Be disciplined. Prioritize community. Plan for sustainability.

When you talk to League One Volleyball (LOVB) co-founder and CEO Katlyn Gao, she brings up those guiding principles often. To hear her tell it, decisions made by LOVB’s leaders reflect a commitment to disciplined execution, a concern for the volleyball community and a conviction that sustainability starts with a strong foundation established at the youth level.

With that foundation solidly in place, LOVB (pronounced “love”) launched its pro league this month. The launch offers further testament to the growth in women’s sports and a reminder of the evolving business strategies behind women’s sports startups. As interest and investment increase, different models deserve a little closer look, especially models that take a more innovative, holistic approach and provide fresh insight into what does and doesn’t work. Those models include the one used by LOVB.

“For us, the innovation is driving lifetime consumption of volleyball and executing a community-up sequence on purpose, starting with youth before launching pro,” said Gao. “We flipped the model on its head. But we didn’t do it for the sake of innovation. We did it because we felt like it fit who we are and what we wanted to do in the sport.”

LOVB Houston’s Jordan Thompson elevates against the visiting LOVB Austin squad.league one volleyball

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