TGA Premier Sports CEO, Joshua Jacobs
By bringing our introductory programs directly into schools and community centers, we’ve removed barriers-to-entry for kids who want to play sports in their communities.
LOS ANGELES (PRWEB) June 06, 2019
With an innovative approach to growing youth sports participation, TGA Premier Sports(TGA) has become one of the nation’s most steadily-impactful developers of community-based sports and enrichment programs for kids ages five to 13.
On pace to enroll its one-millionth participant (since launching in 2003) by 2020, TGA has completed a new franchise restructuring model bringing all eight of its youth sports programs under one umbrella. This will now allow entrepreneurs the flexibility to choose one sport or multiple sports under their franchise, which will create more franchise opportunities and increase youth sports participation nationwide.
TGA is the youth sports delivery system many communities and schools never realized they needed. Its innovative before- and after-school enrichment programs and local sports camps combine developmental golf, tennis and an array of team sports skills with PhD-developed educational lessons. Kids’ engagement in these programs is helping reverse trends of declining youth sports participation in markets across the country.
Research by the Aspen Institute’s Project Play states that active kids are less likely to be obese, perform better in school and on standardized test scores, as well as improved confidence and higher self-esteem. Despite that data, “Non-School Sports” (little league) has been on a two-percent-per-year decline since 2002. In that same era, TGA has expanded into 75 markets across 28 states by giving entrepreneurs who are passionate about sports, youth and their community the opportunity to own sports franchises.
TGA empowers its franchise owners to bring a “Changing Lives Through Sports” mantra into their local communities and, recently, TGA’s business model underwent some internal restructuring that now allows entrepreneurs to own any combination of sports that best suits their business plan and best serves the needs of the local community.
“By bringing our introductory programs directly into schools and community centers, we’ve removed barriers-to-entry for kids who want to play sports in their communities and now we’re taking a similar approach to support our franchise owners who’ve put down roots in these same communities,” TGA CEO Joshua Jacobs says. “A TGA territory owner now has more flexibility to own any combination of TGA sports franchises. We’ve made that process more achievable from a financial standpoint and a greater value proposition.”
Jacobs adds that in order to be successful, youth sports programs should consider being “self-sustaining, scalable and replicable.” To that end, TGA execs listen closely to feedback from their franchise owners as the TGA franchise model evolves to provide programming that is tuned in to each community’s needs and cultural tendencies toward certain sports. TGA built its brand with breakthrough golf programs and expanded to offer a tennis curriculum starting in 2011. Team Sports is TGA’s newest endeavor with Cheerleading, Flag Football, Floor Hockey, Lacrosse, Ultimate, and Volleyball opportunities now available and future sports to come.
“We wanted our franchise owners to have the ability to customize their ‘youth sports delivery system’ in a way that aligns with their passions, their business goals and the demand for specific sports in their community. With being able to pick and choose sports based on certain regional or cultural nuances, or voids in their market, our business owners can now better serve their communities by offering additional sports programs or expanding out geographically,” Jacobs says.
One successful TGA franchisee who has bought into offering multiple sports is Brad Kirkpatrick, owner/territory director of TGA of Greater Seattle.
“The dynamic nature of TGA’s curriculum and business model have helped me grow my business into an easy sell for schools, parks and recreation departments and, especially, parents,” Kirkpatrick says. “Even as a former middle school basketball coach and low-single-digit golfer, I never imagined a career in youth sports, but TGA empowers growth and affords me the kind of work-life balance I didn’t have during my years working in the financial sector.”
Now poised for greater growth, TGA recently completed a $750,000 curriculum and business infrastructure investment to streamline operations across its eight sports. The investment helps facilitate franchise growth and lays the foundation for future expansion strategies across the TGA system including 50-75 new franchises and increasing the number of programs from 7,200 to 15,000 by 2021.
For more information on TGA Premier Sports visit http://playtga.com/franchise/ and follow @TGA_Sports on Twitter.
