Private clubs - US vs ROW

[Paul Turner]

Well summed up by Rich.

Reading old books by B Darwin et al, it's clear that the private clubs in Britain and Ireland have always had this open door policy (or certainly have for a very long time).  To suggest they would adopt the totally private system if the tourist money dried up, is frankly a load of old bollocks (sorry Tom)!  

I wonder if a very high profile club in the US could adopt a ballot system, like at TOC, for limited tee times without infringing their private tax status?

I still can't figure out why private golf is so much more expensive here.  As Rich's figures point out, you cannot attribute this to green fee income- that's peanuts in comparison.  What happens to my $20K-$50K if I manage to get in a top private club in NJ?  Where do they spend it all!?  

[TEPaul]

That's a very interesting financial and tax explanation by Rich about how or even why European clubs may be more accomodating with visitors than many American clubs. However, I'm not that certain I follow the logic of what Rich is saying--it seems a bit like a sort of cultural two-way-stretch to some of those clubs, particularly when Rich says many of those European clubs either can't or don't want to spend the visitor income in the form of off-setting costs on their clubs or courses. We notice that most American clubs are very good at spending money on their clubs or courses needlessly.

The European way that Rich describes sounds frugal, conservative and ultimately probably very prudent when you consider what needlessly large available monies can somtimes do to traditional and tasteful clubs and their architecture that can survive very well if basically left alone and not have needless monies thrown at it.

However, it does seem that some of the European clubs are beginning to run into a few sort of catch-22s and are going to have to dial down on visitor play anyway but probably for some different reasons than US "private" clubs are.

As Frank D mentioned the sad fact is that in an ever encroaching attempt by "public accomodation" laws and such to limit "privacy", private clubs in the US are always less able to be accomodating to those that they may otherwise wish to be accomodating to.

As far as I know private clubs in this country are basically limited to a certain percentage of outside income and that is a straight percentage not able to be offset in any way by cost to course.

Again, I'm not sure about Rich's explanation--by that I mean I'm only not sure I understand it but it does sound interesting. It also seems, if I understand it correctly, that an increase in visitor income would only enure to the benefit of the club if you only have to pay the tax man a relatively low percentage until that point comes when visitor play began to encroach too much on member play. Isn't this the same as the old tax accountant adage that if you're paying more tax ultimately your making a lot more money anyway? Some people may want to make less simply so not to pay the tax man anything or almost so.

The reason I mention any of this stuff is because of what I said earlier about why I said some or much of this apparent European accomodation is probably driven by economics at many Euro clubs.

When I asked about the amount or percentage of visitor play at two very significant Irish clubs both respondents said they had no idea what the amount of visitor's rounds numbers were, only the amount of money they were trying to collect in a year from that source and once they did they then stopped it!

And also Rich implying that the ethos of European visitor accomodation came before the visitor income--I don't know how completely convinced I am of that even going way back--in a way it's beginning to sound a little like the chicken or the egg thing.

[Patrick_Mucci]

Paul Turner,

Let me try to provide some insight with respect to the difference in costs.

First, you have to distinguish between a GOLF club and a COUNTRY club.

A COUNTRY club has a pool, life guards, snack bars with food, beverage and staff costs etc., etc.. and big electic bills to pay for heating the pool.  Swim instructors.
A COUNTRY club has tennis courts, a tennis pro shop, a tennis pro, assistants,staff.  Big electric bills for night tennis
A COUNTRY club has paddle tennis courts, staff, electric.
All of the above have employee benefit costs, workers comp costs and property, casualty and liability insurance costs as well as maintainance costs.
A COUNTRY club has breakfast, lunch and dinner service which usuallly encompases overstaffing, benefits, Kitchen equipment, maintainance etc. etc..
A COUNTRY club has social functions, dinners, dances, parties and all the costs that are associated with same.

COUNTRY CLUBS seem to have to cater to every member's whim in every area

With all this comes a large administrative staff, office and operational.  Managers, controllers, food and beverage managers, staff, waiters, bar tenders, busboys, catering managers, Maitre D's and on and on and on and on.

Wear and tear on the facility due to these activities usually requires refurbishing more frequently.

A GOLF club isn't burdened with many of these ongoing operational and capital expenses.

GOLF CLUBS Are RARE in America.
COUNTRY CLUBS are abundant.

If the economy remains the same or gets worse, I think you'll see more country clubs cut back, but culturally it's hard to do.
Many COUNTRY CLUBS are the social focal point of the local community.

Hope this helps.

[TEPaul]

Pat:

I know you're the fact man but you should have checked with me first on that last post to Paul Turner and simply said to him that the American golf course/country club just has a helluva lot more OVERHEAD than a European golf club.

GMGC is very good example of an American golf club with no anciliary crap going on--and as such it's one of the best deals in town but certainly nowhere near as reasonable per member as many of those Euro golf clubs.

But the one thing we're apparently going to resist forever is the thought of starting times. One of the reasons is that everyone seems quite aware that that is the very reason the club was started 87 years ago. Our eleven founders came from the old Merion Cricket Club and although a nice place there was just way too much play over there for them around 1915--and unbelievably that means both Merion East and West--probably the first 36 hole club in America if not the world!

[Patrick_Mucci]

TEPaul,

Paul Turner asked, if he joined a club in NJ and spent 20-50 K, where would all the money go.  I was just trying to provide an example for him.

I forgot about the men's and ladies card rooms and staff,
and the mens, ladies and mixed grills and staff, and the
shack on the 6th/13th holes and staff.

I was outvoted on my board with respect to starting times, which were implemented.

I feel that they have totally changed the character of the club.  No longer can anyone just wonder up and find a game.
They have also created cliques and eroded general membership comraderie.

Keep your club free of starting times, it makes for a more relaxed atmosphere and congenial membership.

[Paul Turner]

Tom

The ethos was definitely in place well before these courses became tourist destinations.  As I wrote above, Darwin wrote several books on touring the famous courses by train; but believe me, the vast majority of these courses certainly didn't get a glut of visitors back in the 1920s!  Private clubs could certainly have become totally private with very little financial impact, they just chose to keep their doors open.

I think it all links back to Scotland and the country's inclusive attitude to the game.  

[Paul Turner]

Patrick

You make a good case.  But is even that enough to account for an order of magnitude (x10) or even up to two orders of maginitude difference (x100) in dues?  

Is the golf course still the most expensive factor?

Perhaps it's also just supply and demand.  The clubs charge it because they know they can.

What's the going rate for a private Golf Club in the metro area?  

[TEPaul]

"I think it all links back to Scotland and the country's inclusive attitude to the game."

Paul:

Frankly, I've always believed you're absolutely right about that. I hope that "ethos" can last and always be maintained in Europe.

It's always been an oddity and a fascination to me that when Americans think of Europe they often think of stratified societies definitely including royalty and aristorcracies while Americans think of themselves as the ultimate democratic society.  

But when it comes to golf in America vs Europe the whole thing is just about the other way around. Just another fascinating aspect of the roots of golf where kings played with cobblers! Only if it was ever so over here--but it never was.

I think it's one of the most poignant things about golf coming to this country to read really carefully C. B. Macdonald's account of things (we have to realize he might have been the one real transporter of the game in all that it's supposed to be to America). He was so concerned about successfully transporting the "spirit" and "essence" of golf from St Andrew's to these shores and exactly how to do that without forcing it on this culture.

He was so concerned it's almost touching and he feared it wouldn't happen well enough. As it turned out he was probably right both then and now!

[Patrick_Mucci]

Paul Turner,

Members act as part time, uncompensated volunteers in serving their club.  I don't believe they have the time, desire, focus or consensus from the membership to run the club as strictly as one would run a business.

Some clubs have large budgets, $3,000,000 to $ 6,000,000.

I don't think that the club's themselves know where all the money goes.  It's sucked up like a sponge in the dark.

I'd rather see clubs migrate back to golf clubs with minimal non-golf activities, but obviously, I'm outvoted.

[Dave_Miller]

Haverford (sp?) was the club in Massachusets that was sued by seven women and basically put under the jurisdiction of a court appointed guardian/receiver.

Patrick:
I believe the Club you are referring to is Haverhill CC, in Haverhill, Ma.  The issues were much different than just unaccompanied guests and was very poorly handled by the Club or so I have been told.
Best,
Dave

[Paul Turner]

Tom

Yes, I think many Americans have an old fashioned idea of what the UK is like these days.  Social status really isn't much different from the U.S.  If you haven't got money, it doesn't matter if you can trace your family name back 100 years!

I'm often asked, and often find asking myself: which country would I prefer to live in?  I know this seems like a "no brainer" to most Americans, because I think most of you are brought up to believe that (in school...)!  But overall my feeling is there's not much choose between the two places.  From a golfing perspective, Britain will always have my "soul courses" (links) and also take preference because of the openess of the clubs, as we've been discussing.  

From a different perspective, America has vibrancy that is now often lacking in Britain.  Over there, we are all too aware that our heyday has long since past and it has instilled a pessimism.  This is obviously apparent in GCA; what does Britain have to show for new golf courses in the last 50 years!?  In America, there are many new and exciting projects.  

At times, living here, I feel that America is a chaotic place and is spinning out of control!  And I look back to Britain for a sense of stability: there's something reassuring about visiting you local pub, where you know they've been pulling pints of beer since King Henry V111's time (500 years ago).

[TEPaul]

Paul:

That's a darn extraordinary post and it's certainly appreciated--by me anyway.

PS:

I guess what my only problem is sometime on this website I see so many people complaining about so many things about this country--the culture, the way of golf, the USGA, the handicap system, the touring pros, even sometimes the way our own Constitution has evolved with our society. There's nothing wrong with that, I suppose, but if any of them have a better solution, then offer it--something that one doesn't see much of these day--only complaints!

It just makes me tired sometimes because I feel they really don't know how lucky they are in comparison to so much in this world.

I hope you stay in the USA--it may not be ideal but all in all it's not bad at all.

[Paul Turner]

Tom

But for all the complaining, really they wouldn't consider living in any other country.

Me, I may well flip back and forth every decade or so, depends on the Mrs!

I find the constitution dabates fascinating and bamboozling!  Coming from a country that has no constitution, it's strange to see so much focus on words and their meaning.  I think this is also apparent with the a fascination of speeches (words) over here.  I'm always amazed at how often Churchill's speeches are wheeled out in public here, particularly at times of crisis.  That virtually never happens in the UK!  Although, I guess partly because it's too close to home, and any British politician quoting Churchill would be lambasted for comparing themselves to him.

[ForkaB]

TomP

What I wsa trying to say re: taxes and club decisions is that IF a club in the UK finds it has made a "profit" it can either:

1.  Take that profit to surplus after paying corporation tax on it (at the rate of 20-25%) for later use
2.  Spend that surplus on the club or course

NB--reducing member fees is not always an option as it may trigger more draconian tax treatment based on re-classifying the entity as a "business" rather than a "club."

As the clubs I'm familiar with already have ample budgets for course maintenance and adequate club facilities, if that money is spent it tends to be so on projects of dubious merit ("foolish") such as imitation Swilcan Burn bridges or tearing up the 2-year old carpet in the lounge and replacing it with the current Captain's idea of chic.

PaulT

Great description of the bi-continental angst for those of us who have lived in both places.  If only we could take the best golfing elements of each--e.g. US architectural creativity, UK landforms, Californian weather patterns, UK course access, US grill room cuisine, the CONGU handicapping system..........

[TEPaul]

PaulT:

Americans do quote Churchill all the time. I think they look at much of what he said as examples of some of the best inspiration as well as humour there ever was. A couple of years ago I got a tape of some of his old speeches (I'd never really heard him before that totally). His voice and delivery was nothing at all like what I expected but to listen to him today is really pretty hair-raising. The man definitely had that knack to motivate and to apparently to see things in a different perspective. His years in the wilderness were pretty amazing given what came after them. He didn't make them happen just seemed to be able to see something at a time few others could.

But Americans may tend to claim him as much as their own as possible. His mother, Jenny Jerome was a New Yorker and a fairly outrageous one at that (the snake tatooed on her wrist)!

Churchill did say in his historic "Iron Curtain" speech in Missouri that his mother was an American and had it been the other way around he might have got here on his own!

[TEPaul]

Rich:

I also understand the angst of you two. Unfortunately it's never possible to combine the best from here and there into one.

I guess I can understand why the Good Lord put all those 7th century BC tribal nomads out in all that sand in the Middle East but I still can't figure out why he ALSO had to put ALL that oil underneath them!

[Paul Turner]

Tom

I recently found out that a lot of Churchill's famous radio speeches were delivered by an actor impersonating him!  Perhaps he was too drunk at the time.  When I first found this out, it pissed me off, but in retrospect it doesn't really matter, they were still his words.

The guy did have some bizarre opinions on some subjects though and was a poor peacetime leader (I think).

[David_Tepper]

One aspect of golf in the British Isles, that has not been commented upon, is that many courses there exist upon public "common" lands or lands held in public trust. Obviously, this has spared many golf clubs the cost of acquiring property, which in some way may account for lower dues, greens fees etc. It also may account for the more welcoming nature of many of these clubs, as these courses, which sit on public lands, are, in some way, quasi-public facilities.  You simply do not see the "Private Property - Members Only" signs that you see at so many golf clubs here in the US in the British Isles because so many of the golf course there are not, in fact, private property.
            

[TEPaul]

David:

That's a good point about some European clubs being on "public land" and consequently keeping per member prices down and maybe being more accomodating to visitors.

I also don't know of any American clubs that have a number of "golf clubs" that all share a single golf course. One wonders some times about how they can do that considering total RPY (rounds per year).

[David_Tepper]

TEPaul-
I was a member of the Presidio Golf Club in San Francisco for 16 years (1983-99). The PGC is/was a private club that owns its clubhouse and the land under it but "shared" the Presidio golf course (which it built but never owned) with the Presidio Army Golf Club for well over 80 years. The PGC has continued to operate as a private club even though the Presidio golf course has been a full public course since 1995-96. It is the closest situation I am aware of in the US to what you described in your last post.
DT  

[TEPaul]

David:

That's interesting. Over 30 years ago I had an apartment for a short time that looked right out over the Presidio G.C. but I never did set foot on the place.

[THuckaby2]

David: just curious - what rights and benefits re the golf course do members of Presidio Golf Club have these days, with the course being so over-run by the public hordes?  Man, that is one of the most crowded courses in the entire Bay Area - the Palmer management people really do pack them in.

Or does your termination of your membership answer this question?

TH

[TEPaul]

Shivas:

Are you talking real estate planning or estate planning?

[David_Tepper]

TEPaul-
Your comments are not unusual. Several years ago there was an article about the Presidio golf course in the USGA Journal (I think). I believe they quoted both Ken Venturi and Johnny Miller, who would both have to be considered "Mr. SF Golf", as saying that neither of them had ever played the Presidio as well!
The whole time I was a PGC member I never lived more than 12 or 13 blocks from the course. In the 1980's, you pretty much had the course to yourself almost any summer weeknite after 7pm. You could play 2 or 3 balls down every fairway and not bother anyone. It was great while it lasted.
DT
 

[THuckaby2]

In the military days, Presidio was well-known for being quite the tough nut to crack... I was lucky to have some military connections so I got to play it a few times, but he had to actually be there with us, as opposed to Fort Ord, where all he had to do was call... Interesting.

It really did have a mystique almost on the level of Cypress Point back in the day... perhaps even more so, cuz you couldn't see much of it from any public roads, whereas a lot of Cypress is visible from 17Mile Drive and the rest most people had seen in photos or on TV.  

It's strange how over-run it is these days...

TH