Bullpen owner says customers help keep you on target
By Mark Squibb
Amanda LeDrew was baffled when her husband Chris LeDrew first shared his plans to transform a former dollar store into a sports training facility.
“When my wife saw this place at first, she said, ‘You’re planning on doing what in here?’” recalled LeDrew. “The back was full of shelving and pallets and the front was full of merchandise and shelving.”
LeDrew spent three months – and plenty of cash – renovating the building, and The Bullpen Sports Complex officially opened in July 2024.
The Kelligrews facility boats a 4,000 square foot artificial turf, gym area, a number of pitching machines, and a multipurpose room that folks can rent out for birthday parties or corporate meetings. You can also bring in your skates to get sharpened.
LeDrew said he has had to be adaptable and sensitive to the community’s needs in order to make the business work.
“The object originally was a sports training facility,” said LeDrew. “It’s evolved into a lot more than that. It’s a community-based recreation centre… I had an idea of what I wanted to do, and then the community dictated what we ended up doing.”
Case in point? Pickleball.
“Pickleball was not on my radar,” said LeDrew. “Before we opened the doors in 2024, I truly didn’t know what pickleball was. We had to google it, google the size of the lines and the court, and we painted lines two days before we opened up. And our first rental was for pickleball.”
The Bullpen is not LeDrew’s first foray into the world of small business. He also runs a sheet metal and ventilation business in CBS.
The two business models are quite different from one another.
“I could go to a customer and highlight what they needed,” said LeDrew of the sheet metal company. “It’s a big difference from waiting for customers to come into the door. So, that was a big, big change for me. You can’t drag people through a door. You have to wait for them to realize what you have to offer and hope that they’re going to come in.”
LeDrew cites increasing costs of running a business – including everything from wages to electricity to fuel — as a major challenge but said he likes not being tied to a 9-5 job, and that there’s a certain satisfaction from creating your own income.
He encouraged others to pursue their dreams of owning a business — but to not leap without looking first.
“My biggest piece of advice is to do your research before you jump in completely,” said LeDrew. “But, in order to be in business and take a risk like this, you have to jump in, you have to not be afraid of failure and look forward to putting in lots of time and effort – especially in the early days. My first five months I was here 12 hours a day seven days a week. So, be prepared to spend long hours for little rewards with hopes of big rewards at the end… We’re going in the right direction, and I can’t wait to see what the future holds.”