For founders of kids' programs
First Field buys the programs that come to the kids: soccer, chess, art, dance, robotics, anything they count down to all week. Every one of them gets a forever home. The team stays. The families stay. The weekend mornings keep coming.
Confidential from the first hello · no numbers until you're ready · you talk to the owner, not an analyst
Why founders pick us
Most buyers want to strip it, stack it, and sell it in five years. We're the other kind. First Field is a holding company: we buy kids' programs to keep them, and keep them great.
A new field for us, like chess or dance? Your brand becomes a platform in the family, with its name, colors, and warm-up songs intact. Something we already run, like soccer or baseball? Your program joins that platform brand, and we transition the name together, on a timeline you help set. Either way, your team, your families, and your schools stay.
Coaches and teachers are the program. They stay, their pay is honored, and for the first time they get a bench behind them: payroll, insurance, marketing, handled.
No fund clock. No exit committee. No flip. We buy, we keep, we keep improving. Boring on purpose. Boring is what forever looks like from the outside.
Stay for years. Coach weekends only. Hand off in a season. Founders set the tempo of their own exit, and we write the plan around it.
The lineup
Four platform brands, all running across New York City, Hoboken, and Jersey City; scouting across New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut.
Weekend-morning soccer from first steps through twelfth year. A generation of small cleats.
Ten sports, one curriculum. A kid's first taste of everything from tennis to golf.
First crack of the bat, first trip around the bases, first team photo with backwards caps.
Stethoscopes, casts, and pretend patients. Ten programs that turn curious kids into little doctors, nurses, and vets.
The binder has an empty sleeve. Tell us what you built.
The scouting report
Sports, arts, music, chess, science, dance. If children count the days until it, it counts.
Most of the magic travels: schools, parks, churches, rented gyms. A home base or a few of your own spaces are fine too. Soccer Stars runs both, and it works.
Rainouts survived, gyms double-booked, and the families came back anyway. Track records beat pitch decks.
We run our programs in person, so we buy where we can show up with a whistle.
Gymnastics rigs, pools, trampoline parks: if the program can only ever happen at one address, we're the wrong buyer, and we'll say so on the first call.
How it works
Selling your life's work shouldn't be a mystery. Here's the whole chart, star by star. Go ahead and peek at the ending. We would.
Most founders have never sold a business. That's fine; most buyers have never run a kids' program. Step through the chart and see exactly what happens, in order, no surprises.
Who you're emailing
I grew up on small fields and dirt diamonds. I spent my Army years as a Ranger, and then a long time looking for the one business worth the rest of my working life. It turned out to be this one.
Today Soccer Stars, Amazing Athletes, Little Rookies, and Little Medical School are in the family, and I operate our New York City programs myself: same cones, same cafeterias, same weekend mornings you know. So when I say we'll take care of what you built, it isn't a slogan; it's how I run my own.
If you're even a little curious, write me. I read and answer everything myself, within three business days.
The fit check
Five quick questions. Nothing is recorded, and nothing is sent unless you decide to hit send at the end.
The hard questions
No. There's no fund, no clock, no exit plan. First Field is a holding company built to keep things. Less exciting than a leveraged flip. Which is exactly the point.
Done right, it means the opposite. You built something bigger than one person's weekends can hold. Finding it a home that keeps the team, keeps the families, and keeps showing up isn't walking away. It's the last act of taking care of it. And the sideline is yours as long as you want it.
Justis Clow, the founder and the operator of our New York City programs. Same cones, same cafeterias, same weekend mornings you know. Army Ranger before this. You deal with the owner, not an analyst.
Completely, and by default. When it's time to look at numbers, a simple NDA goes in place first. Your staff, your families, and your competitors find out when you decide they do. And a conversation that stays a conversation stays between us.
They stay. The people are the program; buying it and gutting it would be buying nothing. Teams stay intact, pay gets honored, and we add training, benefits, and room to grow where we can.
Honest answer: it depends on the field. If you'd be our first program in a category, like chess or dance, your brand becomes a platform in the family and the name stays, colors and warm-up songs included. If you run something we already operate, like soccer, multi-sport, baseball, or health science, your program joins that platform brand over time. We plan that transition with you, and your families hear it from you first.
Neither. Some founders stay for years, some coach weekends only, some hand off in a single season. The transition plan is written around your life, not a fund calendar.
In writing, with the math shown. Programs like these generally trade on a multiple of earnings; where you land depends on your team, your school relationships, and how transferable the magic is. We won't insult you with a lowball, and we won't spin you a fantasy to win the deal either.
Say hi
Quiet by default · your pace, not ours · no obligation, ever