Branding Before the Build-Out: The Par Club's Story

Before The Par Club ever opened its doors, owner Tom Muldoon thought he just needed help "making the place look pretty." What he discovered instead was that branding — not interior design — had to come first. In this episode, Robin Pasley sits down with Tom to unpack how a former IT executive traded a Fortune 10 tech career for indoor golf, and how a branding exercise with Pasley Commercial Interiors completely reshaped his understanding of who his business was really for.

Tom shares how the branding process uncovered an ideal client he never expected, turned scattered ideas into a cohesive concept, and directly shaped everything from the floor plan and playful design details to the drink menu and membership strategy. He also opens up about the real costs of building a hospitality business from scratch, staying resilient through rising construction costs and economic uncertainty, and why "you can't be everything to everybody" became the guiding principle behind The Par Club's growth.

This conversation is a candid look at what happens when a first-time business owner discovers that the story behind the brand has to be built before the space around it.

Welcome to Design To Help Your Business Grow, where we design the unforgettable.

Interior design is always part of your company's first impression whether you are aware of it or not. Let's make the impression we really want to make on both our clients and our team members.

If you need to create unforgettable experiences, then branded interior design is your secret weapon … because we don’t do boring.  Design to Help Your Business Grow. Pasley Commercial Interiors.

Transcript

Why Did Branding Almost Become an Afterthought for The Par Club?

Tom Muldoon: You don't know what you don't know. I quickly became aware that I had a lot I didn't know about branding. We were very unsure what to do there, how to approach that challenge. Where you had suggested, well, there are some other things we can potentially do on the branding side. And it was an exercise of knowledge for me because there were questions that were asked throughout the process that helped me bring it to an arrowhead, as opposed to having a scattering of ideas that we were just going to lay out there and not become a cohesive thing.

Robin Pasley: A lot of people, since we're talking about it on this podcast, don't understand that branding is not a logo. The logo is what comes out of the branding. The branding is the storytelling, and it's the story of who you are as an individual owning the company and the company itself. And then the idea, from our perspective as a branding agency, is that if we authentically build your story, you will begin to authentically attract. Hi, I'm Robin Pasley, and this is Designed to Help Your Business Grow. And today I'm with you, Tom Muldoon.

Robin Pasley: Tom, tell me about your company. Who — what — why are we together?

Tom Muldoon: My company is The Par Club. It is an indoor golf facility in Castle Rock. We try very hard to establish an environment where people want to come in, enjoy golf, get better at golf, and enjoy the social aspects of golf.

Robin Pasley: I remember the phone call I got the day you reached out to see if we could assist. One of the things that intrigued me most was that you had done the research to find out what was competitive in that market. I love that you went for — it's not just the Cadillac of simulators, it's the genius of simulators.

Tom Muldoon: Yeah, it came out well. There are several models in indoor golf. The most common on the extremes are 24-hour access facilities. They tend to be in industrial parks, and they serve a great purpose to help golfers improve and get a lot of golf and simulation in. Then there's the other end of the spectrum, which I had seen an inspiration for up in Denver, and that was what I wanted. I just wanted to go toward that higher-end facility — very high touch with our staff, high-end technology, and visuals, because I'm a visual person, that would surprise people as they walked in the door.

Robin Pasley: Let's back up a little and tell me how you came to want to open this location, because this is your first step out in owning a bar-slash-entertainment space. What were you doing before this?

Tom Muldoon: I spent my career in technology and IT. I spent the majority of that with the larger consulting companies. I did most of my work for Fortune 10 companies, putting in large IT systems for them. At a point where I was ready to retire from that — retiring being a loose term — the fundamentals of that career had changed post-COVID. We weren't seeing our clients as much, I wasn't traveling, I wasn't engaging people, and it was becoming a bear of a job instead of an enjoyment of a job. I was debating what to do, and I literally saw a commercial on the local news about a facility up in Denver. I just wanted to go see it. And when I saw it, it crystallized very quickly that I wanted to do something like that. I wanted to spend the remaining portion of my work career in that kind of environment. I was lucky enough, through the earlier portions of my career, to have made some good financial decisions that gave me the ability to take a shot. People ask me a lot why I'm doing this, and I tell them: I was going to retire, and I came up with what could be the most expensive, most stressful, and dumbest idea you can come up with — and I came up with this. So now I spend my life trying to make people better golfers while simultaneously pouring them drinks.

Robin Pasley: That's a good combination. It's part of the reason I chose golf as a hobby. I was mentored by two amazing women who both chose one of their husband's hobbies when their sons left for college, so I decided to do the same. My options were fly fishing or golf, and I chose the one with fashion and liquor. So it sounds like you're engaging the liquor side of things with your concept. We got to work together on this project, and I know branding was a major element. Tell us about your engagement with our team and what that was like for you.

Tom Muldoon: One of the things I've taken away from my previous career is you don't know what you don't know, and I quickly became aware that I had a lot I didn't know about branding. It was myself and some advisors along the way, and we were very unsure how to approach that challenge. It was actually an afterthought for us as part of our engagement — when I started talking with you, I said I just needed help making this place look pretty. You suggested there were some other things we could potentially do on the branding side. We came down, we listened, and thought, well, I don't know, that doesn't sound all that hard. We gave it further thought, talked to some additional individuals who told us we were the dumbest people on the planet, and quickly made the decision to engage with you on it. It was an exercise of knowledge for me, because the questions asked throughout the process helped bring it to a point — to an arrowhead — instead of a scattering of ideas that never became a cohesive thing. The exercise and the process really created the brand, rather than us already having a brand and just needing support to grow it. It was the start.

How Did Branding Shape The Par Club's Interior Design?

Robin Pasley: I know you got to meet H.B., our chief branding guru. In my history with him, he has this special gift of taking a lot of pieces that have been handed to him and weaving them together into a cohesive focal thought. It's really a surpassing grace that he has. You got to watch it in operation, and then we got to take what he developed with you and turn it into an interior design, which is my favorite part. Tell me about the challenges we faced in the execution of your project.

Tom Muldoon: In hindsight, we would not have been able to accomplish what we did had we not done the branding step first. Logistically, I knew what the floor plan layout was going to be — structurally, how things needed to be laid out to maximize the number of simulators we could place in the facility, because that's direct revenue, while simultaneously creating space that felt welcoming and open. But that's all I knew. It was because of the work we did together that your team was able to take that and say, here's how we could make this place unique and special.

Robin Pasley: I think I skipped a step. I want you to share with those listening who your ideal client is, because I found that to be something that came out of your branding strategy that was unusual.

Tom Muldoon: That's kind of an understatement. My belief prior to the exercise was that our ideal target client — the person we should be thinking about as we moved everything from branding to design to social media platforms — was the individual looking for the country club experience. That person, rather than spending $50,000 at a country club, would have probably leaned more toward a professional male golfer. Where we landed, and I found this very interesting, was upper-middle-class, late 20s to 45, female golfers or females looking for social environments to be with friends and family. It was the right answer, but I wouldn't have naturally gotten there. It was the right answer because they are the individuals who decide where people go, both for themselves and for friends and family. It's more often that latter group — looking for great experiences for themselves and with friends and family — who find those places.

Tom Muldoon: I say that because nothing we did in the eventual design took away from that first description I laid out. Those individuals still find us frequently. But the fact that we designed for the ideal client that came out of our branding exercise has been very impactful. I've got great stories about people walking in and opening those doors, saying, whoa, what did I just walk into? Because there's an expectation with indoor golf simulation of what you're going to see — and it's not what you see when you walk into our space.

Robin Pasley: We had such a blast taking the exercises you did with H.B. on branding and implementing them. This is your baby, your creation — and I think that's something a lot of people don't recognize: how much an individual's inspiration for the business has to be part of it, including the branding piece. We learned that you're kind of playful, a bit of a jokester, and we brought that into the design. We did a take on the upside-down approach to everything — everything being a little off or different than expected. Hanging the 18-hole course from the ceiling, with the balls coming down, played off that playful side of who you are.

Tom Muldoon: We get a lot of compliments on that specific element, mostly from women, so we really hit the target there. It's not overstated — it's a simple addition that wasn't overly costly with a massive amount of popularity and impact.

Robin Pasley: That's the stuff we like to hear — that ideas that weren't costly actually added up. I know you took the right approach investing in the elements you can't go back and redo later, like the flooring. If you try to redo that later, it costs a lot more than doing it right the first time. I applaud you for those decisions. And your simulators — since you chose smart ones — were part of that upfront investment cost, weren't they?

Tom Muldoon: Yeah. Anybody starting down that path just needs to get comfortable with being uncomfortable, because costs are going to be higher than any plan. It's like building a house — you have a budget, and then you have to make decisions about that budget along the way.

Robin Pasley: Did you own the businesses you ran previously?

Tom Muldoon: No, I always worked as an employee for major large enterprise companies.

Robin Pasley: I think that's significant, because to be a first-time business owner and calmly say "get comfortable being uncomfortable" tells me you're a flexible person with your eye on the prize, who didn't let rising construction costs crumple you.

Tom Muldoon: I don't care what level of entrepreneur you are — whether you're Steve Jobs, Elon Musk, or Tom Muldoon doing something much, much smaller — you have to believe in that vision, right, wrong, or indifferent. There have been stressful moments since we opened: days without customers, making sure we can pay payroll. What keeps every entrepreneur going is a fundamental belief.

What Does a Visit to The Par Club Look Like Today?

Robin Pasley: Tell me about the practical nuts and bolts of what it's like to come to your facility now.

Tom Muldoon: We're really early, so I can tell you where we are now and give you a hint of where we're going. We opened with starry eyes and a bar, plus the food operations required to have that bar — a few menu items and some pre-packaged items, because you need food to have a bar. We opened with a sandwich we call "the crappy," because it's a crappy sandwich, but it's three dollars, and we're not tricking anybody. It's the kind of thing you'd get from a cart girl on a golf course, except they'd charge you ten dollars. We're being reasonable and respectful of Castle Rock and our customers. We do have real plans for food — we've been waiting for equipment, and we're going to start test-kitchening items like Bavarian pretzels, breakfast burritos, and a spicy dip with pita, plus some sweet desserts.

Tom Muldoon: That's been the growing side on food and beverage. We've honed in our cocktails, being very specific and measured rather than launching 90 different specialty cocktails. Our old-fashioned is a huge seller. Most people buy beer — it's a golf place — and we've got 14 taps, so we sell quite a bit of tap beer. You asked about our leagues — they've been very successful, and we get asked constantly about memberships. We're thinking about how to structure that: we may make leagues our membership, so league players get special perks, rather than a flat membership where you can just play as much as you want. We're working through how to reward the people who are our best customers, rather than racing to the bottom. One of the exercises that came out of the branding was that we can't be everything to everybody.

Robin Pasley: Which I think is such an important part of the branding exercise. A lot of people don't understand that branding isn't the logo — the logo is what comes out of the branding. The branding is the storytelling, the story of who you are as an individual owning the company and the company itself. From our perspective as a branding agency, if we authentically build your story, you'll begin to authentically attract the people drawn to who you are. It's a very natural thing, and I thought it was great that you went through that process — and finding it's actually working for your business model is even more exciting.

Tom Muldoon: It was a real wake-up call for me personally. I'm a technologist, an executive nerd — I spoke geek to CEOs and CIOs throughout my career. It was an eye-opener that I'm not going to be everything to everyone. In my mind, I kept thinking, why wouldn't I want that customer, why wouldn't I want this one? But you have to choose. You have to target and be strategic about who you're trying to attract. That applies to the design, but now it's coming into what we want our leagues to be, whether leagues should be memberships, and what type of food we want on our menu — because that attracts different types of customers. We have a premium well — Tito's, Bulleit, Casamigos as our tequila — higher-end products as our standard well drinks. I've had customers tell me I should switch to a cheaper tequila so I could offer four-dollar drinks, and I said, but that's not my brand. That's not who I want to attract. I'm not trying to attract people who want the cheapest drinks.

Tom Muldoon: It's really become a thought process in everything we do — going back to thinking about who our customers are, why we're doing this, what kind of menu items make sense. It was a surprise, in retrospect, because I wouldn't have thought I'd be considering those things four months after opening.

Robin Pasley: That you keep going back to that exercise — asking why are we doing this — and applying it not just to the design but to the function and all your decision-making as your business continues, is wonderful. Do you have other challenges you're facing in the coming year?

Tom Muldoon: Every day has been a learning experience, but I think our fundamental challenge right now — even though we've been casually positive — is that I work there seven days a week. I'm operationally strong in managing money, so I keep labor tight, which means I work more. That's fundamentally driven by awareness. We have to increase awareness of our business locally and a bit more broadly, because we actually get people from Colorado Springs — two of our best customers live down here and drive up because they'd rather play with us than other places they've experienced. One of those customers walked into our bar, doesn't even play golf, had a drink because they were headed to the rodeo, realized two coworkers were avid golfers, and came back the following week — they've been great customers since. I've got to find ways to build that awareness, whether through direct mailing, digital marketing, or handing out flyers at the farmer's market. If I can tackle that challenge successfully, it positions us for strong growth and maybe gets me a day off, since I won't have to be so controlling on labor.

Robin Pasley: I'm hopeful that happens for you, and that you find a great marketing partnership.

Tom Muldoon: In my opinion, we have to play a little reactionary to what's thrown at us while trying to be as proactive as we can. None of us know what interest rates will do — we were in a climate where it looked like they'd come down, and now we don't know if they're going back up. That has direct implications on a high-capital business like ours. We just have to be proactive and react as things happen. I couldn't have planned for a bad winter, or for something not arriving at port for two months. Right now, gas prices are high — I filled up my tank at $5.60 a gallon for premium, more than I've ever seen. I'm sure my customers feel that too, which means less discretionary income for the kind of business we run, whether it's tariff pressure or budget squeezes from other costs.

Robin Pasley: It does, for sure. What you said is true — it's about mindset and belief, believing that what you bring to the customer is still valuable, and being nimble and flexible to move with the forces coming at you. You've had great things to say today about staying positive, believing in the vision, and flexing with what happens. It sounds like it's really worked for you.

Tom Muldoon: I'm not sure how you feel as a business owner, but someone once said — and it's cliché but true — when your passion is your job, it's not a job. I come in every day and love my customers. I've gotten to know quite a few of them, and it's a real joy running that business, which of course comes with stresses. But that's what keeps me getting up every day — I have great customers, and I hope to get to know a lot more of them over the next couple of years.

Robin Pasley: We're the same way. It's what gets us out of bed too — for me, it's helping business owners solve the problems they're in, like the experience you had with us helping tell the story in the brand, the space, and all the elements. If people want to find you, how do we find The Par Club?

Where Can You Find The Par Club?

Tom Muldoon: We're definitely online — you can Google The Par Club in Castle Rock and you'll find us. Logistically, we're not far from the hub of downtown Castle Rock. We're considered part of the downtown merchants association since we're in the downtown area. We're in the plaza on the south side off Plum Creek Parkway, exit 184 off I-25, in the large Safeway Plaza. Once you're in that plaza, it's not hard to find us — we're one of the bigger establishments there, right in the corner, almost directly across from Safeway. It's not hard to find us if you're looking for a great entertainment night or some serious golf.

Robin Pasley: I love that — the serious golf part is awesome.

Tom Muldoon: Not to put pressure on you, but I've got an empty shell room now called my event bay, which I've got to think through. I know your team is coming up to see me soon and give me some ideas. Of course, you know me — I'm going to tell them this is the worst idea I've ever heard, and to come back with their best option.

Robin Pasley: I think we should call that back room the back nine.

Tom Muldoon: I think you've been drinking.

Robin Pasley: I really enjoyed you coming by today and sharing your experience of what it means to be a business owner, and going through the whole process with a company like ours. It's been great to have you here.

Tom Muldoon: Thank you. Honestly, we should thank Rick, who made the introduction at some point. Whether you've gotten to know this about me or not, I'm a big believer in the universe, and I believe the universe sometimes provides. It provided us this opportunity to work together, and it worked out well.

Robin Pasley: It did. I really enjoyed it too. Thanks again for being on our podcast today.

H.B. Pasley: Thank you. Thanks for having me. If you need to create an unforgettable experience, then branded interior design is your secret weapon, because we don't do boring. Designed to help your business grow. Pasley Commercial Interiors.