First I love the idea of adding so many aspects of growing the game for youth with restoration and public access.
Question - in your economic models, how many rounds will you have to do a year to make it sustainable? Or I should say how much of your revenue will come from the greens fees? You have other areas which are cost centers and not profit centers, how much of your model relies on yearly donations to the non-profit? Any endowments in place or planned?
Hi Jeff,
Ahhhh....The million $ question!
I'm not a formal member of the Cobbs Creek Foundation but I know that more money is being and has been raised than is believed necessary for the construction work associated with this restoration and its related components. I know some of it will be socked away in a trust to maintain the golf course(s) at a high level ongoing in perpetuity. I also suspect that some will be used to subsidize green fees for city and local residents at a price point well below what they would be in a traditional golf course business model that did not have philanthropic, community benefit components.
I also know the thinking is that if we deliver on the enormous potential of restoring the inspired original layout by the talents and cache of the restoration architects that the issue of demand should be a non-issue.
One thing the Foundation was very wise in crafting the agreement was to ensure that all monies raised through golf goes back into the Foundation, and not directly to the city. For their part, the city fathers had the foresight to understand the similarly enormous residual economic and societal benefits of the project.