Diallo Smith and Roderick Hardamon, both Detroit natives and owners of Drive, Detroit’s only table tennis social club, hosted a Grand Opening 2.0 celebration last week to celebrate the clubs reopening after an extensive renovation. The Drive 2.0 experience includes full-size Olympic quality Ping-Pong tables, 50-inch flat screen TV’s, lounge seating and private suites, a full-service bar featuring craft beer and handcrafted cocktails and a kitchen offering a wide variety of food options.
“There’s nothing like it in the city. We love to have fun and we like to see people having fun. Ping pong was just one of the things that any and everybody can do that when you’re doing it, you’re having fun, you’re enjoying yourself and you’re talking a little trash while having an enjoyable experience,” said Smith.
“Why table tennis? It’s cool! Think about when you were a kid. You were in someone’s basement, playing table tennis and your heart goes back to that fun and youthful time you had. Fast-forward to today, it’s great for social interaction. It’s a place where you can interact with colleagues, friends, birthdays, and corporate events and play table tennis in a very social and warm environment and you can grab a drink while you’re doing it,” Hardamon added.
Located at 645 Griswold in the Penobscot Building, Drive takes the table tennis experience of your childhood and transforms it into an upscale, mature and social experience with a Detroit edge. The club, the owners believe, is a welcome addition to the myriad of new establishments now in the heart of downtown, but it is even more significant that while so many feel left out, two Detroiters are playing a vital role in the city’s revitalization.
“It means a lot. Starting from when Rod and I were really young, we thought about being a businessman. We went in different directions, I went to Texas and he went to New York, but we came back with this understanding that this is an opportunity to not only be a part of the city but do something for the city and in the city. We’re not only a business in the city and a business for the city, but we do a lot of charitable events working with DPS and other schools,” said Smith.
“Detroit is growing and there are a lot of opportunities for a lot of people. We try to find ways to determine what this venue can do play a significant part of that. I think, in our small little way, we’re accomplishing that.”
The true embodiment of its slogan, “Enjoy life. Play Ping Pong. Be Happy,” Drive’s mission is “to create a community who enjoy laughing, socializing and making the world a better place all through ping pong.”
“One of the coolest things about table tennis is that on any given night here, in a city that seems to be a little fragmented in terms of diversity, it’s like the United Nations in here. We have white, black, Asian, Latino and everybody is just enjoying themselves,” said Hardamon.
In addition to private functions from birthday parties and bah mitzvahs to corporate events, every Friday, Drive will host Vintage Social, a nostalgic music cultured event infused with 80’s, 90’s, 00’s hip-hop, pop, R&B hosted by HOT 107.5’s Kamal Smith and Sounds by DJ LBoog.
For more information about Drive, visit www.drive-detroit.com.
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