“The difference in running a members’ club is having several revenue streams, namely rooms, plus events and F&B, anchored with secure income from co-working space tenants and membership dues,” says Jeff David, president of the 14-bedroom The Fitler Club, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
It is the club’s thousand-plus membership that, during tough times, pays the bills to enable the entire project to re-align. The owners of The Fitler Club, which opened January 2019, envisioned it as a social space for Philadelphians of all ages, and those from further afield. They wanted an onsite boss who understood all the elements of its multi-part structure with a 130,000-square-foot campus that combines the business models of Equinox, Soho House and WeWork.
Jeff David, as concurrent principal of Jeff David Hospitality, which he started in 2018, ticks all the boxes (“I am, honestly, a bit of a chameleon – perhaps it is my Filipino heritage that affords so much flexibility,” he admitted).
As a teenager in New Jersey, David aspired to be a priest but an insatiable curiosity led to hospitality, with such add-ons as publishing highly impressive illustrated guide books for his teams. “‘We do what makes sense; it’s not just what other hotels do. We create a diverse experience, constantly adapting to each guest,’” he wrote in “The Knick’s Guide to Being Good,” written when he was general manager of The Knickerbocker Hotel in New York from 2012 to 2016.
He has had to cope with many crises. During Los Angeles’ 7.4 magnitude Northridge earthquake in 1994, he was at The Beverly Wilshire. Later, he coincided with three Category 5 hurricanes in the Caribbean, and a nearby volcanic eruption on his own wedding day in Nevis in 2001. And during one of the worst rainstorms at the Festive Season opening of The Viceroy Anguilla in 2009, he felt compelled to telephone all guests’ travel agents.
“I personally apologized and asked for continued faith in us. Similarly, over the last few months this year, I have been on the phone for hours working with anxious clientele, from health-sensitive club members to distressed brides-to-be who have had to postpone.”
David started at The Fitler Club in February. On 15th March Philadelphia’s COVID-19 stay-at-home mandate closed it.
“On 17th March we started support for our 200-plus employees. We paid all health benefits 100%, and a fully funded food pantry program fed everybody for three and a half months,” he explained. Members were also well looked after. Catering packages were offered, with no deposits and full refunds. Much of the equipment in The Field House, Fitler Club’s 25,000-square-foot fitness center, which it manages itself, was moved to an outdoor balcony, and members could borrow, free of charge, non-electric pieces for workouts at home.
“Hospitality is rapidly innovating, and the pandemic has hastened trends that were happening anyway. I have always been attracted to innovation and I strongly believe The Fitler Club is already providing something different for today. We have a commitment to diversity and we provide the setting for members and hotel guests who have full run of the club, to meet other cool, influential and like-minded people.”
One salient feature of club life that mainstream hotels undoubtedly envy how little it relies on traditional marketing.
“Ninety-five percent of attracting new members is via referral. It is word of mouth paired with fear of missing out, FOMO,” David explained with a big smile.