Meredith Kinman and Allison Spencer grew up in a swimming family. Allison, the older of the two, was an accomplished swimmer who swam competitively through high school and college. Afterward, she went back to coach her younger sister Meredith’s swim team, where they eventually won a swimming state championship during Meredith’s senior year of high school.
After continuing to coach together as time went on, the “Sides Sisters” (their maiden name) were eventually named to the Metro Hall of Fame. The pair’s accomplishments and involvement in the local swimming world made their maiden last name “Sides,” one to remember.
While the sisters’ careers led them to teach, they maintained a dream of working and coaching together once again. The opportunity to do so presented itself in late 2019 as the owner of a local swim school, Barb Graeve, decided to sell her business and placed a call to Meredith and Allison. Their dream was about to turn into a reality.
Though the COVID-19 pandemic made buying a business difficult in early 2020, the Sides sisters were officially able to take over the school in July 2020. As it stands today, they have 30 staff members and serve between 300-350 students per week, thanks to the popularity of their private lessons-only approach. We sat down with Meredith and Allison to hear more about their future with their swim school and what it means to them to be a female and family-owned business.
What has SportsEngine Motion done for your business?
“It has been a relief. Our clients find it very user-friendly. Before SportsEngine Motion, I would get bombarded with emails for so many reasons when I opened registration. Our families need to register multiple kids for multiple classes, and now they can do that with no problems. It’s been life-changing, and I don’t get 8,000 emails. It has saved me HOURS of work.”
“Before SportsEngine Motion, we were waiting to bill and constantly missing payments and billing at random times, and now it’s all immediate.”
What system have you used previously, and why did you move to SportsEngine Motion?
“We used JackRabbit in the past for registration. The process of learning how to use it was terrible. There was so much information that we didn’t need or deem useful to sift through.”
“There is always someone to help me when I need it.”
“I love the website; I can do all my own stuff. I can make all my updates so easily; the website functions so well. JackRabbit didn’t talk to our website, so I had to connect everything by emailing someone to do it. I can do it all by myself on SportsEngine Motion.”
“If I can figure the website out, then you know it’s pretty simple!”
About Sides Sisters Swim School
Teaching children to become water-safe is the ultimate goal of The Sides Sisters Swim School. Once water safety skills are achieved, we take pride in providing a strong swimming foundation allowing your child to take their swimming journey to the next level. Learn more