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SKILLMAN, N.J. - Recent college graduates Annie McCarthy of the University of Illinois and Carlos Hernandez of the University of Texas are finishing their internships with Wilson Racquet Sports this week.
Winners of the 2011 Wilson/ITA National Promoter of the Year Award, McCarthy and Hernandez spent much of the summer learning the ins and outs of the world-famous sporting goods company at its Chicago headquarters.
“Most people think that with everything that goes into what Wilson does, that it’s a big team. But it’s not,” said Hernandez, who served as the Texas men’s team manager. “It’s only a few-hundred people, but they all work hard.”
Hernandez and McCarthy are ending their internships in style with a gig at the 2011 US Open in New York City, where they will be working in the official Wilson store.
From there, Hernandez will begin pursuing a sport management master’s degree at Texas A & M University, while McCarthy is set to return to Wilson for full-time work as a customer service specialist.
“I didn’t expect it to happen,” McCarthy said of the job offer. “I thought that it would be great if it did, but I was hoping to have a great experience either way.”
After four years playing varsity tennis for the Fighting Illini, McCarthy will be assisting college coaches who are placing orders for Wilson racquets, strings, balls and other accessories.
During their internships, McCarthy and Hernandez have rotated among different departments within Wilson on a weekly basis, gaining hands-on experience with teams dedicated to promotions, accessories, tour management, social media and performance racquets.
McCarthy even spent time investigating counterfeit dealers on eBay.
“There are people in China who buy Babolat string, paint it to look like Wilson Luxilon string – which is a lot more expensive – and then sell it for really cheap,” said McCarthy. “I had to bust ’em.”
Dabbling in everything from specifications to spreadsheets, the interns were struck by the technology that goes into making and modeling racquets.
“There’s an Innovation Center, which is where they come up with the ideas for performance racquets,” said Hernandez. “That was the most exciting part of the summer – seeing how the racquets are made. As an outsider and a player, you don’t really get to understand that side.”
McCarthy said that the Innovation Center includes machines shooting balls at strings and pressing down on racquets to test the strength of the equipment. Everything from the molding of grips to the painting of frames is done at Wilson’s Chicago headquarters.
“One thing that surprised me at Wilson is how much they actually do themselves,” said McCarthy. “It’s a very crazy process.”
With only a few days left in their internships, McCarthy and Hernandez are eager to continue their professional development in the tennis industry.
Hernandez, who wants to work for a Grand Slam event in the future, will be using lessons he learned at Wilson with him at College Station.
“Hopefully, I can take the branding and marketing schemes that Wilson has shown us and apply them,” he said.
For McCarthy, landing a full-time tennis job was not necessarily part of a long-term plan. But the Chicago native said she is happy to stay close to home and work with people she came to know and love over the summer.
“I never knew what I wanted to do,” said McCarthy. “But I always knew what I had passion for. I strived to have experience with that, so that in the future I could find a job that I would want… and it happened.” | 
