The closing of the University Club of Milwaukee’s downtown building before the end of 2023 came as a shock but not a surprise, according to club employees and longstanding members.
On Dec. 19, club members received an email that the downtown club will close permanently, and leadership listed years of bleeding membership, competition with restaurants and a cultural divide between two inner clubs as top reasons to shutter the building. A country club in Brown Deer will survive the downtown facility.
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John Shannon, an art collector who used the club for 30 years, said the club was a meeting space for him, his wife Jan Serr, family and friends. The board was transparent about the financial woes at the downtown facility, but in meetings that led up to the decision leaned towards preserving the golf course.
“The discussions had to do with the country club and the membership there, and the need for renovations there to keep it in good shape for current and future members. There was a lot of bias in favor of the country club,” Shannon added. “More so than trying to keep the city club, which had unique problems.”
Jim Caragher, the club board chair, said the board in October shared the downtown building was running under a deficit. Board members searched for ways to stay afloat but were left without options, he added.
“While we continue to believe in the value proposition for the city club campus, we have been forced to accept the fact that our recovery plan would likely take too long to unfold making the timeline unviable in light of the financial pressures we face,” Caragher said.
Sam Wittman, who worked as a waiter at the downtown club for nearly three years, said the writing was on the wall for both members and employees. “We had a feeling it wasn’t going to last long,” he remarked.
Members were unhappy with the club’s direction and the number of new members coming in was flat. After working for a couple of years, Wittman noted that a debt mounted for the downtown building with no new funding in sight. Eventually, staying open became unfeasible.
“A lot of people are picky about how the place that they’re members of is run. A lot of people were like, ‘Why am I paying money for this club if things are against how I feel and how I want?’ We did have quite a few members who were voicing their emotions, and they were upset about how things were looking for the club,” Wittman said.
The club board intends to sell the downtown property, and Caragher said they were confident they could find a buyer. The Georgian Revival building is worth around $2.7 million, records showed. The city designated it a historic structure more than two decades ago.
What will happen next? Shannon says he is looking to join another cub, but only time will tell what will happen to the building.
“If I had a magic answer, I would have said something to the board. There was no magic answer for this glacial change. It happened over many, many years.” Shannon remarked. “The board tried hard, but they couldn’t do it.”
