Rocky Soccer Academy

Scholarships can do more than just provide money for someone; they can bring people from other countries into the United States. An example is Karl Henning, a U.K. citizen, who came to the United States on a soccer scholarship in 2000. Karl’s life revolved around soccer. From his earlier years he was involved in camps, competitive teams, and high school league. When he finally came to the United States, he attended St. Alban’s college on his scholarship. His future wife, Dawn Jacobs, also attended the same college. However, she was older and graduated before him allowing her to move to Fort Collins, Colorado. Dawn also had a passion for soccer and played on the Fort Collins Force women’s soccer team. Henning moved to Fort Collins to be with his wife after he graduated from St. Alban’s.

Although soccer was still Karl’s passion, he had to give it up due to a job he had received at a meat packaging plant. Even though majority of his time was spent at his job, he still found time to incorporate soccer into his life. Henning taught soccer to younger children and eventually developed the Rocky Soccer Academy in 2006. This was probably the smartest investment Karl had made. The Academy was immediately popular and he had small camps being held in Fort Collins. The talk about the program was quickly spread. More and more people started investing their time into the Rocky Soccer Academy. A few of Henning’s friends from England came over to help him to assist in training the large amount of customers they had been receiving. A main reason why he became so successful so quickly is because youth soccer is extremely popular in Colorado.

Things may be going outstanding for Henning, but he still has some goals and dreams he would like to conquer. One of them would be his facility. The place that he currently has is not enough space and not the proper training facility. His goal is to create a new building that is specifically geared towards soccer. Even though this will be a necessity, a worry of Karl’s is that he doesn’t have enough business to start to build a bigger facility. The problem that is beginning to reoccur is how to expand his business. There are many solutions to solve this problem it is just a matter of which one would be most successful. A few ideas that were suggested were to develop programs targeted to kids over the age of 14, create a marketing strategy so current customers buy more, enter new markets, or expand to different cities around Fort Collins. Dealing with the market is one of the hardest things for a business to succeed in. Even though it is the hardest task, it is essential to be successful. The reason why it becomes so difficult is because of the risk of failure.

The strategy picked may not work, that is the risk the business has to take. The solution that I am going to offer seems most logical and successful to me. This is merely my opinion. The route I would take would be to expand the business to outside of Fort Collins. Promoting the business to outside sources will bring in customers. It would be smart to rent another building or two in one of the surrounding cities such as Loveland, Longmont, or Greeley. The customers wanting to be a part of the Rocky Soccer Academy will not have to drive to get the service that they want. This would allow the business to boom even further and potentially gives the business more cash flow. When the cash flow is above the breaking point or the average line, then Henning could possibly invest in newer equipment or building new facilities. The reason I believe this is more successful is because if you keep your business in Fort Collins then you will eventually run out of customers because Fort Collins isn’t going to get any bigger.

Yes, from time to time new people will invest, but imagine if you had a whole other town to have as potential customers? He is also confident in being able to hire and train more staff such as coaches and managers. Marketing is key to having success in the business world. The market is always changing which would then amount to businesses always changing. If a business remained the same since it was started then it would be out of business. This is also because of the consumers/customers because their needs are constantly changing as well. If Karl Henning makes this choice as a businessman, to me he will be successful.