The problem with links courses are "Fish dont play golf" and the 20 minute to get there circle is often halved for population purposes. There is another real prominent one that may go and I guess there could be many more. It is all very well being a great course but you still need 500 regulars playing once a week.
UK'errs don't really drive more than 20 minutes away. 85% of your membership will come from inside that circle. Looking at the roads and how hard it is to get to Sandilands it would be hard to keep it going if the course was just average. It was a course I had never heard of, they had 180 members at the end.
And the problem faced by many rural courses is that sheep don't play golf! I've been looking the catchment of Cavendish and early conclusions are that around 40% of the membership travels over 20 minutes - many over 30 minutes.
A town of around 20,000 inhabitants has two golf clubs. That is almost certainly one too many! If we are to increase our membership by 100 (which is our aim) we need to spread our net beyond the town of Buxton.
That we already have a sizable number of members happy to drive past lesser golf courses to get to their club suggests that this is not an impossible task.
Happily the journey from all directions is a spectacular one through stunning scenery. I believe this is actually a selling point!