University Club of Portland President Michael Lewellen on diversity, history and club competition

Originally Posted August 10, 2023 | Portland Business Journal

Michael Lewellen has some well-known employers on his resume: Nike, the Portland Trail Blazers and the University of Portland, where he is currently vice president of marketing and communications.

Another title he’s equally proud of is president of the University Club of Portland, a year-long position he began in January.

Established in 1898, the club is located on Southwest Sixth Avenue in downtown Portland in a 40,000-square-foot Jacobean building. The clubhouse was built in 1913 and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

Lewellen, who’s been a member since 2014, is the club’s first African-American president and is a founding member of the club’s 5-year-old diversity and inclusion committee. The club does not collect information on the race of members, but Lewellen said one-third of members are women.

We talked to Lewellen recently about his proudest accomplishments so far and what's still on his agenda. This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Let's talk about DEI. What are your priorities when it comes to diversity??One of the things that we had to do was acknowledge that clubs, I don't say all but many private clubs, have a checkered past when it comes to accepting minorities, certain religions, even the engagement of women as members. So we acknowledge where we have been but are now focused on where we need to go.

How do you create a club where a person of color who might not have ever considered a private club membership would feel welcome??This is a club that was founded in 1898. The location where we sit in downtown Portland, we have been there since 1913. These were periods in American history where racism, sexism were very prevalent in this country. So these clubs were born from those eras. In order to diversify, it's going to be important for people of diverse backgrounds to see other members of diverse backgrounds. I think the other thing, too, is that we successfully infused into our University Club calendar cultural celebrations that would allow for the spotlight to be shown on the diversity of cultures that make up the Portland community, whether it's Black History Month or Hispanic Heritage Month or Pride Month. We have made incremental progress in the area of diversity and inclusion. We by no means see it as a complete circle and will continue to seek ways to diversify membership.

There is lots of competition for membership. There's the Arlington Club, for one, and now Soho Club is coming to town. How do you differentiate yourself in a crowded market??I think our social and professional offerings is how we differentiate ourselves. The fact that we have a 125-year head start doesn't hurt either. One of the things that we're all up against when it comes to private club membership is that we are trying to get people to spend their discretionary dollars. One of the things that we work on constantly is how do we maintain a value proposition. That's food and beverage, we do TED Talks, events that focus on different content (cooking classes, art shows, design and build architectural sessions).

What's gone right in your first six months as president and what's on the to-do list??Right off the bat I wanted to really celebrate the 125 years. And while we had a terrific party, we are also using the anniversary as an opportunity to revisit the club's history. We've pulled a lot of things out of the archives, articles, videos, historic pieces of memorabilia and displayed them for our members. Second is the value proposition around membership, we've got a new chef who's come aboard, for example. And third is finding stories. Our Founders Day is in September when we honor members that have been key contributors to the success of the club ... and who have used the club (for big events). We know that there have been wedding proposals, major business deals. The last part of my presidential platform, if you will, is that we really want to create within our space a location for honor and recognition. There's an old museum of sorts, but I think looking at the memorabilia really calls out that we need to designate a space of honor and recognition.