Church Expansion Strategy Yields Eight-Campus Growth

In 1999, I made what everyone called a crazy decision - launching an aggressive multi-campus expansion when Grace Church was just stabilizing as a single location. We committed to "30 campuses in 30 years" when most pastors were telling me to focus on growing deeper, not wider.

The risk was enormous because each new campus required $200K+ in startup costs and full-time staff before we had any guarantee of sustainable attendance. I was essentially betting our entire financial future on the belief that people in different communities were hungry for authentic biblical teaching, even if it meant stretching our leadership thin.

Fast-forward 25 years: we went from one campus to eight campuses across three states, reaching over 17,000 people weekly with a staff of 150+. The bold expansion didn't just multiply our reach - it forced us to develop systems, training, and leadership pipelines that made us far more effective than we ever were as a single location.

The key insight was that growth creates the infrastructure for more growth. Each new campus taught us something about leadership development, community engagement, and operational efficiency that made the next launch easier and more successful.

Jeff Bogue, President, Momentum Ministry Partners