick, Nick laboratory is one of our guests. That's great. Well, they're great people and John's a friend of mine. And I said, okay, John, I'm giving you a lot of business. You've got to help my clients out. So he doesn't give you the, it doesn't charge you a delivery fee if he caters in libs. So he brought in libs and cakes. And I mean, they just had 50 people. They had the best time. Our pro will come set up a little mini tournament, do a little round rob, a little discussion of pickleball or teaching people what they don't know. I mean, they have the bar there. It's just, and it's team building. It's something that, you know, we all work so hard together. It tends to get tense and it tends to get, you know, focused on what are we doing here in this office? When's the time to kind of get to re -know each other as friends? So great. And look, as someone been in sales for a long time, have been around sales for a long time. have to listen, we teach young salespeople, listen for opportunity. And you're listening. You're actually, not just engaging this customer, you're listening. I mean, and that's the opportunity is just sitting there waiting for you. Had you not listened, you're not recognizing it. That's back to that passion you're talking about. If you really love what you're doing, you're not gonna be just sitting there looking at that customer like they're a dollar sign. Correct. They're a person that has No, they're behind the front desk and just, you know, checking your phone. I love that. And there's plenty of that happening out there. No, I know. Bonnie, talk, kind of what I do with everybody we talk to is, it's right now July of 2024, by the way, everybody, it's a million degrees outside today. What do you think's happening? Let's leave politics, the details of the economy, the election, let's leave all that out specifically, but what do you think's happening? What would you want to leave for people as something that's working for you right now in today's economy, today's environment you think's important. we've talked about some great principles. I love it. Reinventing yourself, believing in yourself, hustle, lead by example, walk the talk. But what is happening right now for Baltimore Pickleball in today's environment do you think people could learn from? I would say you can never really take out the economy. But I think at the basic human level, people need connection. And that's where I find, especially service businesses.

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14.562) You have to speak to that connection and how you make your product important to others. I feel that during COVID, we had this tremendous lack of connection in our society and there was just not that person to person necessity that we need on a human level. And I think now more than ever, we've during that time cultivated a culture that really loves being in front of the screen. And from working at home, from Zoom calls, from being on our devices. think they love it or you think it's just become... I think love is a bad word. I think it's become a little bit of an addiction or something we've been trained to do. And I think because of that, we've created this void and this need for human connection. And that is where I believe this business blossomed from is that you come in, you meet others, you laugh with others, you grow with others, you play with others. Literally, you're playing a game with others. And that's so important because... in such a serious world of politics and division in our political climate, we need something of unity. And there's always that common thing on that court. We're all there to have fun, to hit that ball, to be better people, to get a good workout in, and to make connections. So I think that if you're a service business, you make connections. I think if you're really any business, you just have to be authentic. and have good intentions for your business and for others. If you don't have that, I don't think it's ever gonna be a situation that works. And I think what we're doing right is treating people like I would wanna be treated, which is with kindness, with concern, and with respect. And that might sound kind know, airy and I think this is the best answer I've received since we've been doing this. I mean that. Really, I do mean it from my heart. I think that business is just an expression of things we love and we happen to be lucky enough to make money from it. Yeah, and look, everybody out there, even if you're not in something as fun as pickleball, connection and authenticity, I don't know that I could articulate a better answer. I think if you don't have those things, you're probably going to be swimming upstream.

Direct Mortgage Loans (31:

28.052) Any business, any business, even selling something like, I mean, we sell mortgages, but you still want to try to create a connection and give somebody your authentic self and that they know you're helping them. Right. That's And I would imagine your goal is, you know, generations of mortgages. You help the dad, you help the son, you help the daughter, But you're only going to get generations of anything in any business if you're authentic. I agree. And they believe they can count on you, connect with you, count on you, and that you're genuine in what you're providing. I agree. Hear, hear. Wow. That's a great, that's a great, great answer. Look, I... I don't know that there's a better way to end than on that. Look, be authentic everybody, create connection. mean, Bonnie's jumped, look at this, from dental hygiene to pickleball with a bunch of stops in between. That's a great, great story. Look, thanks for sharing with us. thank you for having me. I really enjoy it and I hope you come out and play more and everyone. joins us to play. It's a great way to blow off some steam and have fun in our world We play all winter. So we play all year, my wife and I played especially in the winter. So you will see plenty of us. look, everybody, Baltimore Pickleball. It's tagged down below. Check them out. They're in Timonium. It's a great place. I've been there. And even if you've never played, them. Absolutely. We have a pro on staff and clinics leagues and all kinds of fun things. mean, our events calendar is on our website. It's just amazing the different offerings that we have. And there's really something for everyone. Learn it, everybody. I was telling Tiffany off camera before Bonnie got here, just your whole friend group is going to learn it. So you might as well learn it while they're learning it before they get ahead of you. My wife played, I didn't even tell you, for like almost a solid year before I played for the first time. And it was eye opening the first time I went and she was kicking 100 of my butt. I didn't tell you that part, but I'll tell you that was one of my first humbling events when I first started. I think I played against a guy with two knee braces. He was probably 80 and he wiped the courts with me. Yeah, beat me. And I thought you've got to be kidding. I've got to figure this out. I've got a couple. You've got to be getting some strategy behind this game. Totally. It's not as simple as it looks. Look, I'm glad your business is crushing it. Thank you for making time today. A pickle crush, everybody. Check it out at some point. But try that great story, Bonnie. Thank you. Look, everybody.

Direct Mortgage Loans (33:

36.216) Check back next time. We appreciate you spending time with us. Bonnie and Baltimore Pickleball Club are a great place. Check them out. Thanks for being here.

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Dean Johnson

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