Like a Boss: The Woman Who Brought MLS to St. Louis
When the most powerful men in the city couldn’t secure the city a team, a woman stepped forward to get the job done
Last Saturday, 22,500 fans stood in a brand-new stadium in downtown St. Louis and cheered. It was moments before St. Louis City SC’s inaugural MLS home game, and they roared as the team’s owners waved from midfield. These weren’t stereotypical sports owners; they didn’t wear suits, and they weren’t old men. They were a group of seven women. In the center was Carolyn Kindle, who wore the team’s pink jersey with her name bedazzled on the back, and most of the attention was on her. All of this—the pride, passion, and pagentry—wouldn’t have happened without her.
“You’re rich!” yelled one fan from behind the goal. “But we don’t hate you!”
That’s one way to put it. In St. Louis, fans are particularly wary of their team’s deep-pocketed owners. Just eight years ago, Stan Kroenke made promises to the city that he broke as soon as he saw greener pastures to move the Rams to Los Angeles. But Kindle felt the love as her team roared to a 3-1 victory. Finally, this town had something to cheer for—something new to call its own.
Better yet, it was their own piece of soccer, a sport which has as storied a history in St. Louis as anywhere in the States, dating back to 1950 when Team USA shocked England at the World Cup. In that game, still considered one of the biggest upsets in soccer history, five members of the team hailed from St. Louis. It’s a connection that’s continued to this day: in the most recent World Cup, two U.S. players hailed from the Gateway City. But they have never had a hometown soccer team in MLS.
For decades, the most powerful men in town tried repeatedly to woo the MLS. The owner of the Cardinals gave it a go. So did the President of Anheuser Busch. The man who ran the Blues put together a group to build a soccer stadium on the spot where Stan Kroenke had once promised to erect a new home for the Rams. He promised that he would right historic wrongs—but he couldn’t get the votes needed to approve his project.
That’s when Kindle decided that if the men couldn’t get the job done, she’d just have to do it herself.
Kindle is a lifelong St. Louisan and comes from the family that started Enterprise Rent-A-Car. She knew nothing about soccer but saw how it connected other cities around the world—the kind of connection St. Louis needed. Kindle figured making the city’s soccer dream a reality was a way she could give back, and so she put together a band of other women—mostly family members—to become owners; only later would she realize it would be the first majority female-ownership group in the league’s history.
"I've been very blessed to be surrounded by successful businesswomen,” Kindle said. “It was a good fit and just added to the story that is City SC.”
But while Kindle had a sharp business mind, she didn’t know soccer. So, once she hired an experienced sporting director from Germany, she scheduled hours-long sessions to chat through strategy with him. It was kind of like Ted Lasso’s “Biscuits with the Boss”…only probably with some St. Louis gooey butter cake.
The female touch goes beyond the ownership suite. Most of the concessions are operated by local female-owned restaurants and businesses. A coach at the youth academy is a woman. Kindle even hired a female head groundskeeper.
"What I've enjoyed is watching young girls come up to me,” Kindle said. “A little girl walked up to me in a restaurant, probably eight years old, and she said to me, ‘If I take a picture with you, I'm going to be the most popular person in my school. I wanted to hire her on the spot.”
Whatever Kindle is doing is working. Two weeks into the season, her team is undefeated—one of the hottest starts by an expansion club in league history—and the stadium and atmosphere are the talk of the league.
“We’re going to put St. Louis on the international map,” Kindle said. “I’m 100% convinced.”
During the first game, while Kindle watched with her other co-owners, the sold-out crowd chanted, “STL! STL! STL!” She couldn’t help but chant along with the rest of her city.
“We’re a sports town, and this is the best of us,” Adam Truska, a local fan, told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. “This is everything that you want in a sports community—and a community in general. Everything that Kindle is doing. This is St. Louis. I bleed Cardinals red, Blues blue and now City red. Or city pink.”
If only the players’ jerseys were bedazzled like their owner’s.
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