3 years ago, Squash New Zealand set out on an ambitious journey to build a single connected national system.
Like many national sporting organisations, Squash New Zealand had strong foundations—a passionate community, a competitive culture, and decades of history. But behind the scenes, its technology was holding the sport back. Core systems were outdated, disconnected, and no longer fit for the future vision of Squash New Zealand.
What followed was not a simple software rollout, but a multi-year partnership, one that required persistence, flexibility, and a shared commitment to getting it right for squash at every level.
A bold vision for the future of squash
When Squash New Zealand began reviewing its systems, the challenge was clear. Its primary competition management platform had been in place for more than 15 years. While competition and grading sit at the heart of squash, there was no reliable way to connect that data to clubs or members nationally.
“It meant we didn’t have any accurate data around who was actually playing and who was a member of a club,” says Martin Dowson, Chief Executive of Squash New Zealand.
Clubs largely self-reported their numbers, leaving Squash New Zealand without a clear national picture of participation. At the same time, expectations were changing. Younger players were increasingly digital-first, while many clubs continued to rely on spreadsheets, manual processes, and physical keys.
“We strongly believed that for clubs to survive in a technology-driven future, most clubs needed a club management system,” Dowson says.
Squash New Zealand’s vision was ambitious: a single, connected national solution that would bring together club management, member data, grading, and competition management.
The question was how to get there.
“You go through a bit of a journey deciding whether you have several solutions and get them to integrate, or go with one supplier to do it all,” Dowson says. “We were open to the best solution.”
That search ultimately led Squash New Zealand to Hello Club.
Clarifying the ecosystem
As part of the partnership, Hello Club was adopted as the preferred club management system for Squash New Zealand-affiliated clubs. It supports memberships, payments, bookings, access control, lighting, and day-to-day club operations.
At a national level, Hello Club also helped build MySquash, Squash New Zealand’s central platform that brings together club data, member records, grading, and competition systems into one national view.
While several systems operate behind the scenes, Dowson says the experience for users is deliberately as simple as possible.
“Our users go through the same front door,” he says. “They just open different doors to get into different parts of MySquash.”
Connecting every club, every member
One of the biggest outcomes of the partnership has been the introduction of a new affiliation model, enabled by the connected system.
“So we now have every member of every club in New Zealand connected through Hello Club into MySquash,” Dowson says.
Most affiliated clubs use Hello Club as their club management system, allowing data to flow seamlessly into the national platform. Importantly, Hello Club also worked with Squash New Zealand to ensure clubs using other systems could still connect.
“Hello Club bent over backwards to create a solution so all the clubs have a connecting point to the national system,” Dowson says.
Benefits for Squash New Zealand
For Squash New Zealand, the impact has been transformational. For the first time, the organisation has accurate, real-time visibility of membership and participation across every club, district, and region.
“We’ve had 50 years of operating with self-reporting,” Dowson says. “Clubs told us what they had. Now we’ve got real data.”
That visibility is already shaping decision-making.
“For example, we can quickly identify areas with low junior player participation and use that to implement targeted strategies to grow junior numbers in those regions,” he says.
The new affiliation model has also simplified affiliation fee collection and strengthened Squash New Zealand’s credibility with Sport New Zealand.
Benefits for clubs and members
While the national benefits are significant, Dowson says the real test of the system is how it performs at the club and member level.
For members, the goal is to have an experience that is seamless.
“There’s no double handling anymore. Members don’t have to register at a club and then register again at a national level. When they register at a club, they use the same login to access their national profile.”
Once connected, members can access Squash TV, grading and scores, competitions, and future services, all through a single account. Squash New Zealand has also enabled more flexible participation, allowing non-members to engage through social competitions, ladders, and grading systems.
For clubs, the shift has been equally important. Hello Club has helped modernise operations, reducing administrative load and lifting professionalism. For many clubs, Hello Club’s integrated access and lighting control have also improved the overall admin and member experience.
“At the end of the day, our members are getting a better experience,” Dowson says. “And because of the features we’ve built, we’re saving volunteers time, which helps mitigate volunteer burnout, a systemic issue in sport in New Zealand.”
Onboarding with big uptake
One of the standout achievements of the project was onboarding more than 160 clubs in a matter of weeks.
That level of uptake required hands-on support and deep experience working with clubs.
“The Hello Club team worked closely with John Fletcher, our National Development Manager,” Dowson says. “Without every club putting in effort, this wouldn’t have been a successful project.”
The reality of partnership: progress isn’t always linear
Delivering a national system that connects clubs of all sizes, multiple partners, and decades-old processes was never going to be straightforward.
“We thought we’d go through A, B, and C to get there,” Dowson says. “Instead, we had roadblocks, detours, and experiences we didn’t expect, but we’ve landed at the same place.”
Those moments, he says, are where the partnership with Hello Club proved its value.
“It was always going to be tricky,” he says. “We’ve had to adapt and change along the way, but Hello Club has always been honest and direct, and we’ve understood why decisions were made.”
Rather than treating the relationship as transactional, both organisations worked through challenges together, staying aligned on the long-term goal and grounded in the realities of club sport.
As Hello Club’s CEO, Rodd Penney reflects, “It’s easy to talk about partnerships when everything is running smoothly. What matters is how you work together when plans change. We faced challenges along the way, but by showing up with honesty, adapting, and persevering alongside Squash New Zealand, the success of this partnership became a real testament to shared persistence.”
