The Columbia Club is in residence at the Princeton Club of New York, and I am a member of both. There have been recent staff layoffs by club management. I suggest that these layoffs demonstrate poor policy.
The club is what we make it to be, and perhaps it means something different for each of us. I like to remember P.G. Wodehouse and the Drones Club. PCNY members don’t throw bread and sugar in the Tiger Bar & Grill, but our club is still great fun. Some of us like to attend the events or meet to play bridge. I watched the presidential election returns at the Tiger Bar. The place feels like home because the people who work at our club provide and sustain a super-positive environment in the heart of the metropolis.
Theodore Gamble ’75 writes in the March Club Notes, “In the midst of a difficult and unsettled economy, it is important to remember that the Princeton Club can be a friendly and comforting haven in Manhattan.”
I consider it very unsportsmanlike of the club management to drop staff in these challenging economic times. I wonder how our laid-off staff buy groceries; the fresh berries that wait staff bring to me in martini glasses at the bar don’t taste quite so juicy. I find it hard to play at PCNY when staff members (who not so long ago stood smiling on the dining room sidelines) are now likely waiting in unemployment lines.
If we pitch in and help PCNY with patronage, ideas, and efforts at this time, we can make things better. It is poor policy to drop the employees who once supported us when they now in turn need our support. I think that we should throw this bad management decision out of the club.