Dear Golf Industry Professional:
With both the major industry shows behind us and weekend temperatures heading to the 60s in Chicago (what? yes, dozens of golf courses are opening for the weekend “bonus”), it’s time for our February Perspective on the industry. Headlining this month is Editor-in-Chief Jim Dunlap’s coverage of the recent acquisition of DSS (formerly CourseTrends) by EZLinks Golf using private equity to finance the purchase. As they expand their services to go toe-to-toe against the hydra-like GolfNow and its ever-expanding range of services, the battle to be the one-stop provider of technology and marketing services for golf facilities continues to get more interesting. To get his take and EZLinks CEO Gary Cohen’s comments on the strategy and fit, click below for the current issue:
In addition, the February issue covers the following topics in our pursuit of providing monthly edutainment for our readers:
• Stuart Lindsay provides his take on the PGA and GIS Shows and what appears to be an increasing spirit of cooperation between the two organizations to improve the health and future fortunes of the average course owner/operator. While we’re not yet out of the woods as an industry on the fundamentals as outlined in our 14th State of the Industry (presented this year at both shows thanks to new cooperation by the NGCOA leadership), Stuart outlines that we’ve got a better shot at turning the tide by these two organizations working together vs. independently.
• Publisher Jim Koppenhaver suggests and supports his theory that major disruption may be coming to the golf consumer equipment market in ’17 and beyond based on events and performance in ’16. Add to that his spirited case for recreational golf (which doesn’t recognize the pejorative label of “non-conforming” equipment) made to attendees of the NGCOA business meeting and there could be some fireworks in this staid sector this year.
• Jim Dunlap also provides several case studies in how short courses are seeing a mini-revival as an alternative for the 18-hole round, the 5-hour time investment. They’re also having modest success in getting people to put the words “golf” and “fun” together in the same sentence again (at least for their local followers).
• Plus the monthly Industry Scorecard (the only integrated scorecard of multi-source performance indicators) including the January month (nice, positive head-start) and Year-to-Date (don’t get excited, same figures) weather impact, December Utilization (basically flat, took a hit on rounds as expected), November equipment sales figures (still a sea of red) as well as Denver, CO as this month’s Market Focus which registers as the 9th healthiest of the Top 25 US Golf Markets in our annual ranking.
We recognize and thank our continuing sponsors; KemperSports, Troon Golf and Bayer CropScience as well as welcoming returning sponsor EZLinks Golf to the Perspective family! As the season opening approaches here in the northern climes and stakeholders move from strategy & planning to execution, those wanting to increase their brand exposure and be associated monthly with intelligent discussion on key issues could benefit from our successful 12-month sponsorship offering at a slight discount vs. the basic six month sponsorship rate. Twelve-month sponsors also receive all Pellucid industry-standard reports (State of the Industry, Outside the Ropes, Monthly Weather Impact Tracking (Nat’l, Reg’l, Markets), Top 25 US Golf Markets Scorecard and National Golf Consumer Franchise Health Scorecard). Sponsorship provides monthly exposure to approximately 30K industry leaders and followers and associates your brand with Pellucid’s effort to expand intelligent thinking on today’s most challenging industry issues. For more “opportunistic” spenders, we might suggest one of our smaller-bite “Ad Partner” programs for those who may not be able to make a 6 or 12-month commitment (as short as 3 months are now available) or who may not need a half page or more exposure (quarter pages now available). If you’re interested in knowing more about sponsorship opportunities or are interested in a preview of our ad partner options, contact Editor-in-Chief Jim Dunlap (760-212-3714, jdgolfer@cox.net).
If you know of associates who would benefit from the topics and insights covered in this issue, feel free to forward this email and encourage them to register on the Pellucid website (http://www.pellucidcorp.com/news/elist) to join the conversation, discussion and debate.
As always, you can review and order any of Pellucid’s range of reports and services at www.pellucidcorp.com. We also want to bring to your attention Pellucid’s recently- announced participation in the next generation golf course database, the Internet Golf Course Database (IGDB) with partners Apparation LLC, Never-Search and GolfCourseRanking.com. For more information on this comprehensive database, updated quarterly and refreshed completely every 12 months (all 15K+ US courses), contact jimk@pellucidcorp.com. From the numbers and details of how our industry’s consumer base is changing at the national level to our individual facility-level services including weather impact (Cognilogic) and market analysis (Golf Local Market Analysis), we’ll keep you one step ahead of the competition in this continuing challenging industry landscape.
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