Tech Caddie Podcast Spotlights Trutee Golf, a Next-Generation Tee Sheet Built with AI and Intentional Design
Upper Arlington, OH — The latest episode of the Tech Caddie Podcast, hosted by Mike Hendrix of smbGOLF, features an in-depth conversation with Connor Van Gilder, founder of Trutee Golf — a brand-new, AI-powered tee sheet and point-of-sale platform built specifically for golf course operators and the golfers they serve.
The episode arrives at a pivotal moment for golf technology and digital hospitality. Trutee Golf has quietly completed its first major deployment, powering all four municipal golf courses operated by the City of St. George, Utah, and is now positioning itself for broader growth across the industry.
https://youtu.be/c9Txd6UcHBs
A New Breed of Golf Technology
Trutee is not a legacy platform with updated packaging. It is purpose-built from the ground up using a modern tech stack — TypeScript, Next.js, and an AI-optimized architecture — enabling the small team to develop features at a pace that traditional golf technology companies cannot match.
“We made sure our tech stack is very modern and something that AI would recommend and likes to work with,” Van Gilder told Hendrix during the conversation. “Now developing the code is the easy part. The hard part is figuring out what to build and how we should build it.”
Van Gilder, a veteran product designer whose background includes leading design at Zonos and working on end-to-end property management software at Entrata, brings a rare perspective to golf tech: that design is not decoration — it is efficiency. His philosophy is that a well-designed platform reduces onboarding time, shrinks staff training curves, eliminates unnecessary clicks, and ultimately makes operators more effective and golfers less frustrated.
“Everyone tends to think design is just what it looks like,” Van Gilder explained. “But it’s also how it works, how easy it is. The more efficient you are, the more effective you are. That ends up paying dividends down the road.”
Built Around Real Operator Pain Points
The City of St. George engagement illustrated exactly what operators have been missing. Before Trutee, staff were running five to ten reports at the end of every day and manually entering data into spreadsheets just to reconcile their financials. With Trutee, that process is now a single report — cutting a two-to-three-hour daily task down to five minutes.
The platform also simplified the city’s junior golf program, replacing a cumbersome workaround through a third-party registration tool with a native, seamless sign-up flow for parents and discounted rate management for staff.
Feedback from frontline users has been direct: “It just works.”
AI-Powered, Not AI-Dependent
What sets Trutee apart from legacy competitors attempting to retrofit AI features is that artificial intelligence is embedded into the product’s DNA — not bolted on. Van Gilder’s vision goes beyond a chat interface. Trutee is being built to proactively surface actionable insights to operators rather than waiting for them to ask.
“We’re looking at ways to preemptively figure out what you might need to do and surface that to you,” Van Gilder said, describing a feature in development that would automatically flag uncharged no-shows and prompt staff with a single confirmation click. “You could type that into a chat interface — but we want to eliminate even that step.”
The platform already delivers analytics that many operators have never had access to, including a breakdown of mobile versus desktop bookings. When Van Gilder shared with one customer that 65% of their tee time bookings were coming from a phone, it was the first time that operator had ever seen the data.
“Measure What Matters” — A Call to the Industry
The podcast episode directly previews a forthcoming article by host Mike Hendrix, set to publish Friday, June 6, 2026 through the National Golf Course Owners Association (NGCOA):
“Measure What Matters: Why the Tee Sheet is Only Half the Story”
The article challenges golf course operators to look beyond whether their tee sheet is full and start examining the steps a golfer takes to complete a booking — and where they drop off. Hendrix and Van Gilder both expressed frustration that existing platforms have withheld this basic purchase-funnel data from operators.
“A lot of operators look at the tee sheet — is it full, is it not full?” Hendrix said during the episode. “I don’t think very many operators today think about what were the steps the golfer had to get through to get there. The fact that they don’t have those insights is a little offensive.”
The NGCOA article will be available at ngcoa.org upon publication.
Open Architecture, Built for the Future
Van Gilder also outlined Trutee’s commitment to an open API model — a sharp contrast to closed platforms that restrict integrations to protect market share. Under Trutee’s architecture, third-party developers, management companies, and resort operators can build their own booking experiences directly on top of the Trutee infrastructure.
“We just want to be the rails — the foundation,” Van Gilder said. “If they want to book through our website, great. If they want to embed or create something custom on their own, also great.”
Hendrix noted that the industry is watching closely, pointing to active RFPs from municipalities including Columbus, Ohio (six courses, several producing 40,000 to 50,000 rounds annually) and Westchester County, New York as signals of the market opportunity ahead.
Listen to the Full Episode
About Tech Caddie
Tech Caddie, hosted by Mike Hendrix, explores the technology, trends, and strategies shaping the future of golf course operations. The podcast features conversations with industry leaders, operators, and innovators focused on improving the business of golf.
