Golf is no longer sustainable as we know it...

[Mike_Young]

I was reading Tom Doak's post regarding the buggy paths and felt that he summed up much of where we are with the industry today. We basically have developed an unsustainable industry.

The golf industry that we know today has been a false industry since the mid-1980s. Much of this was due to the real estate development business and many of our golf courses were developed with that in mind and no concern for how we would maintain these golf courses or even justify their existence in the future. And as TD said in his buggy paths post; we continue to act as if this problem will go away and we will go right on down our merry path.
When I stop and think about it I am absolutely amazed at how sophisticated businessmen could manipulate and allow such a false plateau within a business. And it all feeds off of each segment. for example: golf course superintendents, they are probably the most critical of all elements in producing a golf course environment that is sustainable and can function without having to be subsidized by either a municipality or a real estate project. Yet look at how that industry has changed. It is now a sophisticated four year degree program with a much more scientific outlook on things. Yet not all the graduates can even find work and the mentality and procedures that have been taught in these programs dramatically increase the average golf courses maintenance budgets. Now I know there will be many superintendents that immediately attack me for this and if so I apologize.
Recently I was on a golf course where they were trying to decide how to reduce  maintenance budgets of the golf course  so it could actually survive and the professional and the golf course superintendent would be able to maintain their salaries and the owner make a living. Yet the young superintendent was concerned with how such a reduction in maintenance budget would hurt his reputation. And this was based on the fact that the sand and at another club in town was shipped in from Ohio yet this sand would be coming from a sand pit 5 miles away. There was never the question asked of how can we  maintain this golf course where it will be a sustainable project.  I ask...how much would food cost if the food industry was convinced that the products needed to be grown on USGA recommended profiles.

The same scenario is often played out with the Golf professional.

And when it comes to golf course design and construction that is an entirely wild wild West. We have thrown so much BS on the unknowing, club committees and developers, whereby they think the answer to all problems is to spend more money and to always be sure you spent more than a club down the street or the development down the street. But the truth of the matter is that neither the design business or the construction business is a sustainable model within golf itself and for itself.  ( slight possibility it can work for RE development)

We can have all of the industry meetings to explain how things will turn in the future but at some point we have to face the facts. There is no design and construction industry in the United States and will not be for a long time. That is not to say there will not be some work, but it will not be enough to sustain anywhere near the number of people in the business.  And it is wrong to continue to act as though there will eventually be work to sustain these people.  Now there is nothing wrong with this and it's probably a good thing. Think back to the days when so-called Golf design was a fledgling business and you will see that it was usually done by people who were somehow involved with golf on another basis day-to-day. And that's how it will be again. We have blown enough smoke and created enough false plateaus in the last 25 years to do us for the next 50 years. I have never put a tee in a set of plans, taken a divot from a set of plans or made a ball mark in a set of plans. The average old owner knows that....it was the committees and developers that wanted something else...and even they only wanted to pay for a huge marketing fee disguised as a design fee....that's all over...  The new model is straight from Larry The Cable Guy...."git ur done"....

I am not saying any of this to be adversarial. There will always be exceptions of private clubs that can afford these conditions and a few resorts but the sport of golf throughout the country cannot sustain what we have created and we can either accept it and do something about it or continue down this path of thinking it'll right itself. And it will but it will be in the opposite direction....

[Michael Huber]

Mike,

Im no expert, but i know enough to know that is some pretty heavy stuff. 

Excellent post.

[Adrian_Stiff]

Mike- Some of that is a superintendents pride and in many ways it should be commended but these people will mainly be the first to get in the trenches when the club needs help. Making people employed is often the main way to cost cut, sometimes it highights the fact that you have been over spending on the labour anyways.

The sustainability of a golf course in the US has defied gravity for a long time the UK model is more reasonable athough you tend to have a much bigger cost with your irrigation requirements and needs to change seasonal grasses and fertiiser cost. I have known manu US golf courses employ up to 8 times the labour, there will be UK golf courses that figure in the GB top 100 that only have 4 people working on the course. I dont think you can ever get as skinny as we do it, but you have got to redefine that model a bit to stay in town.

As you say there will be a few exceptions that can offer everything, but you are right things need a change.

[ChipRoyce]

Mike- Some of that is a superintendents pride and in many ways it should be commended but these people will mainly be the first to get in the trenches when the club needs help. Making people employed is often the main way to cost cut, sometimes it highights the fact that you have been over spending on the labour anyways.

The sustainability of a golf course in the US has defied gravity for a long time the UK model is more reasonable athough you tend to have a much bigger cost with your irrigation requirements and needs to change seasonal grasses and fertiiser cost. I have known manu US golf courses employ up to 8 times the labour, there will be UK golf courses that figure in the GB top 100 that only have 4 people working on the course. I dont think you can ever get as skinny as we do it, but you have got to redefine that model a bit to stay in town.

As you say there will be a few exceptions that can offer everything, but you are right things need a change.

I know there's lots of reasons for our maintenance costs including the 'Augusta Effect' (must be green and lush, etc...) when compared to the GB&I.

At the same time, most areas of the US has much greater temperature differences than the UK (harsh winters and warm summers). Wonder if this causes US courses to require more resources than GB&I?

[Adrian_Stiff]

Chip- Also if you look at say the Upper bits of the USA or even Canadian money, you have an income stream affected by say 20-25% when it snows but your outgoings are still high.

[Michael Huber]

One other thing I will add:

Despite the increase in the number of courses, and the popularity of the golf cart, it takes longer to play a round now compared to 20 or 30 years ago. 

[Jud_T]

The real problem as I see it was an extension of the lack of regulation of the mortgage market.  As long as a developer could sell homes and lots, the golf course, and it's associated design and carrying costs, were incidental.  Now, as in the broader real estate market, we have an oversupply of mediocre product and less demand....How many pure core golf courses in percentage terms are there of those that are in financial difficulty now?

[Bradley Anderson]

Sustainable?

I am getting so weary of reading the word sustainable in every other sentence that you read about golf these days.

Geez give me a break. Can't we put something else on the runway? At the end of the day, someone needs to get empowerd, think out side of the box, and align us with some new buzz words for golf. I mean can't someone leverage a paradigm shift here? Please?

[Mike Hendren]

Mike,

Virtually all "bubbles" result from the liberal availability of capital - be it tulips, technology, commodities, real estate or golf courses.   Like other industries, the golf business will right itself - eventually.  Sustainability is not the problem.  The industry's maturity is.  Unfortunately, unlike the mature banking industry in which I participate, the golf industry can't easily consolidate through acquisitions and can't be thinned by regulatory shut-down.  

In any mature industry, top line growth is unachievable - the National Golf Foundation, not to mention Brad Klein, has for years been publishing information that suggests the number of rounds played isn't growing and that it actually might be declining.  That leaves improved operating efficiency as the only means of sustaining, much less growing, the bottom line.  Seems to me the golf industry must figure out how to turned fixed operating expenses into variable ones - a challenge way over my head.  

No industry owes its participants a living in a capitalistic society.  Some folks are just going to have to call it quits - just like they are in virtually every industry that makes up the domestic and foreign economies.  

Perhaps the answer lies in one of my favorite quotes from a December 1999 article about John H. Newman, Jr. then president of First National Bank in Scottsboro, Alabama.  Newman said "There are three ways to run a bank.  You can let your customers run it. You can let your competitors run it. Or, you can run it."  The survivors will figure out, or have already figured out, how to run their golf courses.  

I'm likely wrong.  From experience, we often ultimately wind up wondering what all the fuss was about when the market comes roaring back sooner than we envisioned in our wildest dreams.  Capitalists have extremely short memories.  

Good luck to you.

Mike

[Mike Hendren]

One random thought in response to Bradley's call for a paradigm shift:  The industry should do what it can to convince the golfing public that playing nine holes on a nine holes golf course is the norm.   I am already seeing that begin to work in the housing industry, where the 1800 sf craftsman bungalow is hot the the 4500 sf tract mansion is not.   Affordability and quality architecture are not mutually exclusive.

Mike

[Brent Hutto]

And if the golfing public can be further convinced that a sub-3,000 yard Par 34 9-hole course is the norm we could see a veritable boom in "sustainable" golf courses, replacing some the 7,100-yard Par 72 layouts that are in many cases living on borrowed time and not much of it.

[Mike_Young]

The real problem as I see it was an extension of the lack of regulation of the mortgage market.  As long as a developer could sell homes and lots, the golf course, and it's associated design and carrying costs, were incidental.  Now, as in the broader real estate market, we have an oversupply of mediocre product and less demand....How many pure core golf courses in percentage terms are there of those that are in financial difficulty now?

Jud,
I would think plenty.

Bradley,
The pnly other word I could think of was not appropriate for the site....

[Tom_Doak]

Mike:

Oh, blame it all on my post, if you have to.  

I wish you had gone over to St. Andrews and presented that.  Most of the people in the audience would have given you a blank stare, although there were jokes from the European, Australian and even the Japanese architects about hoping the American economy would improve so that our guys would stay at home instead of trying to take their jobs away overseas.

In the ASGCA presentation, guys were talking about .100 cutting heights and new herbicides that will take Poa annua out of bentgrass ... all of which went over like a lead balloon to the international contingent, who are still grounded in the real world of smaller budgets, pesticide restrictions, and water scarcity.  I'll fill you in more by p.m., so I don't get Brauer too mad at me.

The thing to keep in mind is that like many other parts of the economy, the status quo of ten years ago was being fueled by money people couldn't afford to borrow.  We couldn't really afford all those golf courses and houses and cars, and we shouldn't have been able to keep that many golf course architects, carpenters, or auto workers in business.  It would be crazy to think we will get back to that unsustainable level.  It's more likely that since we were building 400 courses per year when we only needed 100, it will take a lot of years of building close to zero new golf courses before we get back to the number we should have been on ... and after that we'll only need enough architects to build 100 new courses.

For superintendents the situation is a little different ... their budgets depend on what their members are willing to pay.  As long as the membership is full of guys who think the stock market is going back in the right direction, some clubs will continue to overspend ... but at many clubs, the accountants and lawyers and foreclosure experts are about to be in charge, and the young superintendent you mentioned will probably be the first expense to go.

[Bradley Anderson]

Mike,

I had a wind storm on Saturday. 200 manhours later we are still picking up sticks from softwood trees that were planted in the 1960's.

There are so many costs related to golf course management that we have no control over.

[Mike_Young]

 

Perhaps the answer lies in one of my favorite quotes from a December 1999 article about John H. Newman, Jr. then president of First National Bank in Scottsboro, Alabama.  Newman said "There are three ways to run a bank.  You can let your customers run it. You can let your competitors run it. Or, you can run it."  The survivors will figure out, or have already figured out, how to run their golf courses.  

He is dead on....

[Mike_Young]

Mike,

I had a wind storm on Saturday. 200 manhours later we are still picking up sticks from softwood trees that were planted in the 1960's.

There are so many costs related to golf course management that we have no control over.

I agree....but you r get'in it done...

[Bradley Anderson]

Mike,

The USGA specs for greens is an issue that has come up on these discussions about the cost of golf. I would like to comment on that.

To have consistency of green speeds you either manage for Poa or for one of the newer bents. But Poa can be an issue in certain parts of the country where ice damage can happen. We have a lot of Poa greens here in Detroit that got hammered by ice this winter. And Poa ain't cheap to keep alive in the heat either.

So now if your going to manage for bent you sure as hell aren't going to get away with planting Penncross. You're going to be using one of the newer breeds.

The issue with the newer bents is they have to be topdressed regularly. And because they are so dense and so fine, you need to topdress with material that is on the finer side of the sand spectrum, or you'll just have too much material hanging around on the surface because it won't work into that fine tight canopy.

So now you have to be building the green with material that will match up with the material that you are going to be topdressing with. Cause if you build with something too coarse in texture you will choke up your porosity with the finer stuff that you are topdressing with. I'm sure you are aware of this.

But  there you have it - it actually does get to be fairly technical. And you have to find a source that will be available for the future management of those greens. So gosh darnit someone better be selective about what is being used to build those greens. Does it need to come from Ohio? Well maybe it does. It all depends on whats available in your area. But its got to be done right, or we're wasting our clubs money.

[Bradley Anderson]

Mike,

The Ohio bunker sand is awfully good stuff I have to say.

Yes it is more costly. But it also lasts a lot longer than any other sand I have used. It doesn't wash out and get contaminated with silt like the brown sands do. So on a clay base golf course, I'm not so sure that the Ohio bunker sands aren't actually your best economy in the long haul.

My only concern with it is it does fly farther off the club face, and it does accumulate on the banks much more than the brown sands did.

A savvy college educated superintendent will be able to communicate this with his club, and get you guys in to address those issues from a design standpoint.

We're all in this together. But you guys saying that we are overspending is about as helpful as when we used to bitch about you guys overbuilding.

[Mike_Young]

Bradley,
Your course may be able to afford it....but you are also helping say what I was saying....Everything you say may make very good agronomic sense....you are in a club that is an upscale club where the members will subsidize such cost or will say no....  For the average old course out here the owner is going to just get it done....he could care less....about the sand size....me...I wouldn't rake the bunker but once a week and if a few pebbles got on the green so be it....
Not saying you are wrong for your situation...but for most....it ain't going to happen that way....IMHO....
cheers

[Tim Nugent]

Mike,

I had a wind storm on Saturday. 200 manhours later we are still picking up sticks from softwood trees that were planted in the 1960's.

There are so many costs related to golf course management that we have no control over.

Sure you do - break out that chain saw and repaet after me "ioh, THAT tree? It broke up in that nasty wind storm we had Saturday".

[Mike_Young]

Mike,

The Ohio bunker sand is awfully good stuff I have to say.

Yes it is more costly. But it also lasts a lot longer than any other sand I have used. It doesn't wash out and get contaminated with silt like the brown sands do. So on a clay base golf course, I'm not so sure that the Ohio bunker sands aren't actually your best economy in the long haul.

My only concern with it is it does fly farther off the club face, and it does accumulate on the banks much more than the brown sands did.

A savvy college educated superintendent will be able to communicate this with his club, and get you guys in to address those issues from a design standpoint.

We're all in this together. But you guys saying that we are overspending is about as helpful as when we used to bitch about you guys overbuilding.

See Bradley..you think I am attacking supts..hell I attacked golf architects much more than supts....do you think I am condoning sitting in an office and drawing 50 pages of plans for a golf course that a guy could build with three stakes per hole..no....
The mindset you are showing me of having to show a committee the advantage of a sand from 1000 miles away is what concerns me with the industry....you can't convince me of such and that doesn't make me a bad architect for telling a client he doesn't need such....
I have zero problem with you doing such if it can be sustained...but the second your club goes to half the members it might have and a guy says...put sand in the bunkers....the mindset may be different....
You give me such a good example of what I am speaking....I respect your abilities and you....but we have to agree to disagree here....

[Jeff_Brauer]

Mike,

Golf has muddled through for 500 years or more. It will survive, but some of your examples show that a real change in mindset will be forced upon us and some will change kicking and screaming.  But, we don't need to change golf 100%, we need to change it about 10% or so, maybe 15%.

Frankly, the clients I work for probably have inflation adjusted maintenance budgets that are far less than the 1980's and they get better results.  Ditto on the professional side.

I do believe that the 1980's began an era of convenient amnesia amongst elite in the golf world.  Research money was spent on developing grasses for play quality, mostly because of JN and a few other pros had the floor and that is what they lobbied for.  But, just like distance increases, maintenance increases seemingly have gone up 4X for the top clubs, while most of American golf courses exist at only slightly higher levels of maintenance.

I believe that turf research (as Tom D alludes) is now moving towards genetic resistance to diseases, drought, etc., because that was trendy in the 1990's.  Perhaps the results of that work will be seen soon to a large degree.

Certainly, research started now will reflect current economic concerns, producing grasses that can grow in compacted soils perhaps, be easier to maintain rather than better maintained, etc.

I am a firm believer that no one wants to go backwards, in ball length, general maintenance levels, etc., so that leaves science as our best way to adapt golf to future conditions.  I hope we are at least as savvy as the generations before us in doing that to keep golf going!

[Bradley Anderson]

Mike,

Oscar Wilde said that a gentleman is someone who doesn't insult you unintentionally. 

Its ok to imply that our profession has had a hand in the unsustainablity of golf - because it is true.

I think it has something to do with competing with the other golf course. You want your club to be the best.

But being good managers and good stweards is also a part of the pride that we take in our work.

[Don_Mahaffey]

Mike,
Like you, I've been writing about the same thing for years. Too much of what was going on in golf was not practical (new word for you Brad) and there are still those hell bent on hanging on to the way things were done a decade ago.
As you know Joe Hancock and I have teamed up to form a small construction company. Believe it or not we just might be busy. The reason for what looks to be a nice work load for us is because we are taking a practical approach to small renovation projects and have some likeminded people to work with. However, since we have joined up I've come across a couple of jobs that made no sense at all. Jobs where original architects were brought in to spruce things up (translation for fix what they couldn't get right the first time) and these guys have completely over done the design. Like to the tune of millions of dollars over done. it may be professional suicide to speak out, but when are these guys going to learn that an owner who bought a course on a short sale and who just wants it to be functional isn't going to spend 10 times what he paid to fund some over blown renovation?

I have been fortunate to work with some guys who knew how to get the job done without breaking the bank. Neal Meagher helped me when I bought a course. I needed some green designs quick because I was racing the calendar and Neal ended up making some sand models onsite, then took photos and with some clever graphics I had what I needed with a day. He knew I did not need 10K worth of CAD construction docs as I have a calculator and a measuring wheel. Neal was excellent.
At Wolf point Mike Nuzzo trusted me to take the lead on construction and I believe that Mike has what it takes to stay in business in these tough times because he's a talented designer and he's also practical. He doesn't create informal drawings and then try and ding clients for a huge bill for construction drawings or site visits… or whatever. He;s not just looking for a check, he loves golf, golf courses and he’s doing what he can to stay in business and help his clients. He provides a great product and most importantly what he's suggesting is going to get done because he works out a way to satisfy client needs in an affordable fashion.
I was fortunate to work with Mike Devries who is a great talent but also very practical. If El Boqueron ever is built, it will be in large part because Mike finds ways to build great courses for a lot less than what we usually see.
I had a great few days recently walking a potential site with another architect who has a history of turning out great courses for a lot less than normal.
All these guys will survive because they don't just rubber stamp huge expenses that others will phrase "industry standards". What many guys aren't getting is there will be no industry if they still conduct business like everyone is fat dumb and happy.

At Wolf Point we're down to 4 guys taking care of the course. We recently bought and refurbished a 7 gang pull behind. We rebuilt everything and installed 11-blade reels. We mow fwys twice a week at .450 and they are pure. We have 80 acres of fwy and one guy goes out on the gang, one on a lightweight to trim out edges, bunkers, greens...etc… takes about 16 man hours to get all the fwys done. We cut our mowing labor by half not to mention wear and tear and fuel savings. Of course the problem is if i ever apply for a "big" job and tell them I'm maintaining my course with 4 guys and a gang mower they'll treat me like Jethro from the sun baked muni out in the middle of no where and kick me out.

[Mike_Young]

As Don says..heres where we are going:

Example...guy needs a deck on his home....does he pay for a few thousand dollars in plans and have a contractor come and order an exotic wood or does he get the local home remodeler to come out and build the deck....

Same will happen at golf courses...architecture and building are going to meld together:  In Jim Urbina's Interview he says: " as we look back in history every great golf course designer had an associate and labor crew that gave every waking moment of their time to create wonderful and thoughtful designs envisioned by the Icons of golf."  Whether it is a classic on a superor piece of land or the local golf course....that is the future of how to get it done....

For me this video says it better than most....when it comes to all the fancy degrees and methods and everything else that gets hyped on some of this stuff:
Check it out   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rlLk4O01Vd4   the simple basic method worked....

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