Everyone Only: The Gimme Golf Club Origin Story | NLU Pod, Ep 1033

Five years ago, Kyle Walton had a kernel of an idea: What if I started a golf club that wasn’t attached to a golf course? That idea eventually became Gimme Golf, one of the best and most inclusive golf societies in the country. It also changed public golf in St. Louis in a profound way.

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[Music] be the right club be the right club today Johnny that’s better than most how about in that is better than most better than most expect anything different ladies and gentlemen welcome back to the No Laying Up podcast sie here we are back this week with another one of KV’s narrative podcasts really appreciate the response you guys have had to these they’re a fun change of pace i love it when we can kind of slow down listen to Kev dig into a subject that maybe doesn’t get a lot of attention and this is another episode in our series shining a light on public golf in America i’m not going to spoil it here in the intro but I will say you might come away from it feeling like I did which was I I wish I had something like this in my life so without further ado here’s KBV what’s the best clubhouse that you’ve ever been inside i’m a spoiled sports writer turned golf podcaster and I’ve been lucky enough to get some really cool invitations over the course of my lifetime there’s something a little surreal even a little intimidating about drinking an Aelia inside the clubhouse at Augusta National right next to a portrait of Bobby Jones but I’ve now done it a half dozen times one spring Nick Faldo was sitting in a table just a few feet away jack Nicholas and his family were at a table across the room i felt like pulling one of the staff members aside and asking “Are you sure I’m allowed to be here?” Because I won’t blame you if you have to kick me out but that’s the thing about a great clubhouse it should make you feel welcome whether you’re a master’s winner or a hacker like me i’ve had a Guinness upstairs in the clubhouse at North Bareric that tasted like liquid bliss and I’ve had a ham sandwich inside the winged foot clubhouse that I still daydream about i love clubous that have an old wooden bar with notches and scratches in the polish and old lockers that aren’t fancy but have been carefully tended to the keys or combinations passed down from one generation to the next i love club houses with old pictures on the walls or ones with the names of past champions that are handpainted year after year onto plaques to mark the passage of time a great clubhouse can be a grand castle with dramatic views from high above the course like St george’s Hill or Riviera Country Club and it can be understated yet elegant like Shinikok Hills i like taking mental snapshots of all of them every time I’m lucky enough to get invited in for a postround beer but none of those not even Augusta National would earn the distinction of being my favorite clubhouse in golf that honor belongs to a nondescript brick building in St charles Missouri 425 Clark Street right across the street from an abandoned gas station and a scuba gear supply store there is a laundromat and a used car dealership close by too it does not have a golf course attached to it in fact there isn’t a golf course within 10 miles of the building but it is I’m convinced the best golf clubhouse in America it’s the headquarters of Gimme Golf okay I think I can guess what you’re thinking what the heck is Gimme Golf that’s a question I didn’t know how to answer until recently when I traveled to St louis it just so happened to be the same week of the PGA Championship at Quail Hollow and admittedly there is a time when it would have bummed me out to miss my opportunity to document Scotty Sheffller’s latest rung on the climb to golf immortality scotty Shuffler wins in a runaway in the showdown at Charlotte the Quail Hollow does not exactly represent what I love about golf or what we’ve been trying to do with these narrative podcasts i don’t think the members at Quail are bad people shout out to you Johnson Wagner we remain massive fans i don’t know why I’m doing this to myself hitting another shot after I chunked one and scold one i just don’t know that the club has much of a soul it’s somehow too perfect and too boring at the same time after talking it over with TC and DJ we thought it would be something of a spiritual pallet cleanse for me to lean the other way instead of going to Coil Hollow where we’d already have five people on site how about I hook up with our maestro sound editor Charlie Van Kirk and pay a visit to a golf club in the Midwest where camaraderie and community are so essential to the mission statement they’ve built something singular and special even though they don’t have a golf course to call their own you blew it hey nice in this episode of NLU Special Projects the latest in our series about public golf we try to unpack a couple of philosophical questions that are common in Scotland Ireland and Great Britain but ones that rarely get asked in America how do you organize a golf club that is more of an idea than a physical place and how do you make sure that everyone always feels welcome it’s just everyone only it’s all in the tagline in our attempt to answer those questions we’ll drink a little beer oh tremendous tremendous vibe we’ll play a little golf inside and outside and we’ll also talk about loneliness about the challenge of making friends as an adult my wife was like “You need some new friends.” and how to stay connected to what you actually love about the game it doesn’t matter what kind of quality of golfer you are you know but first let’s take a quick second and hear from one of our sponsors the very people who help make these kind of adventures possible i want to give a massive shout out to our friends at Roach who are huge supporters of our content including the episode you are listening to right now you already know they’ve got our favorite polos hoodies shorts pants you name it best fit best feel simple as that they’ve got great new items for summer including the USA collection awesome red white and blue polos it just hits a little bit different on Roback they got a little American flag on the yolk of the neck as well they got great print design stripes uh as well the looper shorts the Delta Looper shorts are my go-to i’ve actually got some on right now immediately reach for these when I’m even coming close to a golf course or if I just want to go out on town they’re super comfortable perfect for any situation they’re wrinkle-free they got a great stretch waistband and I just they’re very very very good quality just like everything they make honestly you can go to their website rback.com you can use code NLU for 20% off your first order through the end of this week and anything you choose on there is going to be great quality it’s going to last you years it’s a great great product and we are proud to work with them rhk.com 20% off polos shorts and more with code NLU back to KBV how the heck do you invent your own golf club out of thin air the best way to tell that story should probably start with Charlie and I grabbing a beer at Looper’s Pub with Gimme founder Kyle Wal good man how are you good to meet you so good Charlie hey Charlie nice to meet you welcome to Welcome to Gimme pardon me while I stick a mic in your face yeah yeah all good man i’m kind of used to I’ll give you guys a tour you want to get a tour i’m too early for a drink yet you need a beer i would drink a beer go for it i’d never met Kyle before this spring but I certainly knew of him we have that 40-something dad vibe in common where we get more joy out of our teenage daughter’s golf journeys than we do our own there is a good chance you’ve seen some of his work even if you didn’t know it at the time in 2020 Kyle started his own graphic design company and started making golf videos they were good enough that eventually the USGAA took notice and asked him if he’d be interested in making a video where he and a friend hopped in a car and took the US Open trophy on a tour of the United States i’ll be taking the US Open trophy on its greatest adventure yet and getting it in the hands of passionate golfers all over this country it was in the middle of CO so there wasn’t a lot of video content being produced but Kyle and Matt Cartis took the trophy from one side of the country to the other going from Wingfoot to Pinehurst to Oakmont to Aaron Hills to Cherry Hills to Pebble Beach before eventually wrapping up and dropping it off at Tory Pines the trip took about 25 days and the video series that came out of it was authentic and heartfelt a reminder that while places can feel sacred it’s ultimately the people in those places that make golf special at a time when the world was scary and full of uncertainty and loss you could still bring joy to random strangers by walking up to them on a beach and asking them if they wanted to hold the US Open trophy it caught the attention of the people on the master’s content team and suddenly Kyle a kid from North County St louis who grew up without any real connections or pedigree to speak of was the guy tapped to be in the room filming the likes of Scotty Shuffler John Rom and Roy Moy the first time they walked into the champions locker room wearing the green jacket in a world full of influencers and creators pointing the camera at themselves Kyle’s work stood out because he took an old school approach of letting moments tell the story and letting them breathe it was intense work but it was fun and Kyle was essentially self-taught when it came to making stuff he’d worked odd jobs in golf and marketing throughout his life and even at one point working in a chemistry lab for 2 years out of college all that experience gave him enough self-belief to know that making stuff wasn’t that hard as long as you were curious and you were willing to work at it his digital film studio grew to the point where it could be a viable living that could provide for his family but all the while there was another idea that kept percolating around in his brain he wanted to start a golf club or maybe more accurately a golf society it’s something that’s common in Great Britain and Ireland but rarer here in the United States it wouldn’t have to be connected to a specific course but the people needed to be invested in each other if you couldn’t afford to join a country club or you just didn’t feel comfortable joining one with all its rules and expectations shouldn’t there still be a way for you to be a part of a community of golfers who felt connected to each other by something other than the randomness of a tea sheet making tea times at public courses is often a challenge particularly if you want to get bunch of tea times back to back how could you ever pull together a group of 40 strangers by telling them to hop on golf now at midnight and pray they’ve all got fast fingers how could you ever hold a skins game where people hung around the 18th green with beers to playfully heckle their buddies as they tried to birdie the last so they could snatch the pot but there were also courses in St louis a city that Kyle cared deeply about that weren’t getting a ton of play pretty good courses even because this was before the co boom really saved golf maybe Kyle thought there was a solution that could be beneficial for everyone i would have some beers with some buddies and be like man like I think there’s something here you know I’ve worked in the golf industry i worked at a lot of golf courses i see a lot of pros that are working at these clubs that were doing a lot of they were doing everything you know their food and beverage uh inventory like running tournaments and I’m just like they don’t have time to you know brand or build community or do these things that I think are super important in the game or that matter to me a lot and I was like I think I’m pretty good at that stuff so I was just trying to figure out a way for all parties to kind of succeed you know um how can I make this make sense for for a business how can I help golf courses how can I provide an affordable option for you know a large a large swath of people that want to enjoy the game and uh there was just a bunch of conversations with friends you know bunch of people telling me I’m crazy um trying to work through ideas and I pitched I pitched this idea to a bunch of courses all the pros asked if they could invest in the business and all the owners told me to take a hike is kind of how it worked around here um and so obviously my pitch was just wrong so I kind of went away back to work back to normal life you know and it would just kind of pop up and I just really felt like I’d have a lot of regret if I didn’t like give it a go you know i was like I don’t know if it’s going to be a business or if it’s just going to be a community or if it’s just going to be a fun thing for me to do but I got to try to make it happen kyle decided to stick his neck out which as the giraffe of NLU I have to respect he went to some local courses with a $10,000 check all his own money he said “Look I’ll give you this upfront and in return you make a certain number of tea times available to our members and they’ll pay me a monthly subscription there might be a little discount but members are going to buy beer and food from you and they’re going to be loyal to your courses and we’re going to keep coming back and bringing more people with us it can be a mutually beneficial relationship.” They were like “Well that many rounds for that money I don’t know like if you you know if your members play a lot you could really hurt our business.” They’re like “How many members do you have?” And I’m like “Oh I don’t have any members.” And they were like “Oh yank.” You know they immediately took the check and uh kind of said you know “Good luck kid.” Now he just needed some members and that is where Kenny Riley comes in if Kyle is the Robert Plant of this origin story then Kenny is Jimmy Paige he’s an affable bloke with a roguish grin he’s got sizable muscles and a litany of tattoos he reminds you of the guy who in high school who could fix your car if it broke down and he wouldn’t even charge you he just radiates good energy he’d been around the golf space in some capacity for years a bit of an entrepreneur and a bit of a gear head never quite finding his place until Kyle came along kyle and I we didn’t know each other but we had uh mutual friends in different groups and uh had a buddy of ours you know kind of say “Hey you guys need to get in a room with each other and you just need to to talk about all your ideas and what you’ve got going on.” And sure enough uh reached out to Kyle and said “Hey maybe we should go get a drink and you know spend an hour and talk about this idea that you have and we I’ll try to punch as many holes in it as possible and see where it goes.” Well the drink turned into a dinner and the dinner lasted about 3 and 1/2 hours so uh Kyle kind of laid it all out you know very passionate about his plan for public golf in St louis and you know after the first 20 minutes you know I was I was ready to sink my teeth in and I said “What are your obstacles like how can I help what can I help remove out of your way?” And he’s like “Well I got to crowdsource these 50 initial memberships and I I don’t know how I’m going to do it.” And I was like “Well what if what if I could help and I’ll just buy all 50?” And he said “Well first of all no uh I can’t let you do that but it sounds like you’re you’re interested and and you’re willing to help.” And I said “Yeah.” And I didn’t mean anything by buying the 50 other than giving the capital that would make this thing go they decided to be co-owners of the idea and started recruiting members they’d pay a monthly fee that they’d have access to three public courses in St louis plus they’d be part of regular outings and tournaments one of the most important things Kyle and Kenny came to an agreement on right away people needed to feel welcome didn’t matter if you were a hedge fund manager a firefighter a construction worker a teenager a plus-3 handicap or a single mom you should feel comfortable teeing it up with Gimme and making friends anyone who wanted to be clickish or exclusionary or discriminatory was getting in the boot that is how they landed on Gimmy’s motto and mission statement everyone only kenny what does golf mean to you so that’s a great question golf to me pre pre Kyle Walton I will say this um PK yeah PK PK uh super frustrating uh hardest game in the world I loved it was kind of that I hate golf I hate golf I can’t wait to play tomorrow kind of thing I was kind of always trying to play the best golf I could and you know what a way what a let down you because as soon as you card a double or a triple you’re like this this game’s not for me i can’t do it what am I doing now uh AK after Kyle he slowed it down to a situation where it’s more about who you’re playing with and less about the score um it was kind of the original like spiel that he had you know Gimme is a non-intimidating way to be involved with golf but it is it is so much more about the people you’re playing with score is out the window um be where your feet are kind of thing you know and seeing his his crew that kind of helped pave the way with how Gimme plays golf and how we handle the game um I am full in on the uh Kyle Walton style of golf the first year of Gimme Golf’s existence 2020 they had three courses in their network and one of the courses it worked out great for Gimme they fronted the money and the members played a ton there the other two well they made bank we made it work on one of the courses i think we got our money’s worth the other two absolutely fleeced me absolutely fleeced me they got so much money uh and those three courses said yes then they all came back post 2020 and they were like “Hey we don’t need you like we’re busy we’re put we’re packed like you know we’re raising prices.” And but they all were like “Look you wrote us a check when we needed it so we’ll give you another chance this year and then if you can like work on the model and figure out a way to make this make more sense like we we’d love to keep working with you and so that gave us a whole year to kind of just get with some people that are smarter than me um run some formulas run some ideas run some data and just kind of say like how can we do this in a way that you know gives them more money but doesn’t like really [ __ ] us and you know it’s based off of play as opposed to just flat numbers and we were able to kind of work it out gradually word got around and Gimme started adding new members in year two they were able to add three more courses to their network kyle worked on the media and marketing side of things and Kenny dug in and tackled the day-to-day but when the winter rolled around the club kind of went into hibernation people drifted apart for a few months that first winter we started to see membership drop off you know we probably had 115 20 members and then we dropped off to like 30 or you know 20 and guys were like I’ll be back you know like there’s nothing to h nothing to do he’s like “Hey man i always wanted to have an indoor space i always wanted to like have a clubhouse i you know I’m a I like doing club fittings and club sales.” And I’m like “Oh okay.” And he did a lot of the heavy lifting and honestly like he took he took the risk on the building he’s like “Let’s do this like I’ll talk to my dad like I think we can make something work like he’s not going to like help us but he’s going to sign papers and like if you’re ready to do this I’m ready to do this.” And I was like “Holy.” Just the perfect thing man and it was like through the winter like really is where it was like mental health being able to just you know go up to the clubhouse and rip some golf balls and hang out with the guys is is amazing [Music] he did it 8.1 8.1 [Applause] Half of the building that would eventually become the Gimme Golf Clubhouse was when they first thought about buying it an abandoned bridal shop there were still racks of musty dresses filling up one of the rooms some of the members looked at the space and thought it was a disaster but Kenny in particular saw its potential with the building here at 425 Clark when we were considering purchasing the building kyle’s like “I don’t I don’t have the ability to to do this like are are you okay doing this?” And I was like “I just got to clear it with the boss.” And my wife’s look when I said “I think we want to buy this building.” And she’s like “Why?” And I said “Well you know this dream and Kyle you got to hear from Kyle he could paint the picture.” And she’s like “Yeah I don’t know.” And I was like “All right well you love me right like just trust me on this because I do think that it could be something huge.” But she kind of gritted her teeth and was like “I do trust you.” And I was in a I was at Sherwin Williams and was not happy and I the fact that she kind of looked at me and was like “Whatever you’re doing now you cannot do forever so if this is it if this is what you think is it you should do it and it would not have happened without her and uh the fact that she gets to walk in she’s actually here right now um and you know just just I love her so much the fact that she believed in the idea and and stood behind us and still stands behind it um yeah she’s a huge part of why this is is here whatever money Kyle and Kenny made from memberships they immediately reinvested in the business they didn’t want to take on any outside investors because they didn’t want to answer to someone who saw it merely as a profit opportunity that meant growth and progress was going to be slow eventually they had enough money to put in a couple Trackman bays in the clubhouse so they could host simulator nights in the winter they started decorating the clubhouse with some of Kyle’s photography and hundred different golf artifacts they’d found or inherited kyle’s wife Mandy brought an entire room to life by taking old pages out of golf magazines and turning them into wallpaper as we started construction and as things happen you know people would kind of come in and ask like “What is this place going to be?” But even even funnier is when you see guys walking with golf bags and they’re like “It’s so funny.” And the guy’s like “I drive by this place every day i finally had to stop what What is this place?” And I said “Welcome home.” The Gimme Simulator League turned out to be a literal stroke of genius kenny and Kyle built a putting green that stretched nearly a third the length of the building whenever someone would hit an approach to the green that left them an eagle putt they’d have to try to make a 30-foot putt in real life if the putt was going to claim a skin a big crowd would gather around to watch and the roars and groans would erupt accordingly all right we got an eagle putt on two all right heater he’s simply living up to his potential this is going to be in front of tens of people hey think about it man think about it good luck he’s a claw guy he is cutter looks like oh it’s got a chance it’s got a chance you blew it you got a birdie on him you got a birdie he gets a birdie all the while Kyle and Kenny kept playing outdoor golf too gradually adding members via word of mouth one week someone from Bel Reeve or Glenn Ekko two of St louis’s most prominent country clubs would reach out and ask if they could join the following week it would be a construction worker everybody’s so different like all walks of life firefighters you know Believe members and like we love golf for the same reasons you know and it’s just such a supportive like collaborative you know somebody’s wife’s sick or something and everybody comes together for that i think it’s cool that golf brings people together you know that were different ages and different socioeconomic backgrounds we have guys here that can are pretty much barely skimming their memberships to all the way guys that are worth millions and so it’s pretty unique to see that kind of in a completely different phase there’s a handful of us that belong to private clubs and belong to this place there’s people that work their asses off so that they can pay to belong to this place like it’s and we all play and love each other and travel together it’s it’s a really special place when Kyle took a buddies trip to Scotland for the first time two years into Gimmy’s existence a light bulb went off in his brain when I went over it was that was when I was like “Oh dude.” Like we’re not doing anything different at all like we’re doing it the way that it was supposed to be done in in my opinion like there’s just this this weird energy over there where golf means everything and also there’s like a lack of reverence where it’s just like it’s so ingrained in your day-to-day that it’s super super important and it’s also not that big of a deal and you I don’t think you can really experience that until you’re over there you know um and you know we had some caddies that we played with and you know they’re just at the pub and they they they’re wearing a sweater and some khakis and they’re just like “Yeah you know grab their clubs with no head covers and they’re going to go play St andrews.” And it’s like it’s just different you know it’s just different over there and it it to me it just really sort of like solidified like “Oh okay we don’t necessarily need a property.” Like the people matter a lot like who who we’re hanging out with how we’re how we’re building this community matter more than like where we’re playing when I first reached out to Kyle in the fall of 2024 he used a phrase that I’d heard a dozen times before but it didn’t really click until Charlie and I came to St louis your vibe attracts your tribe there’s no shortage of golf collectives out there some people like to use golf as an escape whether it’s from their work or their marriage some people like to get hammered and laugh until they can’t breathe i don’t begrudge those people and in my 20s I can maybe see the appeal now that I’m in my 40s that’s just not my vibe at Gimme people didn’t show up to [ __ ] about their families instead they bonded over the challenges of raising kids of striving to be good husbands they might drink three beers during a round but not 30 when Kyle brought his teenage daughter Kinsley to compete in the Simulator night skins game the members loved it she’s a great player by the way and regularly takes their money and Kyle well he doesn’t have to worry about her overhearing crude or obnoxious stuff because well that isn’t Gimmy’s vibe in the golf space like there’s a little bit of that bro culture and I’m not whatever it is what it is it’s fine but like but like for us like I want this building to represent like what I think golf is you know you guys just walked through there was a 70-year-old guy in there getting lessons you know and my daughter’s in here and so like whatever that other energy is like it’s not really here you know like we’ve had it all oh you got a barber shop you got a locker room you got a bar all you need is a stripper pole and we’re like dude that’s just not like that’s just not it um and then we do have a lot of guys here that yeah they love they love their family they want to be around their family and you know you always have younger you know getting older 43 years old like you got we have younger membership like we got a lot of young guys that are just finding girls or engaged or whatever and it’s like “Yeah you know the old ball and chain i got to go to dinner.” I’m like “Dude like you picked her.” Like “What do you mean like go have dinner with your wife.” You know and they’re like it’s literally like a light bulb goes off they’re like “Oh oh hold on i don’t have to do the whole thing like I can actually like okay.” And then you see like it changes you know it changes and I think that’s great like I’m I’m going to be married 20 years in May and and my wife is massively massively involved with what we do i mean she’s built almost everything in this building and uh and you know I obviously wouldn’t be you know anywhere close to where I am today without her so like that energy just doesn’t isn’t isn’t going to fly around here and it’s fun like some guys just see their way out they’re not there yet you know they want to have fun and that’s that’s fine like whatever i’m not like judging anybody but like here like this is a family place we want everybody here tagline’s everyone only like we want you here but like you know be a good person and just to be clear women are welcome at Gimme this isn’t Never Neverland from Peter Pan a place that’s meant to be a boy club gimme has about 15 female members including Dr ally Wilson one of the regulars at the Simulator Night League she played golf in high school and I can attest from seeing it in person can still mash the ball a lot of the members have actually ended up hiring her to help with their golf fitness because she’s a doctor of physical therapy and a boardcertified orthopedic specialist i think naturally golf is just a sport that’s a barrier for a lot of people because you’ve got to have the clubs you got to have the equipment like it’s it’s expensive so if you’ve never you know been exposed to it it seems like almost like a foreign language to learn how to use the this equipment so I think just generally that’s a barrier but I think it can be intimidating for a lot of women um almost like when you go to a gym and you walk in and there’s all these like big like dudes lifting really really heavy and you feel like they’re all looking at you because you’re the only girl there um it can be very intimidating and it makes you want to leave because you have so much anxiety uh so I think that’s sometimes what golf can feel like because there’s it’s getting better but there’s not a lot of women that are that are out there playing so when you’re the only one out there it feels like everybody’s kind of watching you and checking you out to see you know does she actually have game or not she had some apprehension about walking into Gimme for the first time she had no idea what to expect so the first night I came in for Winter League I was I remember being really nervous i was like I’m probably going to be the only girl here like what are we going to talk about like are they even going to talk to me and I walked in and Kenny 2 was the first one that greeted me and then there were a couple of other guys that I think saw me on the Slack channel cuz we have a channel that we all messaged through and immediately came over and were like “Oh you’re Ally right?” And introduced themselves and they just treated me like any like one of them like a member of the club one thing that the pandemic laid bare for me is just how important friendship is when it comes to mental health and I think that’s particularly true for men it’s one of the reasons why golf exploded in 2020 people needed to find a way to hang out with each other that wasn’t on a screen and golf was the connective tissue that made it possible that’s probably the best way for me to introduce to you another essential character in the Gimme story kenny Hendrickson better known as Kenny 2 what’s your name my name’s Kenny kenny kenny 2 kenny 2 kenny 2 are you used to coming in second or is this uh is this a new thing i’ve never I’ve never known another Kennedy you know my first camp about a month after I joined I mean I probably got six nicknames that that trip you know started out Kenny 2 then it was K2 then it was oregano wait wait wait right where does the oregano come from well we went like I I guess it went like sort of this like fake weed you know like has that nickname of K2 kenny 2 wasn’t much of a golfer before the pandemic an architect by trade he had various hobbies that kept him busy including a zealous appreciation for the television show and comic The Green Arrow but when the world shut down and a couple of his friends moved out of St louis he descended into a pretty noticeable funk my wife was like “You need you need some new friends.” Um and so so we I signed up on our anniversary in 22 and just fell in love with it immediately like the community part what led to your wife making that declaration well so you know during so during the pandemic like golf was the only thing that we could do right like safely you know all that kind of stuff and uh I I hated golf before that cuz I was like I’m used to being good at things um and so it was just really it was a really frustrating game i’d play you know a couple times a year or whatever i didn’t really have any clubs and then during the pandemic just started playing all the time i can but I can remember telling my wife like I don’t really want to go do this but I do want to hang out with my friends and then my two best friends actually moved to Portland in January of that year and that’s when she was just like I think you need to you need to find some friends when Kenny 2 did eventually join Gimme he felt like he’d found a second home he met people who immediately embraced him who wanted to have beers together and asked him questions about his family his passions his quirks thursday night winter league became the highlight of his whole week and instead of selfishly holding on to it wanting to keep it exclusive he wanted to share it and then I joined a winter league team and Thursday night became like the highlight of my week every week and it was just like okay I imagine there’s people like me that need this and haven’t joined it because of the distance or um you know some other barrier and if there was a clubhouse closer I really think that we could you know expand our reach and so that’s really that was really the genesis of it it was just like man I want this feeling this this mental health reprieve yeah like I want that for as many people as possible his brain started turnurning he approached Kyle Walton with an idea hey what if I built you a second clubhouse he’ll tell you like he’s like this this place changed my life and I just wanted it to be I wanted to help like grow that and so he approached me he was like “We were thinking about opening up a Sim spot um would you be interested in maybe franchising or growing it in some way?” And we were not we were not ready for that and but if he was going to you know take on the risk and and try to build something we were like “Look we can you can have access to the brand and like we can come up with some ideas and and allow us to kind of grow and and he was like he was like I’m in.” And so uh that’s when we kind of started introducing the South House and you know they took on that build fortunately he’s an architect so the build went great and uh the place the place is beautiful um it’s in like a big industrial sort of building it’s a bigger bigger space it’s all like shotguns like lacks some of the quirk of this place but it’s it’s shiny it’s the fancy place and uh he’s done a great job man and it’s it’s it was fun to see someone come along and and believe in what we were doing that much and so much so that he kind of wanted to jump in um and now he’s kind of where I was like he wants to you know potentially get out of the rat race at some point and he’s like giving all of his extra time to this thing and and try doing the same thing we did just trying to make it work you know a lot of people might have stopped there two club houses a steadily growing membership a blossoming network of St louis courses welcoming Gimme merchandise and regularly scheduled buddy trips to places like Sweden’s Cove and Sand Valley but to Kyle and Kenny it just made sense that one end of the original clubhouse ought to be a bar and that’s how Looper’s Pub was born it took some time to get the permitting taken care of to figure out the ownership structure and the day-to-day operations but eventually that musty old bridal shop was turned into a worldclass bar one equipped with televisions and topshelf bourbon we partnered the restaurants that I run partnered with a local brewery they make some of the best New England style IPAs like in the nation they’re unbelievable so we try to feature those as much as possible if you wanted to just hang out for an afternoon and watch Scotty shuffle 65 in the third round of the PGA Championship which is what Charlie and I did you could feel right at home with like-minded people it made me wonder could this same model work in other cities i think from a business model perspective the golf demographic matters so like I we’ve been approached by probably 15 or 20 different cities of people that are like “Yo like we want this.” And I’m like “Yeah me too.” you know like but also like you guys are in here like it’s really quirky in here it’s really different and like this can look like an Applebee’s real fast you know what I mean like it can lose its soul so like that’s super that’s been super like important to I think us to make sure that that that doesn’t happen gimme currently has more than 500 members and there are two different tiers of membership there are other plans in the works like buying the old gas station next door so that there is room to expand and maybe even buying a golf course that’s coming up for sale in the future pouring some resources into redesigning the greens sometimes it sounds like a wildly ambitious plan but but then Kyle and Kenny ask each other why not people are always looking for community man i think that’s why sports are such a big deal that’s why you know you got a team that’s my team oh you like my team oh well then we’re like we’re in the same little boat and that’s how guys do it like and so yeah I mean 100% I think we’re fulfilling that need and and I think there’s a lot of guys that would suggest that they didn’t know something like this really existed or that they needed it and like I said because I’m fortunate to have a really really good crew of humans around me and have my family tournament and have these friends that are really really close it’s like I kind of just thought a lot of people did this and then they’re like “No dude like that’s not a normal thing.” And I’m like “Oh well then it should it should be so we should like how do we do that?” Of course you can’t tell a story of Gimme without you know venturing out onto the golf course when we come back we’ll take you to the weekly Gimme Golf Skins game and talk about what it feels like to celebrate good golf and bad golf among friends [Music] this podcast is brought to you by the Nest which is No Langup’s community of avid golfers when you join the Nest you support all of our NILU content from Strap to KV’s deep dives like you’re listening to right now the special projects all of it you also unlock access to our Nest exclusive content including the monthly Nest podcast extra videos and every thread on our Refuge message board uh we have so many great things up on the website we have the full interview from Strapped West Texas Neil’s conversation with Brian Chavez of Friday Night Lights fame it’s fantastic i could not get enough of that guy uh in the strapped episode and you can listen to that interview in its entirety if you’re a Nest member in addition to all the content you also get 15% off every order in the NLU Pro Shop and exclusive Nest member discounts from our sponsors you can check them out in your Nest profile at nolingup.com/profile uh some examples of discounts codes that are just for Nest members $25 off an order of Holderness and Born on their site hbgolf.com 20% off the stack Stack Radar or combined in a bundle 25% off a set of grips from Golf Pride and a free 2025 Roost logo towel with any purchase of $75 or more in the NLU Pro Shop so many great offerings i’m only covering a few of them here but head to nolayingup.com/join to get involved and join the nest again that’s nolayingup.com/join get involved and join the nest back to the pod mark can I get a three-word review about public golf in St louis from you oh buddy I’ve been thinking about this um so not being a native my three words to describe St louis public golf was better than expected just coming out here I didn’t know what to expect and I mean we’re out here at Bowwin and I think this is just one of like the better conditioned public golf courses that I’ve played anywhere shaggy Zoya Fairways everything’s wet all the time lots of mud balls and uh lots of trees and you get everything here in Missouri we don’t have the best architecture but we have really good people it’s always getting better public golf is really coming around in St louis it’s They had kind of a I don’t know i don’t want to call it a rough time but some courses were in rough shape that are rebounding now surprised with options cuz I feel like in St louis we do have a lot of options of good public golf and like you go around to to other areas and they don’t really have it quite as much as what St louis would i would say I only get three words i’d say a lot of options that’s my first one is just mean I I everybody askked me what my home course is and I go I don’t have a home course that’s my favorite thing that’s one of my best things about Gimme is I don’t have to have a home course i mean I I played 12 courses in three months boy man I don’t know i wanted to say a two-word like everyone only like because genuinely man there’s there’s a lot of great options around St louis gimme is awesome just cuz there’s like 12 clubs in the network and then there’s you know really high quality mid-tier golf you know that you can get on for 60 bucks that’s just like you can’t find that around the country everywhere like the quality of it love it every time that’s more than three words four we’re up to four oh [ __ ] every time is is four that’s love every time love every time there you go you’re going to put me on the spot accessible it’s It’s not like Beth Page not like Beth Page that’s Conway that’s I don’t think anyone who golfs regularly in St louis would describe Ballwin Golf Club as a mustplay even some of the Gimme crew was a little apprehensive about it being the entry point for Charlie and I into their universe it’s a 9-hole course that weaves its way through a couple of housing developments and the conditioning can range from solid to unmemorable but whenever it pops up on the gimme rotation for the weekly potluck skins game nobody complains so you guys putting the pot in potluck where’s the the name come from potluck was like obviously the skins pot i think one of our first designs was like a casserole dish with the words potluck written inside and it was I think it was the whole idea of like everybody come have a good time like you would at a potluck and then the joke was don’t bring a casserole if you’re familiar at all with the world of NLU you probably know by now that my golf game is a bit like the tin man from the Wizard of Oz trying to fake his way through a performance of Swan Lake i can occasionally break 80 but not with much consistency or elegance the chipping yips come and go and I rarely transfer my weight to my left side i’m always a little nervous to take my game on the road and represent our brand but what I found over the years is that good people even really good players know how to make you feel welcome regardless of what your game looks like that’s the best way I can sum up an evening with the gimme crew about 40 guys joined us at Bowwin and every time I turned around someone was offering me a beer from one of their coolers oh he’s a Miller Lightite guy i Oh he’s one of us i couldn’t help but feel right at home even next to guys who played college golf despite Charlie offering some occasionally blunt commentary on my game here’s Kevin peeing off under pressure kevin chunks his hybrid off the first te into the wind fairway finder got it about 100 yards out there all right should have hit driver cuz of the bigger face situation but you know still chunking usually the up there somebody somebody was [ __ ] with us hit buddy hey that’s right driver off the deck Kevin i like that i do love that you want to see the DoD i don’t why not why not we got it oh yeah give yourself some okay kb driver off the deck on the first fairway from about 250 260 uphill oh not quite we hit it birdie hey birdies are nothing we hit it but right into the woods calling John D heads up just in case i’m watching uhhuh pretty good hit something sit oh thought that was kind of a tidy punch from KV but a little little too much mustard yes indeed this is respectable we’re feeling you know like we acquitted ourselves well there we executed mostly what we’re trying to do but yeah that was the idea um maybe you should revisit the Club Pro guy episodes and work on your strokes game punching out uh the hidden like wisdom of of like Club Pro guy is that like actually a lot of amateurs really could help themselves if they were better at punching out can I get a three-word review of Kevin Van Vulenberg’s golf game oo no no I can’t i’ll knock on the record i’ll knock on the record it’s just too good i played some decent golf bracketed by my everpresent bad golf and in truth I remember very little of it but when we came to the ninth hole 160 yardd par three over water I couldn’t help but notice that a large crowd had gathered around the green i knew if I had shanked one into the pond a very real possibility I’d never hear the end of it it would make for good content at least but somehow by the grace of the golf gods I hit a beautiful eight iron to the left side of the green when it landed I got my first ever golfing ovation no one had made a birdie yet so the skins were still in play when I crouched down to read the putt I stared down my 25-footer feeling like I’d already won knowing that the big crowd watching from the hill with beers in their hand was actually rooting me on when I poured in my putt right in the throat a bunch of friends I’d only just met erupted like I just won the RDER Cup shot of the day shot of the day this guy rolled in a 40footer a nine for birdie you missed it i fantastic probably the only time I’ll ever get like a gallery bar i didn’t end up winning the potluck another member made a late birdie to match just as the sun was going down we laughed and told stories and exchanged fist bumps it felt like the best possible outcome i didn’t need the money but a generous collection of new golf friends who could ever put a price on something as valuable as that i’m Kevin Van Vulberg editorial director at No Laying Up this episode was written and reported by me and Charlie Van Kirk a man of many talents charlie also provided sound editing and original music for this podcast additional music by Hannah Reed Carrie Van Kirk Christopher Marion and Asher Kurtz additional editing by DJ Pyhowski and Todd Schuster a special shout out to the Gimme Golf members who sheepishly took us to Buffalo Wild Wings after our Skins game at Baldwin confessing that it was the only restaurant open at 10 p.m we’re going to Buffalo Wild Wings Charlie uh and we’re going to make this happen it’s It’s not my first pick but uh God I’m I’m hungry apologies to TC our buddy Steve Mann something of a foodie was particularly mortified i don’t want this to end up in the pod i don’t want Tron I don’t want Tron finding out that this is how cities end up getting called the princess city we’re reporting you to TC directly steve he made us promise to return to St louis for some real food in the future you tell TC I will take him on a culinary and golf architecture journey in the city that he’ll love it and we’re already looking forward to it we’ll see you again soon [Music] that’s [Music] [Music]