6 min read

How Private Clubs Can Deliver Member Experiences Like Disney

Picture of Ed Heil Ed Heil : Updated on April 23, 2026

Crushing Club Marketing Podcast Culture Core Values

Key Takeaways

Hire for behavior, not just experience. Describe your standards and culture in job postings and during interviews. Use motivation-based questions to find people whose instincts match your club's mission before they're ever hired.
Onboarding is culture transfer — don't skip it. A great onboarding program doesn't just explain the job. It tells the club's story, establishes non-negotiable standards, and gives new team members a clear sense of purpose and identity.
People + Purpose + Place + Pride = Profit. Lead with your people, clarify their purpose, sweat the details of your physical environment, and hold the line on quality. The financial results follow when the foundation is right.
Language shapes culture. What you call your team and your standards matters more than most leaders realize. Involve your team in that conversation — the answers will reveal a lot about the culture you're actually building.
Build community, not just programming. Younger members are looking for belonging and connection, not status. Design experiences that introduce people to one another and create the kind of meaningful moments that drive long-term loyalty.

When we think about service excellence, two company names come up more than any others: the Ritz-Carlton and Disney. Club leaders use those names as examples as they measure their own service levels against their own standards of excellence. That Disney and the Ritz have been able to deliver consistently outstanding service for so long is remarkable and yet, the secret lies in their systems, culture, and their daily habits.

Barry Jacobson spent more than 30 years as a Disney executive, leading premium guest services across some of the most iconic properties in the world, including Golden Oak — Disney's private residential club community inside Walt Disney World. Before that, he cut his teeth in the private club world with Club Corp (now Invited), so he understands both sides of the equation intimately.

In this episode of Crushing Club Marketing, Barry breaks down the principles behind Disney's legendary service culture and offers some memorable tips that club leaders can deploy at their clubs.

Private Clubs and Disney Have More in Common Than You Think

Everything happens for a reason and Barry's path from Club Corp to Disney and back again wasn't accidental. It turns out the two worlds share a foundational commitment that most people overlook.

At a resort or theme park, guests check in and check out. At a private club, members show up every day. One experience is transactional, the other is relational. Barry describes it as one of the most eye-opening transitions of his career: learning every member's preferences, anticipating their needs before they arrive, building genuine connection over time.

However, whether you're creating happiness at the Magic Kingdom or an elevated dining experience at a country club, the mission is the same. Make people feel special, treat them as individuals, and deliver something they can't find anywhere else.

It Starts with Hiring and Onboarding

If there's one thing Barry returns to again and again, it's that service excellence doesn't start on a “cast member’s” first day at work . It begins in the hiring process.

Disney is deliberate about this. Their job postings go beyond a list of responsibilities, they describe the behaviors and standards expected of every cast member. Candidates should know exactly what they're walking into before they ever show up. And the onboarding experience, now called "Traditions", isn't just paperwork and a quick talk with the GM. It's about sharing the culture through storytelling. New hires learn that picking up trash in the park isn't beneath anyone, because it’s what Walt Disney did himself.

For club leaders, if you're not describing your standards and behaviors during recruitment, you're hoping the right culture will materialize on its own. It won't. In fact, in the absence of clarity a culture will be created, but it most likely will be the culture your employees create, not yours.

The Formula: People + Purpose + Place + Pride = Profit

Clubs that lead with profit optimization and treat people as cost centers tend to cycle through staff and end up producing inconsistent member experiences. Clubs that are “People First”, tend to build the loyalty and retention that makes revenue sustainable. Barry has distilled years of operational leadership into a unique equation that brings this point to life.

People: Hire the right people and give them the tools they need to succeed. Purpose: Make sure every team member understands why they come to work each day. A dishwasher isn't just washing dishes. Their purpose is enabling the kitchen to deliver an extraordinary meal. Place: Sweat the details. The entrance is clean. The bathrooms smell right. The pool is crystal clear. Pride: Don't let standards slip. The old fashioned is made the same way every time. The steak is cooked right, or it goes back.

Cast Members, Not Employees: The Power of Language

One of the more memorable moments in this conversation comes when Barry talks about how Disney calls its team: cast members. Not staff. Not employees. The distinction matters more than it might seem. When your team is a cast, they understand they are on stage every minute of every day. They're performing, whether they are behind the scenes or customer facing.

Words matter. Think carefully about how you refer to the people who come to work every day to deliver an amazing member experience, and to involve those teams in the conversation. What titles and terms actually reflect the culture you're trying to build? The answer shapes how people see their work and how they show up for members every day.

To best illustrate this point, consider the popular HR term in corporate America today - “Human Capital”. Barry pushes back hard on this phrase and its dehumanizing inference. In the clubs where Barry has done his best work, the goal is simple. Make your team members feel special, treat them as individuals, give them tools to excel, and help them grow. That's not human capital management. It's leadership.

Building a Sense of Community: The Evolving Member Expectation

What makes the need for remarkable member experience is made more urgent with the shifting demographic of prospective club members. For older generations, club membership carried status. For younger members like Gen Y, Gen Z, and those coming behind them, status in a private club membership is largely irrelevant. What they're looking for is connection. Belonging. Experiences. A place where their family feels at home and they can build genuine relationships with like-minded people. Your team is the heartbeat for creating the environment where these experiences can grow and thrive and where memorable member experiences live.

When club leaders stop thinking about programming as amenities and start thinking about them as vessels to build community and culture, members become advocates and their experience becomes truly memorable.

Where to Start: Advice for the GM Who's Overwhelmed

Building, or reversing, a club’s culture is not easy and it takes time. So, before you build a plan, listen. GM’s listen to your board, board members listen to your GM, listen to your members, and especially to your team. Understand what the club is actually delivering versus what it's supposed to be delivering. Find the pinch points where issues develop.

Then, look at your onboarding. Does your team understand their purpose, not just their job description? Do they know what quality looks like? Have you told them the stories that explain why your club does things the way it does?

And check the details. Barry literally suggests calling your own club, like a secret shopper, and listening to how the phone gets answered. It's a small thing, but it's also the first thing a prospective member experiences. As he says, “Inspect what you expect.”

Today, Barry brings his Disney lessons to organizations through Barry Jacobson Consulting. He helps clubs, hospitality brands, and membership organizations elevate their service culture, strengthen employee engagement, and build the kind of consistency that turns a good club into a great one.

Frequently Asked Questions

How can a small club apply Disney-style service principles without Disney's resources?

The core principles — hire for behavior, train for consistency, tell stories, hold people accountable to clear standards — don't require a large budget. They require intentionality. A GM who personally greets their team each morning, calls their own club to hear how the phone is answered, and tells the stories behind the club's standards is already doing the work. The investment is time and commitment, not dollars.

What is motivation-based interviewing and how does a club use it?

Motivation-based interviewing asks candidates about their natural habits and preferences rather than hypothetical scenarios. A candidate for a housekeeping role might be asked how they keep their own home organized. A front-of-house candidate might be asked what they enjoy doing socially. The goal is to find people whose instincts naturally align with the job before you ever make an offer — reducing costly mis-hires and improving cultural fit from day one.

How do we compete for talent when we can't always match wages at larger employers?

Barry's experience at Disney — where compensation wasn't always the primary draw — points to a consistent answer: create a place people want to work. That means making team members feel valued, giving them clarity of purpose, investing in their development, and building a culture they're proud to be part of. Compensation matters, but people often stay — or take a pay cut — for a culture they believe in.

How do we engage younger members who don't seem motivated by traditional club amenities?

Younger members are motivated by connection, not status. The most effective strategy is designing intentional community-building experiences: events that introduce members to one another, programming that brings families together, and an environment where people feel genuinely known. The club that wins with the next generation will be the one that feels less like a facility and more like a neighborhood.

What's the most common service mistake Barry sees clubs make?

Confusing steps of service with standards of behavior. Steps of service tell a team member what to do — fill the water glass, present the menu, clear from the right. Standards of behavior tell them who to be — warm, attentive, proactive, consistent. Both matter, but clubs often drill the former while neglecting the latter. The result is technically correct service that feels hollow.