It was also during this time that Cross Gates became even further convicted on the importance of community and giving back.
It was not easy, but I developed a much deeper sense of my faith, and I developed a slogan that says, ‘There’s just nothing that the nearness of Christ can’t handle.’ That became and still is my mantra.” “You’ve been through the fire and you work so hard. “For me, this definitely became a spiritual journey,” said Larry. That just gives you some perspective on the magnitude of the devastation.”įor Larry, the biggest lesson here was the importance of having faith. “But then you just have to start multiplying that - 42% of my employees, in general, lost their house, much less their livelihoods and so forth. “Personally, my house flooded, my church flooded, my kids’ school flooded,” recalled Larry.
The storm impacted 42% of the club’s entire market, damaged the main facility and completely flooded the newer, second location. The next crisis to face Cross Gates Family Fitness, which had grown to two locations, was Hurricane Katrina in 2005. There is no doubt the fire experience is what matured us to embark on this huge growth pattern we’ve been on ever since.” “To this day, 25 years later, when we have a dues increase, we have to go in and identify all of our chartered members to make sure we don’t increase their dues. “It was the connection to the community we had already started to make that really shined through,” said Larry. To give back, the club dubbed these paying loyalists “chartered members” and promised their dues would never be raised so long as they stayed a customer.
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In fact, many members continued to pay dues despite not having access to the full facilities. “It literally looked like some kind of FEMA hurricane rescue center - we had all these trailers everywhere - and that was the adventure,” said Larry.Īccording to Larry, this is when the Cross Gates Family Fitness community really solidified, with the membership rallying around the club as a result of the tragedy. They brought in trailers to serve as the men’s and women’s locker rooms, and converted the surviving racquetball courts into areas for strength training and cardio.
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Thankfully, the club was insured, and the couple thought outside the box to figure out how to stay afloat during the rebuilding process.
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“It was literally trial by fire,” recalled Larry. The only thing that survived was a small metal building housing four racquetball courts. However, about a year after officially taking ownership of the club, and literally days after finding out they were about to have a second child, 80% of the club burned to the ground. The couple was thrilled to own their own facility, as they’d fallen in love working as managers at a nearby health club. They quickly got to work reimagining the facility as a multipurpose family destination for the Slidell community. It was acquired by Larry and Merryanne Welch in 1994. Cross Gates originally opened as a neighborhood racquet and swim club.