At the national level, April registered a meaningful uptick as Golf Playable Hours (GPH) registered up 8% vs. Year Ago (YA) at the national level. That result kept the Year-to-Date (YtD) up double-digits at +11% vs. YA. The YtD regional positive/negative breadth ratio moved strongly to positive at 8:1 with 33 regions having favorable weather against 4 regions with unfavorable weather (8 regions fell in the neutral zone of +/- 2%, with all 45 regions now “in season”). Looking at YtD weather impact performance by day-of-week, favorability continues to be stronger in weekdays vs. weekends which will somewhat mute the rounds impact. Looking to the year-end forecast for GPH, the current call remains similar to ’14 and continues to track behind the 10-yr average. The supporting figures for the 2015 full-year comparative GPH for Total US, the comparison to the 10-yr average and the day-of-week breakdowns are available to Geographic Weather Impact Analysis tracking purchasers or Pellucid Publications Members via the Client Login section at the Pellucid website (go to www.pellucidcorp.com for information or to subscribe; for information-seekers we’ll send you a sample of the ’14 1st half actual results to review).
Looking back at March rounds played as reported by Golf Datatech/NGF to calculate the facility % Utilization Rate (UR), the basically flat rounds demand results (+1%) significantly trailed a double-digit increase in GPH (+24%) resulting in a steep drop in Utilization for the month (ouch, lost an opportunity). For the YtD period, the flat rounds performance similarly trail strong positive GPH figures resulting in a big decline in Utilization through March. The supporting figures are also contained in the Weather Impact Tracking report or Pellucid Publications Membership monthly update.
Jim Koppenhaver comments, “April is perennially a litmus test for Stuart Lindsay’s “Golfers are more like bears than squirrels” theory which proposes that good Spring weather (Bears) generates significantly more participation and rounds than good Fall weather (Squirrels). If that’s the case, then the golfers are still in hibernation unfortunately because we should have seen a much larger uptick in rounds demand behind the March weather results. Given that we’ve got another month of weather favorability in April now in the books, we’ll see if we just get a “delayed reaction” to better weather than ’14 in the pre-season or whether we’re looking at another rounds demand challenge surfacing. The other unfavorable factor (which could be slightly influencing the lag in rounds demand) is that the weather favorability is skewing towards weekdays vs. weekends and we know that we’re still daylight-challenged in many geographies so the opportunity to play after work on better weekdays is still somewhat constrained. Of the full year geographies, we’re seeing nice “comps” for the SE and the West Coast with the Desert SW and Texas not getting as favorable treatment thusfar from Mother Nature. Lots of golf yet to be played this season but it seems like we may be squandering some early-season favorability as the consumer hasn’t yet “warmed up” to the idea of golf even though the temps are playable by Pellucid definitions. If April doesn’t register any stronger, it’ll be time to think about doubling down on the marketing budget and getting into the battle for share-of-golfer early this year.”
A broader and more detailed scorecard of the monthly key industry metrics, including the Revenue and Rate figures, can be found in Pellucid’s free digital magazine, The Pellucid Perspective. To register to get the current and future editions, go to , fill in the information and you’ll be registered for the next edition on 5/15/15.
Intelligent, curious and courageous industry stakeholders wanting the detailed metrics and monthly updates on weather impact at the national, regional and market level as well as utilization and the full year forecast numbers have two subscription options:
• Subscribe to the Geographic Weather Impact Analysis Tracking service service ($199, 12 reports annually) or
• Subscribe to the Pellucid Publications Membership (Outside the Ropes monthly newsletter, 2014 State of the Industry, 2013 Industry Golf Consumer Franchise Scorecard, Geographic Weather Impact Analysis tracking, 2014 Top 25 US Golf Markets reports, Golf Participant Base Projection analysis) for $495 annually.
For individual facility owner/operators who need facility-level history, current year results by month and day-of-week and full year forecast data, Pellucid/Edgehill’s self-serve, web-delivered, real-time weather impact service product, Cognilogic, is your answer. It’s available for $240 for the year-end report and unlimited annual access via the Cognilogic web portal or $120 for a single year-end report. For more information, contact Stuart Lindsay of Edgehill Golf Advisors (mailto:edgehillgolf@msn.com) or click here Order Cognilogic .
You can order any of the above information services via Pellucid’s Online Store .
Contact:
Jim Koppenhaver, President, Pellucid Corp.
mailto:jimk@pellucidcorp.com
www.pellucidcorp.com
