A return to architecture as THE focus

[Patrick_Mucci]

If financial pressures result in the conversion of many country clubs to GOLF clubs, will there be a heightened focus on the architecture of the golf course, since all of the tangential issues associated with COUNTRY clubs will be removed.

Would this produce a rennaisance in GCA ?

[Andy Troeger]

Patrick,

If financial pressures eliminate the country club aspects not related to golf they will probably eliminate the opportunities to do any architecture related work in terms of restorations and renovations too.

I could see it putting more focus on the quality of the golf courses though since that would be what would be left under your example. I'm not sure the average country club member cares about architecture the way you do and most GCA'ers do so I could see it requiring more to converge in order for the renaissance to occur.

All that said, some would say we've been in a renaissance for the last 10-15 years. Maybe your scenerio adds to it, maybe not.

[Ian Andrew]

Pat,

The highest price initiation in Canada – to a club that is not looking for members – is to Oakdale G&CC. The course is a decent Stanley Thompson – but the attraction is not the golf course – but the exceptional family based atmosphere at the club. They are a very socially active club - possibly because they are a strong Jewish club - but more likely because that is what the people there would like.

There are people who want golf only – there are others that join clubs for the social side of the game. Financial pressure stops spending – but rarely does it change the social structure of a club.

So my answer to you is no – I think clubs would reduce their expenditures until better times returned. I've been through a "real" downturn in the early 1990's and clubs made very few alterations. They did not change their structure, they did not work on their golf courses, they simply waited for better times to do anything.

A question to you - have we not gone through an amazing renaissance in GCA just recently - since WWII there has never been a period that has produced as many top 100 courses.

[Matt_Cohn]

Patrick,

I don't think I understand. How would a financially strapped club benefit from eliminating other activities that bring in revenue?

I'm not arguing - I just don't get the premise. Thanks.

[Jim Nugent]

Matt, the answer must be that the other activities are net money drains, at least compared to other ways to use the resources.  

[Ken Moum]

Matt, the answer must be that the other activities are net money drains, at least compared to other ways to use the resources.  

It's been my experience that country clubs have a silly way of keeping the books. I know mine does, and I have talked to some others who do a similar thing.

At mine, not one dime of the fixed clubhouse overhead is charged to the Food and Beverage budget. Not even the payments on the $1 million still owed on the clubhouse after 20 years is included.

F&B is income minus materials and labor -- so it sometimes looks like the house makes money. And they get all the banquet income, much of which is generated by outside golf events.

The admin budget gets all the dues.

The pro shop gets guest fees and cart income.

The Superintendent's budget doesn't have a nickel of income,  only expenses.

As a result, we have had board members who believe the clubhouse is subsidizing the golf course.

Aslong as clubs keep the books like that, and it's relatively common I think, they won't make GCA improvements a priority.

The good news is that our current board is smarter than that, and they hope to change the situation.

K

[Mike_Young]

Pat,
I don't know.  I don't think it will happen immediately.  I think the main issue with many committee run clubs is that they are "scared" of the monster and rely on management to tell them what they need to do.....I firmly believe that this " more people join now for social reasons" is BS generated by club managers to justify their position over that of golf pros.  For instance our club has a 1000 members with a 59,000 sq ft clubhouse.....we are constantly told that most now join for tennis and dining.....food makes money and golf loses......come on.....if this is the case then close the golf for a month and see what happens to the food business.  Our biggest problem today with many of these clubs is how to "back off" on the over built clubhouses that drain these clubs.  Once we figure that then maybe the architecture can be addressed.  IMHO

[BCrosby]

Pat -

I don't understand the question. By "converting" to a "golf club", do you mean the elimination of things like food services, pools and tennis? Leaving only golf, a bar and a pro shop?

If that's the question, are you seeing that happening? Because I'm not.

Bob

[Patrick_Mucci]

I don't think I understand. How would a financially strapped club benefit from eliminating other activities that bring in revenue?  

Because those activities create expenses which exceed revenue.  The club takes a financial hit for those operations.[/color]

I'm not arguing - I just don't get the premise. Thanks.

[Mark_Fine]

I'm afraid you have this one backwards Pat!  Despite it being their main asset, it is becoming harder and harder to get clubs in trouble to focus on their golf course.  

[Andy Troeger]

Pat,
Doesn't that depend on the club and how the club chooses to determine where to allocate member dues and initiation costs etc?

I agree that fancy clubhouses probably almost never pay for themselves, but it would seem like the expenses of a pool and tennis courts probably aren't that different from golf. You have maintenance and staff costs and the dues have to cover them. Every club has their own priorities, some of which just include golf, but I don't see many country clubs getting rid of some of the accessories either if they have people using them.

[Patrick_Mucci]

Pat -

I don't understand the question. By "converting" to a "golf club", do you mean the elimination of things like food services, pools and tennis? Leaving only golf, a bar and a pro shop?

If that's the question, are you seeing that happening? Because I'm not.


Bob,

Clubs that served breakfast, lunch and dinner are cutting back .... severely.

Many clubs have eliminated or downsized breakfasts and have limited dinners to specific nights.

Expenses have climbed substantially over the last 5-10 years.

The product is begining to price itself out of existance.

Look at Initiation fees from 10 and 20 years ago compared to today.   Today's are much lower, yet, today's dues are much higher.  Why ?  Because membership is down and clubs are having a hard time attracting new members.  So they're trying to make it easier to join by lowering initiation fees.

They need the annual dues revenue to support rising expenses and they're willing to reduce the initiations which were used for capital reserves or to reduce/eliminate debt.

They need to meet operating expenses, which are getting higher every day.

As you raise your dues to meet the increasing expenses, you lose members, which makes the costs fall on fewer members, driving the cost per member, higher.

Sooner or later something has to give.

Clubs are reluctantly reducing services in a number of areas, the food service area being one of them.

I know a fairly wealthy club that used to have an incredible menu.  Now, their menu is rather limited.  Why ?  The member's tastes didn't change.  What changed was the realization of the cost of that expansive menu.

Clubs that were open all year round, now close for December, January and February.  Why ?  Because utilization is down and the cost to continue full service operations would create additional financial burdens.

Many clubs are well below their targeted member count.
That increases the cost per member without increased expenses.  With increased expenses it's even worse.
 
Older members don't want to pay for improvements and younger members don't produce the utilization patterns that the operating model was designed to perform under.
[/color]

[J_ Crisham]

Patrick, The clubs I belong to-3- in the Chicago area all struggle inthe winter months because most of the older members-60yrs and up all leave for the season. I think it becomes a sheer game of numbers to try to cash flow a dining room. My personal feeling is that a great golf course ,a 6 or better will always have a line waiting to join for golf. Tennis is sadly dwindling across the country from where it peaked in the 80s. I would prefer more spartan clubhouses and better maintained golf. A perfect example is a gem of a 9 holer The Dunes Club. Only been there once but it is as it should be!

[Patrick_Mucci]

Andy,

Fancy clubhouses aren't the problem.
Very few country clubs have "fancy" clubhouses.
Most are fairly old and in need of repair and/or redecorating.

Part of the problem is that each dues paying member feels entitled to "their" area of interest being special.

If pool use is limited, does that justify ongoing operations, especially when the pool is generally a Memorial Day to Labor Day operation, with utilization further reduced when kids are in school, or off to camps during the summer ?

The limited number of members who use the pool will say "yes"
The accountants will say "no", and therein lies the conflict.

The 8 members who show up for dinner Tuesday night will say "yes"  The accountants will say "no"

The 4 members who want to play tennis at 9:00 pm will say "yes".  The accountants will say "no"

Clubs can no longer be all things to all people.

My question to members is:

"If YOU bought the club tomorrow, how would you change operations ? "

The answers are interesting.

Mark Fine,

You're just in stage I.

That's where the members want to retain the operating model and the target for budget cuts is the club's largest budget, "The Green Budget".

When they see that the golf course is NOT the problem, although, that's another topic for discussion, they begin to come to grips with the generational and cultural changes that have occured and what they have to do to make the club a viable operation in the future.

[Kyle Harris]

Pat,

The issues presented will not change so long as any country club holds itself to a standard of exceeding members' expectations.

Why or how golf became a "service" industry is beyond me, but when you train and manage employees with the attitude that nobody should leave pissed off or unfulfilled, you establish the expectation that the club can suit any need.

Why a club needs to compete with local restaurants and parks for food and tennis is beyond me. Golf is a unique game that requires unique attention and little distraction.

You're dead on with your assessment, but the culture starts at the very bottom - from the kid who takes your bag from your trunk to the "staging" area despite the fact that you managed to get the bag there in fine shape for the first however many miles of your trip all the way up to the underwriters and accountants who are just seeing numbers.

Remind golfers that they are playing a sport and not there to have a dozen people fall on their knees for 5 hours and you'll see some changes.

[John Shimp]

I think Pat raises an interesting topic.  My original club in Charlotte - Carolina Golf and Country Club has recently made numerous changes to reduce and better target non-golf related amenities such as 21 meal a wk food service, broad daily lunch buffets, and wknd night surf and turf stylemeals that were big money losers.  It is now called Carolina Golf Club and has a narrow but good food offering, a spruced up pool, and no aspirations to startup tennis or other activities/services that would make it a full service country club.  

The linchpin to this reduction in service and country club aspiration was a master plan to the 1929 Ross golf course that Kris Spence (with Brad Klein input) drew up and began implementing about 4 years ago.  This plan included purchasing 40+ acres of adjacent land to build 2 new holes and construct a fine practice facility where the existing holes 1-2 were and to rework the course in 4 stages over 5 years.  The club needed to take a staged process due to financial considerations.  As the work has progressed (and so far turned out well) the club's membership roles that had initially dropped 50 or so below full boat have now produced a closed waiting list.  In the process the club has been able to raise non-equity initiation from $8k when I joined to $22k now.  Presently the club is closed and Kris Spence is beginning the biggest piece of his restoration effort which should significantly increase the fun/challenge of the course without a massive rerouting, etc.  Hopefully the result will justify the excitement that has built up at the club and the long waiting list.

So, Pat's supposition is being played out in Charlotte for the reasons he gave in some replies.  I would say that a key for clubs to successfully pull this off besides having a course worth focusing on, a forward thinking board, etc is to have a real local market strategy for the club.  I don't  think a Doak 6+ golf course in any town will always  produce a well financed club.

Carolina is now looking like a membership deal in Charlotte to the young professional set because members and prospectives believe the redone golf course will hold its own with the $70k plus full service clubs in town such as Charlotte, Quail Hollow, Myers Park, and Carmel but will cost a lot less (1/3 initiation and about the same in annual dues).  Carolina's board based their decisions on the belief that this business niche would be out there if they could get the course and the overall club service mix right.  

[Andy Troeger]

Pat,
You obviously have a point, as some golfers also think their part of the club is the most important and everything else should be eliminated to better focus on their needs!  

I've seen three types of clubs...one type that's all about golf, one that's very family oriented with lots of activities beyond golf, and then the ones that try to be all things to all people (and often fail on most/all accounts to please anyone).

I would guess that if you have a great golf course to begin with the golf club model would work, but a club struggling financially that doesn't already have great architecture probably would struggle to find the money to improve the course.

As you say, it comes down to why people join the club and what they would want in a club and change about the current structure. The clubs that have a particular focus to me seem to be more viable than those ones that have too many conflicting priorities. I could see more becoming "golf" clubs, but I don't see that guaranteeing architectural improvement or financial success depending on their current membership structure.

[Patrick_Mucci]

Andy,

It would be interesting to study the relationship between changes to the golf course and the club's focus and/or services.

Stated another way, I wonder if clubs where golf was viewed as JUST another activity, had more alterations than clubs where golf was King, by a wide margin.

As was stated previously, as the older members retire and/or move to warmer climes, and the utilization patterns of the younger members emerge, how will clubs deal with the old business model in the face of new utilization patterns and increasing costs ?

[Andy Troeger]

Patrick,
Personally I just hope that golf doesn't diminish as a priority because of the cost/time issues to play.

I do agree that the alterations to courses vs priorities would be an interesting study. I would guess the quality of those alterations is dramatically different if nothing else.

Heck, here in ABQ the four most highly thought of facilities are public anyway. The clubs have their niche but its not a big one for a city of this size.

[Tommy_Naccarato]

What an interesting topic. Especially in light of the recent talk of recession in this country.

Not to stray off topic here, but on Friday I attended a seminar on the national energy conservation act of 2004, which is going head strong on creating better ways to economize on saving electricity through lighting, HVAC and other means (the building envelope they call it, meaning skylights, double-pane windows etc.) all that conserve, yet provide the same needs of our current day demands; as well as the tax benefits that come from it.  It was an interesting seminar showing the different types of lighting methods that now can be used. Example: A fixture with (4) Super T5 florescent lamps 4' long with a reflector can put out the equal number lumens of light to that of a 400 watt H.I.D. high bay fixture used for warehouse lighting, at a 1/4 of the cost. Plus there is the federal tax break for using it.)

Now your topic has me thinking: How can a country club or any golf course for that matter, better save itself from more costlier means of maintenance?

Is it real simple to turn the water off more often and get rid of the notion that is green is the only surface which to play the activity? If a club removes a great many trees which require more water to keep them alive, mean less water means more savings; at the very least, less maintenance to pick up leaves, etc? Do bunkers that don't require edging or fly mowing every day, or every other day means less costlier means thus returning the sport to it's more au naturale' roots?

The golf course envelope so to speak.

Thoughts?

[Tommy Williamsen]

Pat, I don't know courses that have closed pools etc, if that is what you are talking about.  My club added 5000 sq feet to the clubhouse, spent $ 750,000 on the pool, regrassed the fairways, remodeled the 18th hole and built a new practice area.  Before all the work we were down about 75 members.  WE now have a waiting list (member cap is 425)  Other CC clubs in the DC area have had extensive remodeling of clubhouses and food service besides doing work on golf courses.  In terms of food services, as I travel I have found the food at CC clubs to be better than it was ten years ago.  There have been at least ten clubs that have done extensive work on both the course and clubhouse.  Many have added workout facilities and some even have babysitting on site.

In my travels it seem that strictly golf club are having a more difficult time attracting members, since most of them are second or third clubs.  The exceptions, of course, are the very high end clubs like Kinloch in VA or Old Memorial in Fla.  My golf club has about 250 members (individual memberships only).  I think the cap is 300.  

Maybe I am missing something.

[Joe Hancock]

Tommy,

I think your observations are about right.

I was looking into clubs here in Grand Rapids, and to be honest there is nothing compelling to join. Most clubs have a focus on things I'm not interested in:

Flowers
Pools
Dining (not that I don't enjoy, it's just something I don't want to pay dues to do)
Parties
Lush conditions throughout the property

There is not one golf-focused club in Grand Rapids. I would guess it's because the market doesn't want one.

Joe

[Bill Brightly]

I think a focus on architecure can be "A" factor, not "The" factor in a club's success.

A club with great architecture will have an advantage over other competing clubs, all things held equal. And the more the golfing world appreciates great architecture, the bigger that advantage.

On the other hand, the more golfers prefer perfect greens, perfectly manicured fairways, regardless of the architecture, the less is that advantage.

From the Board's perspective, I think the golf course must remain the focus, and the club must continue to make capital investments in the course, and keep it in superb condition. If not, the club will spiral downward as word spreads and prospective members go elsewhere. (You and I probably know a few in North Jersey who are in trouble now, under their desired membership number, with no waiting list, etc. Forced to cut their operating budget, conditions worsen.)

But I dont see other offerings being dropped. Clubs today better offer a nice pool, tennis and the BOOMING sport of Platform Tennis. You simply MUST offer very good food. (But we close for 6 weeks fron Jan2-Valentines Day to save on expenses and do major work on the clubhouse.)

And sorry John K, but the good old boy attitude about women and kids better change, too. Because in the year 2007, COUPLES are joining clubs, not the Husband...(Our fathers' daughters won't put up with what their mothers did, do you know what I mean?) The age of Ozzie and Harriot may have been a great time to be a man, but clubs clinging to that mentality will be few and far between. I think you will see more summer camp programs at clubs, where the kids can be dropped off and learn golf, tennis and swim. And the old fogies are going to have to get used to seeing kids on the course because this type of offering is going to keep the pipline full of new prospective members, and allow the club to be selective, and keep its membership strong, which will, in turn, keep the club in good financial condition.

I dont have to out run the bear, I just have to out run a few neighboring clubs...

So if a club is doing EVERYTHING right, then having great course architecture can help put them over the top, keep their waiting list nice and long, allow for healthy initiation fees, etc, etc.

[corey miller]

Archtiecture at NY area country clubs is doomed.


I see very little chance of country clubs in the NYC metro area switching to a golf club model.  For the most part, these clubs and people have ruined the golf course over the course of many years and as much as we talk "restoration", there is little hope of ever going back.  

Very few of these people have joined these clubs because of the quality of the golf course.  They have joined because it is the thing to do, or they want to "learn the game".  

I will go one step further and say I am very wary of any of the new golf only clubs in the  metro area ever being able to create a good golfing atmosphere.  Frankly, not enough good golfers who have already been exposed to great clubs have either  money or inclination to join.

And sadly the average "newer" member of typical Met Area Country Club expects the feel of the place and the service of the place to be like the Ritz Carlton.  

[John Shimp]

Patrick, Bill Brightly, Andy troeger,

Replies 2, 5, and 15 can give you all some real life examples on this topic.  Might prevent more blanket statements like clubs must have very good food and do everyting well to merit a waiting list.