Matt McClish Looks for Revival in 2018
When Kennedy Club Fitness Paso Robles general manager Matt McClish joined the KCF family at the Arroyo Grande location more than a decade ago, he was looking for light responsibility and then found himself opening the Paso Robles location.
Celebrating their 10-year anniversary, the team at KCF is working on developing a deeper relationship with the community with membership director Keith Swank.
Together, McClish and Swank look toward improving an already great community.
“Our ultimate goal as a company, and for Paso, is to help create the healthiest community in the country,” “I was watching the Today Show and they listed the top five, and we were No. 3 — and they listed it as ‘San Luis Obispo-Paso Robles.’ That is cool.”
McClish and his wife Karisha Dearing both work at KCF, and a new sense of purpose took ahold of him after his son Eli was born.
“Both of us moved around as kids,” McClish said. “We didn’t really know what community was. It was three years ago, and we were downtown with Eli for Halloween and the streets were closed and there were ‘a billion’ kids around, and it hit me — this is something special. That is when things like Rotary, and Chamber, and now school board [became important].”
Building a sense of community was a common theme throughout the conversation.
“Paso has opportunities, and we want people to be healthy no matter where they are working out,” McClish said. “Our goal [at Kennedy] is to help everyone get there, and we hope we have a facility that meets as many needs as possible.”
Today, McClish and KCR membership director Keith Swank are working together to build a better fitness club and with it, a better community. Both McClish and Swank agreed that their line of work is highly rewarding.
“People walk in like it was hard to get up this morning, and they walk out with that glint in their eye,” McClish said, “and you know that whatever challenges they are going to have that day, they are going to navigate those just a little bit better because their head is in a better place than when they came in.”
The brick and mortar, the pool, the exercise rooms, the basketball and racquetball courts, the free weights, the stationary machines — the stage is set. What Kennedy does over the next 10 years seems to be based on what people do.
“We see the big picture, and Matt referred to ‘community,’” Swank said, “and what we are going to improve on is relationships — we are building relationships, not memberships.”
Without giving away details, Swank hinted at a change in the way the club will approach memberships.
“We need to be much more elaborate about our process,” Swank said. “We are working on setting the groundwork for 2018.”
“We are rebuilding the process,” McClish concurred.
