How New Trier Unified Competitive, Lessons, & Masters in One Platform

New Trier Aquatics: Running a Community Aquatic Organization at Scale

Featuring: Jeremy Meserole, Director of Competitive Swimming
Location: North Shore, Chicago
Programs: Competitive Swim, Lessons, Water Polo, Masters
Size: Over 1,000 participants
Goal: To serve the community from their entry to the water to forever, and be the gold standard for community aquatic programming.

“The transition was super easy. I did probably do some things on my own that Katie (captyn onboarding guru) offered to do. The amount of service provided was incredibly helpful. An educational kick off call and a couple of follow-up calls and export later and pretty much everything was in Captyn that needed to be.”

— Jeremy Meserole

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The Challenge: Managing Many Programs Without Creating Chaos

Before switching to Captyn, managing athletes across multiple programs required workarounds. A single swimmer participating in more than one program often had to be created multiple times in the system just to manage memberships, billing, and communication.

“With so many different programs, we had to create multiple instances of the same athlete. That made administration and communication more complicated than it needed to be.”
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— Jeremy Meserole

The result was fragmentation. Not because of poor management, but because the systems weren’t designed for multi-program aquatic organizations.

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Improving the Parent Experience: One Family, One Account: 

One of the biggest improvements came on the parent side.

Captyn allowed New Trier to associate multiple parents/caregivers with a single athlete account, giving both parents equal access without sharing login credentials.

“Having multiple logins associated with one swimmer has been huge. Sometimes one parent handles everything, but if they’re not available, the other can step in immediately.”

— Jeremy Meserole

Parents also responded positively to the overall experience.

“We were on the same system for 17 years. We’ve gotten a lot of positive feedback about the cleanliness of the interface and being able to do everything on the phone that you can do on a computer.”

— Jeremy Meserole

For families juggling multiple schedules, that simplicity mattered.

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Operations That Match Real Life on Deck

As a director who spends significant time on the pool deck and at swim meets, Jeremy needed tools that worked where he worked.

“In the past, if something needed to be changed, I had to wait until I could get to a computer. Now, if something comes up, I can troubleshoot it right on the pool deck.”

— Jeremy Meserole

That ability to manage programming and resolve issues in real time reduced stress and eliminated delay in providing great customer service, especially during busy competition weekends.

“It’s refreshing to be able to take care of something immediately instead of putting it off."

— Jeremy Meserole

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A Smooth Transition for a Large Organization

Switching systems can be intimidating, especially for a 1,000-member, board-run 501(c)(3) organization. But New Trier’s onboarding experience proved otherwise.

“The transition was super easy,” Jeremy said. Onboarding meetings helped them understand the software, and a few onboarding calls, everything they needed was in Captyn.

Support from the Captyn team played a key role.

“The service provided was incredibly helpful. They walked us through what we needed, offered to handle setup, and were very responsive.”

— Jeremy Meserole

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Unexpected Wins That Matter in the Moment

One of Jeremy’s most memorable moments came during USA Swimming renewals.

A parent ran into an issue renewing their athlete with USA Swimming. New Trier had opted out of bulk renewals, which means Jeremy normally wouldn’t have been able to help the family. But Jeremy discovered he could process the renewal directly through Captyn.

“That was kind of cool. We definitely couldn’t have done that on our old platform.”

— Jeremy Meserole

It was a small moment, but one that saved time, allowed New Trier to provide a great customer experience, and reinforced confidence in the system.

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Looking Ahead

For Jeremy, the standout value of Captyn isn’t just functionality, it’s Captyn’s responsiveness.

“The platform can do what we’re used to doing and it’s still adding new functionality at a rapid pace. That hasn’t always been our experience elsewhere.”

— Jeremy Meserole

And his advice to other teams?

“If an organization of a thousand members can find value in it, it’s even easier for an organization of 200. It’s absolutely worth taking a look.”

— Jeremy Meserole