Full-Time Clubs
The biggest change in the game over the past six years or so is the rise of the full-time table tennis club. There were about ten in December 2006 when I did a presentation to USA Table Tennis, trying to convince them to get into the business of recruiting and training of coaches and directors to set up such centers and junior training programs. (Nothing came of that - two board members literally laughed at the idea. I blogged about this on January 4, 2012 while writing about "USA Cadet Depth.") Anyway, since then the number of full-time clubs has skyrocketed as coaches see how others doing them so successfully. Here's my current list of 56 full-time table tennis clubs in the USA.
The biggest stumbling block for those who are setting up these centers is that there is no manual on how to do it. Each time they have to re-invent the wheel. It's not quite that bad - they can see others doing it successfully, and so know it can be done, and they have others to ask advice on how to do it. I don't have time to put one together. (I do way too many volunteer activities already.)