Hello golf stakeholders:
Welcome to post-Labor Day and the annual tug-of-war between (generally great weather) golf and…football. Beyond the Perspective facts and figures in each issue, our Publications subscribers and Golf Market Research Center (GMRC) participants have seen the July FINAL report of the Essential 8 KPI scorecard covering: Golf Revenue, Rounds Played, Avg. Rate/Rd, Capacity Rounds, % Utilization, Golf Revenue-per-Available Round, Avg. Peak WE Greens Fee (rate card changes) and % Effective Greens Fee (discount levels and change); see below for links if you want to join that merry band of outlaws, “be in the know” and have exclusive visibility to weather-adjusted metrics (Utilization and GRevpAR) and the critical revenue/pricing results for the month and Year-to-Date.
Contributing Editor Stuart Lindsay takes on a challenging and complex topic this month trying to figure out how the growth in simulator golf (both on premise at courses and the non-course retail locations) is impacting the industry at large and the average operator. As always, he has a unique take on how much additional supply has been added due to the simulators’ explosive growth and thornier questions like whether that’s accretive or dilutive for the average owner/operator. His observations, answers and predictions on this front may surprise you.
Publisher Jim K. is “supporting cast” this month as he delves into an observed blind spot historically for golf course buyers (both individuals and companies) which is, “Are there enough golfers in the draw area to support the property and how many of them are current customers?” Despite very good tools that Pellucid/Edgehill have built in the areas of Market and Customer Franchise Analysis, it still amazes us how many buyers (and their broker allies) still wade into purchase decisions (and increasingly pay a premium) based on their intuition that they can overcome poor market dynamics and/or don’t need to know anything pre-purchase about the size, loyalty and contact information quality of the existing customer base. To give it relevancy, he provides an example using a recent transaction.
See below for the headlines to each of our recurring sections from the regional August weather impact (ugy) to By-the-Numbers which provides the July and Year-to-Date results for Rounds (down and slightly up respectively) and Utilization (down and fractionally up). We’ve already compiled the August golf operations performance scorecard “preview”, courtesy ofour Golf Market Research Center (GMRC) early-responders, and the sneak peek suggests that Rounds will again follow the decline in weather in both direction and magnitude (which means no good news on Utilization). If you want to know those numbers on a regular basis, you can either participate in GMRC (course operators) or sign up for a Publications Membership(everyone else).
INDUSTRY EVOLUTION
2 Lines between physical & simulator golf blurring: Good or bad?
By Stuart Lindsay
BUY/SELL DYNAMICS
6 Two questions eluding even intelligent golf course buyers
By Jim Koppenhaver
COMINGS & GOINGS
10 Activities back to 10-15/mo (11 events tracked), plants beat plows 2-1
WEATHER IMPACT
12 August posts 2nd consecutive bogey at -6%, YtD retreats to flat as result
BY-THE-NUMBERS
14 July Utilization slips a point, YtD “holds its head” up fractionally
MARKET FOCUS
16 Houston, TX weighs in at #27 in Golf Market Strength fueled bycontinued population and income growth
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 discussion and healthy debate.
