The Kinetic Cup: Rooftop golf joins community

More often than he’d admit, Kinetic founder and principal Jay Brandrup heads to the upstairs portion of his office with a twinge of excitement and stands in front of what he calls the company’s “smart mirror.”

“Alexa, show Leadership Board,” he says, and in just a few seconds, an elaborate score sheet appears on the mirror, where you can tap on players and check out their statistics for the company’s annual competitive wiffle ball golf tournament: The Kinetic Cup.

“It’s oddly addicting,” he said, “and one of the many things we have in our office environment that fosters teamwork and play.”

On the first Thursday in October each year, Kinetic employees, clients and friends gather atop the business’s rooftop, where soft grass turf has been installed, to participate or watch on lawn chairs as the top 16 qualifiers battle for the winning title and a specially-made trophy. 

The fundraising event has been growing in attendance since it first started in 2016, he said.

“We’re so fortunate for the unique digs down here on Morris Avenue,” Brandrup said, adding that competitors practice on the rooftop all year.

Kinetic is a 23-year-old custom design company that helps other companies understand and apply the latest web technologies and become more competitive, Brandrup said, and they have a serious love for their nonprofit partners. 

One of the tournament’s goals is to collect donations for The CHARGE Syndrome Foundation, which raises awareness and funds for children born with the complex genetic syndrome, which causes an array of medical and physical difficulties. 

Brandrup, who has a 14-year-old daughter named Adelle with CHARGE syndrome, said the tournament has been an amazing way to get the word out there and raise money for the foundation. 

The 2016 Kinetic Cup champion David Malone, a financial advisor for Morgan Stanley, remembers coming out at 8 or 9 p.m with Brandrup the night before qualifying scores closed, so he could play enough rounds to qualify that night.

Malone, who knows Brandrup through mutual charitable work, started playing after Brandrup showed him around the Kinetic office one day and they shot balls on the roof for a bit. After participating in the tournament, Malone said he felt like part of the Kinetic family. 

“When you’ve made a deep run in the tournament, or in my case ended up lucking into a win, you just feel a part of [the company],” Malone said. “Jay’s got a broad reach throughout the city.”

Plus, he said, there were a lot of interesting additions that made participating in the tournament, and even practicing, extremely fun.

The “serendipitous angles” at the various roof lines on the course also allow for risk-versus-reward decisions, like whether to bounce the ball off the roof and see if it comes back to the green for extra points or to see if people can shoot the ball off the spout on the roof down the gutter, which was fashioned to travel back to the green. 

“Think pinball-style,” Brandrup said.

There’s a scale of points for various ways of arriving to the green and even a metal bounce plate fashioned to help kick off more gutter shots for the green.

Malone also said he wouldn’t know anything about The CHARGE Foundation if it wasn’t for Brandrup.

“Their business is great at Kinetic, and their focus is on the charitable side first and everything else falls into place,” Malone said. 

To this day, he still has a trophy replica on his bookcase in his office. 

“I’ll say this, it’s a tournament that reminds how big Birmingham is. You grow up here and you work here and live here and you see a lot of the same people, but [this] reminds you how big Birmingham can be,” Malone said. 

Kinetic began in 1995 and is made up of 16 people. Neighboring its Morris Avenue office are a number of new additions, from The Essential and Pilcrow Cocktail Cellar to the relocated Honeycreeper Chocolate shop and the re-opening of the peanut shop, now known as Alabama Peanut Co.

“We’ve been waiting for Morris Avenue to blow up for 20 years,” he said. “We’re so excited about our new neighbors.”

Entering the Kinetic Cup, he said, is open to all employees, clients and friends, who are welcome to continue to practice all year around and view the entire bracket online.

This year, they raised over $6,500 for the foundation.

Learn more at kinetic.com.

What’s going on?

Know about something in Birmingham you consider bizarre, eclectic or utterly original? Let us know! Email information to sydney@starnespublishing.com.