Edi De Pellegrin has spent her home and working life in Wyndham. The 53-year-old managing director of WynCity Bowl and Entertainment complex talks to Charlene Macaulay.
What is your connection to Wyndham?
I was born in Wyndham, every milestone in my life has occurred in Wyndham – being born, getting married, I’ve raised my three children here, my business, even got divorced here. I love Wyndham.
Tell me the WynCity story.
WynCity started by accident. My dad, George Scolaro, was able to get his hands on some secondhand 10-pin bowling equipment. He and his brothers had a business building some factories, and they put it in there. Each brother eventually went his own separate way, and they all retained a section of the business. Dad retained the bowling section. He said to my sisters and I: “Do you want to run this?” And we thought, it can’t be too hard. It was hard, but there was a huge network of people that made themselves available to us, and if you want to learn, you can learn anything … that’s how WynCity evolved.
What’s it like working with family?
It’s lucky that we’ve all got really, really different personalities, and we each look after a separate area of the business. It’s great working with family because you can have an argument and then two seconds later have a coffee. I guess the one brilliant thing about being in a family business is that it’s kept us all together.
Last year, WynCity was in the running for “best family entertainment centre worldwide”. What did that mean to you all?
We market the place really, really well. If it can be done, we try and do it – we’re not frightened to think outside the square. We knew that we wanted to provide entertainment for the whole family. We didn’t want mum and dad to sit here bored while the kids are happy, and vice versa.
We wanted this place to be something for everyone, and the city has embraced it.
What are your hobbies outside work?
I love to travel, and I’m really fortunate to work in an industry where I get to travel the world to look at various attractions. I get to see how the back of house is run in a lot of facilities, which a lot of people aren’t privy to. I felt like a Kardashian when I was in Hong Kong and they opened up Disneyworld just for us – it was amazing. I don’t have a lot of time, but I love relaxing and reading – I’m an avid reader.
