[Dan Herrmann]

Received a quarterly update from my club's owners this week.   Included a recap of rounds played in 2020 - through October 10, rounds have been up 20%!


COVID-19 has, I think, been driving people to golf, which is great.   The only drawback is that it's a lot more crowded out there.


We've gone to tee times for the first time - primary driver is keeping groups apart in line with social distancing guidelines.   Guest rounds are way up, and we're getting a good number of "Second Club" members.


I would think that most courses/clubs around the USA are likely experiencing similar bumps.   In a year where financial forecasts for golf were very bleak, it looks like things are going to turn out quite well.


What have you seen at your club or golf course(s)?

[CMP]

When I saw this title, I thought this sounded like my wife doing an audit of my google calendar.


Same here - tee times up across the board (and for the first time that I've seen it - they were enforced)


One of my clubs had a record (revenue) year for corporate outings as well.

[Daryl David]

Record round numbers at two of my clubs since March. All this with no guest play until the last 2 months  Very crowded. Will be interesting to see if this boom lasts into next year.

[Peter Flory]

Even when the pandemic fades in the future, the bump in the work-from-home acceptance could have a positive long-term impact on golf.  It is much easier to slip out at 4:30PM on a weekday when you don't have to commute back from the city. 


Also, with more people working from home, there will be more demand to get out of the house on occasion. 


Not saying it will go this way, but it is imaginable.

[Matt MacIver]

Rounds up +20% this year, work and school from home driving it. Course is in great condition - how is that possible?!  Good weather, likely; good maintenance, possibly.

[Tommy Williamsen]

Of course this is true in the US. Not so much in Ireland where rounds are down because of the paucity of overseas visitors.

[Duncan Cheslett]

The same thing is happening in the U.K.

Not only are visitor numbers up at most clubs, membership is up too. Lots of people seem to have taken up the game for the first time in the aftermath of the lockdown. Existing members are playing more often - because they can.

With the daily office commute seemingly a thing of the past for many, the opportunity for twilight golf is obvious. I see 9 & 12 hole evening roll-ups becoming the norm at suburban golf clubs.

From looking like a disaster for golf clubs in March, the pandemic is actually proving a bonus. An outdoor activity played in small socially distanced groups is increasingly an easy sell.

The looming recession and the inevitable rise in unemployment might well scupper things yet, but my instinct is that sadly the demographic most likely to be adversely affected is not the same one which is attracted to play golf.

[Tom Bacsanyi]

I don't know where we ended up overall, but we were closed all of June, opened up July 1, and July rounds were up 30%. I wonder how much of the business was driven by new and/or "dormant" golfers (those who barely ever played and became regular players)?

[A.G._Crockett]

I don't know where we ended up overall, but we were closed all of June, opened up July 1, and July rounds were up 30%. I wonder how much of the business was driven by new and/or "dormant" golfers (those who barely ever played and became regular players)?

Great question, and I suspect we will find out at least some of the answer in the coming months as the weather becomes less golf friendly.  My suspicion is that, as we move out of the period in which families would be traveling a lot, being involved heavily with kids sports, and going on vacations and head into colder, wetter weather, rounds will come much closer to being "normal".

[jeffwarne]

I don't know where we ended up overall, but we were closed all of June, opened up July 1, and July rounds were up 30%. I wonder how much of the business was driven by new and/or "dormant" golfers (those who barely ever played and became regular players)?

Great question, and I suspect we will find out at least some of the answer in the coming months as the weather becomes less golf friendly.  My suspicion is that, as we move out of the period in which families would be traveling a lot, being involved heavily with kids sports, and going on vacations and head into colder, wetter weather, rounds will come much closer to being "normal".

How many kids will have decided to choose golf by that point, and how many, having chosen more local sports rather than travel all over the place, will suddenly find they DO have time for golf AND their other sports due to not spending endless days travelling al lover to play other average kids in team travel sports. i.e. Littlle League in the morning and golf in the afternoon with the parents or other new golf converts.

[Tommy Williamsen]

Bunches of folks have been buying second homes at the resort where I live and we have taken in more than fifty new members since April. I have seen more kids on the course than I have in years. Hopefully the kids will keep playing, even after we are through with the pandemic.

[A.G._Crockett]

I don't know where we ended up overall, but we were closed all of June, opened up July 1, and July rounds were up 30%. I wonder how much of the business was driven by new and/or "dormant" golfers (those who barely ever played and became regular players)?

Great question, and I suspect we will find out at least some of the answer in the coming months as the weather becomes less golf friendly.  My suspicion is that, as we move out of the period in which families would be traveling a lot, being involved heavily with kids sports, and going on vacations and head into colder, wetter weather, rounds will come much closer to being "normal".

How many kids will have decided to choose golf by that point, and how many, having chosen more local sports rather than travel all over the place, will suddenly find they DO have time for golf AND their other sports due to not spending endless days travelling al lover to play other average kids in team travel sports. i.e. Littlle League in the morning and golf in the afternoon with the parents or other new golf converts.

Another great question.  I think the answer to this is under the heading of "You don't know what you don't know."


The genie has been out of the lamp for some time now on youth sports; travel baseball, AAU basketball,  select soccer, ODP volleyball, and all the rest, and I didn't see much way to put the genie back before this.  But I think it is important to remember that at least on of the reasons for the growth of all that stuff has been that it is unsupervised, at least when compared to school sports and in-park stuff run by a recreation department under the umbrella of city government.  Those  can be tightly regulated, including being shut down; the travel stuff is a Wild West show by comparison, even now.


That said, I think it's possible that it could work the other way.  School sports could decline sharply, and the stuff that is not under stricter supervision could actually grow.  And, of course, it's possible that by the fall of 2021, there will be a vaccine and things will return to what they were before March of 2020.  I don't think we know how that will work, and may not for some time yet.

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