66 PUNCHMAGAZINE.COM {due west} What’s your favorite thing about owning and running Goetz Brothers? The thing that I really love is the fact that we get to watch kids grow up and hopefully bring the next generation of athletes to shop with us. Frequently, I’m told by customers that they remember when their dad or mom brought them to Goetz Brothers to get their first glove. It’s amazing that people associate that memory with our store. How do you and your brother divide the workload? Marc is mainly responsible for the majority of buying and I’m responsible for everything else: staffing and supervising, scheduling, accounting, sales. What percentage of your business is baseball- and softball-related? Probably 80 percent. A baseball player needs pants, socks, belt, cleats, gloves and a helmet. So there’s just a whole lot more merchandise you can sell to an individual player on the baseball/softball side of things than Which sports did you excel at in school? I played both baseball and soccer at the varsity level in high school. I went to college at UC Riverside, redshirted in baseball my freshman year but then ended up playing three years of club soccer. You also coached baseball and soccer for many years. How would you describe that experience? Coaching is probably one of the most rewarding experiences of my life. You get to make an impact on the lives of young people—teaching them teamwork, positivity, responsibility and how to deal with failure. Do you recall any special challenges being both dad and coach? You hear of coaches having difficulty coaching their own kids. My kids were a pleasure to coach; they worked hard, had great attitudes and set great examples for the other players. I believe my relationship with my kids was enhanced because sports gave us programmed time with each other.
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