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Interesting Article on Golf's "Recovery"

Interesting read. I am interested to know where they got the numbers when they say that 400,000 left the game of golf in 2013. I wonder if they going off memberships not renewed for 2014?
 
Intresting Read thanks for sharing
 
amsmith61 said:
Interesting read. I am interested to know where they got the numbers when they say that 400,000 left the game of golf in 2013. I wonder if they going off memberships not renewed for 2014?
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That number comes from the National Golf Foundation, which tracks all kinds of data every year about participation in the game. Link: http://www.ngf.org/

The bigger thing in that article is that the upper class is still very active in the game, and the article talks about that type of player being at private clubs around the NYC area. I think that the high-end private clubs in bigger cities are never going to struggle, but there will be a lot of mid-tier and lower-tier clubs, especially outside of big metropolitan areas, that will struggle going forward (if not already) as the amount of people that play golf continues to drop.
 
The golf industry went through a huge period of overbuilding IMHO. Golf courses were often built just because it was the thing to do. I played on a course in Knoxville in the middle of nowhere that had about 2 houses sold out of hundreds of plots. They went through bankruptcy and I think they're going to make it, but it was very touch-and-go for a LONG time.

So I think many of the closures are golf courses that were built for the wrong reasons. That's not to say there hasn't been a decline, but the courses I play are all full, and there's plenty of "blue collar" players out there, not just the ultra-rich.
 
I for one, read that article, and didnt think it was actually trying to comment on golf. Rather, it appeared to try and remind us that wall street people are way too rich, blah blah blah, 1%, blah blah blah, they do things you can never think of.

Getting past that, yea. Private country clubs in smaller areas are struggling, around here anyways. Public courses are doing fine I think.

Honestly, of the few private courses around, I think theyve priced themsleves out when compared to the price of a much newer course that is also considerably nicer.

Our biggest problem in my area is the baby boomers are dying, and they seem to play a lot of golf. I graduated with 39 people in my class. only a couple play golf.

If they want to boost the numbers, bring more kids into the game. My uncle donates many of his used clubs to our high school so some kid with no clubs can play the game if they want to.

~Rock
 
I agree with needing to get more kids involved. More and more courses around me are starting up junior golf programs and putting in junior tee boxes. Hoping my 2 year old will start to play now that we have a little field by the house he can hit his toys clubs in and not just use them to beat up his little brother. Lol.

Also agree that the public courses seem to be doing fine for the most part. Many courses around me are finally seeing that if they lower their rates they can get the place booked rather than charging twice the fee and only having a quarter of the players. Most of the nicer courses here like Celebration have even started doing rates that include range balls, 18 holes, lunch, and discounted replay if you want to play more. Some have even started doing unlimited play. Went out and played 36 at one of the Disney courses recently for about $40. Could have gotten more in but the wife would have killed me.
 
I think that article suffers from extreme myopia. Golf may be alive and well in the high rent districts, but I think overall things continue to get worse still.

Five years ago I moved from an affluent area (Northern VA) where getting tee times even a week in advance was a challenge at times, to a predominantly blue collar area (extreme SE Michigan) where finding a tee time is never a problem, and many times you can walk right on a course. There are 49 courses listed within a 30 mile radius of my zip code, and in driving around the area I have passed by probably 15 or so that you can see from the road in that radius. The only times any of them are what you'd call packed are during the early weekday evenings when leagues are going on.

The course I live on (which I believe is one of the two healthiest in the immediate area), some days I am baffled why it's completely dead on a beautiful day.

And all of these places you can get on for less than $30 most of the time - that's at least half of what a comparable course in NoVA would charge. I'm not sure how some of them are still running, to be honest, they are that dead looking.

I'm making it a goal to play each of the public courses in that radius over the next 2-3 years at least once, even though I suspect more than a few could be classified as "goat tracks". That's too much variety not to take advantage of, and I wonder for how much longer that variety will remain available.
 
I didn't take anything from the article, but thought I'd post my latest brain fart...

Golf isn't fun because too many people are self-taught (cheap) and learning bad habits. Then when they hit the course they spent good money to frustrate themselves. So the problem is that instructors are charging live-able type wages that aren't in line with most service industry wages. You don't even see instructors around because they just show up when they are on the clock and leave quickly thereafter. They could bring golf back to the masses with some better deals on instruction or showing more interest in teaching people.

Another recent article mentions that dues used to be a tax write-off and is no longer the case.
 
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