Does a New Year Bring A New Clubland?
New Year's Greetings from Clubland USA
If one was seated at their Club Table surrounded by cocktails, your favorite bar bites and cigars (but only if you’re the Detroit Athletic Club or any of the Union League Clubs), how would you describe 2025 for Clubland?
Yours truly would hope that you would share that there’s an exciting new publication, Clubland USA, that you’ve been reading that has been bringing you some of the best stories across Clubland.
Two words seem to come to mind for me: club fever.
Everyone’s chatting about clubs whether it’s the New Yorker’s recent profile of Nick Allen’s Reign, a hotspot for young right-wingers in the age of Trump, to the New York Post hinting at a possible “club bubble”.
And that’s not to say that it’s all good news, either. Hundreds of clubs closed their doors across America, including Neue House which closed its doors in September, with many more on the brink of closure in the next few years.
And SoHo House, once a scorn of the world of private clubs, has gone back to being privately held and even culled its bloated membership list in the past few months. Could it be taken seriously by some of the club snobs that made it the butt of so many jokes in years past?
Since our launch in March, we’ve brought readers inside DC’s most talked about club, Executive Branch while also reporting the heartbreaking news that Phoenix has become a city without a city club. Personal narratives of hallmark institutions, such as the Miami Surf Club, have been written by friends of this publication.
Ishaan Jajodia has chronicled the ultimate club sport, squash, in a series of articles including a feature-length profile of Spencer Lovejoy, CEO of the National Squash League and the Toledo Squash Classic.
Our Clubhouse Guides with topics ranging from Holiday Fund contributions to bringing your date to the club have been a treat to write and informative to our readers. We always love hearing feedback of all types, including those that result in a half-hearted mea culpa.
We don’t expect the “club fever” to subside either — and we’re excited to have a front row seat to bringing our readers along for the journey in 2026.
As our editorial holiday comes to a close, Ishaan Jajodia shares his prediction for clubs in 2026. Please enjoy your respective New Year’s Eve parties and stay tuned for an exciting year ahead. - LR
Happy New Year’s from Clubland USA
New Year, New Clubland?
Predictions for 2026 in Clubland
What Does 2026 Look Like for Clubland?
By: Ishaan Jajodia
A great historian once told me something that I’ve long suspected. Experts, he said, particularly historians, weren’t terribly good at predicting the future. They were, rather, experts at extrapolating from what they understood the best: the past.
Clubland’s story is one of ups and downs. We’ve had some legacy clubs close their doors forever with many others expecting to do so in the next year, but also the private club sphere is expanding.
It’s safe to assume that this is only the beginning. We’re going to see an explosion in clubs and club-adjacent organisations pop up through the United States, though how enduring their legacies will be, no one truly knows.
All clubs seem sure-footed until they’re suddenly not, and we’ve got some clubs that are suddenly prosperous not as a result of their leisurely atmosphere, but, rather, for extraneous reasons, solely to gain advantage.
I reckon most of them will survive as new institutions: when the Liberal Party supplanted the Whigs in Victorian England, the locus of liberal politics moved from Phineas Fogg’s dearly beloved Reform Club to the newly created National Liberal Club.
The economics of club life continue to fascinate all of us. Dues, like taxes, are always climbing and nearly every club that I belong to has indicated that it will continue in the next year. And, as the economy continues to show signs of stress, more members will face the hardest choice in Clubland: do I stay or do I go?
Who stays and who goes?
For clubs with a healthy base of younger, single members, anecdotal evidence seems to point that they might maintain their memberships even in times of great financial difficulty. The challenge, however, will come from younger families who are struggling to get a foothold in the housing market and are willing to engage in economising, even if it is somewhat temporary.
This would suggest a possibility that our tribe will become oddly distributed between older empty-nesters and the members between the ages of 25-40.
s
Squash is still king
Squash is seeing a renaissance across the United States, especially in the run-up to its inclusion in the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics. More and more people are signing up to play, though the scourge of pickleball remains, and represents a perennial distraction. Tennis remains an all-time favourite, though the passing of seasons doesn’t always permit us to get out there and dominate the baseline.
Entering the new age of Clubland
Many of the clubs I belong to have undergone significant rebranding exercises, with one particularly going quite upscale. For years, I’ve derided this university-affliated club for being not too different from a middling hotel lobby. The last quarter, however, shows that it has made significant strides to improve operations, appearance, and branding.
This club, like many, seems to have not yet figured out social media. It’s a challenge that even we – both Zoomers – are even struggling to figure out or frankly get started with.
Legacy clubs have seen the success of newer, privately-owned clubs and recognized that visually captivating images are a powerful tool to get younger people in the door. Personally, I wish there was a way for certain elements of club life to be seen by exclusively by members on social media.
Now, you wouldn’t want to see three-martini luncheons on a public feed, would you? I would rather go oink-oink in disgrace than come across as a pig in public, devouring a crab cake with a side (or two) of dirty vodka martini.
Clubs are warming up to young-uns
It seems that more and more legacy clubs are opening their hearts and membership rolls to young people. They’re starting to realize that the young ‘uns are actually good for business and for the general atmosphere of the place.
As both of us have spent more time in Clubland, over the past year, we’ve noticed a remarkable increase in the “under 35” crowd at clubs as diverse as Manhattan’s Union and University clubs to St. Paul’s University Club and even the Racquet Club of Philadelphia.
After all, a good wood paneled room needs some whiff of life, some joie de vivre, right? Pardon my French but I suspect that this trend is going to continue.
To be answered
2026 invites a remarkable question: what even is a club? What counts as one, and why? We’ll come closer to the answer over time.
Thank you for your continued support of Clubland USA. Our next issue will be on Tuesday, January 6.