A few random thoughts here...
Doing away with junior levels of membership virtually guarantees the future ruin of a club in 15-25 years. I shudder to think what the golf landscape is going to be here in Florida in 2035, especially at clubs that haven't convinced their older, most wealthy members to ensure the strong legacy of the club by being okay with the club aggressively pricing junior (under 30, 30-40, 40-50) membership categories.
One reason why people aren't joining or hanging out much at golf clubs - public or private - is because the main traditional alternative hangout locations, e.g. restaurants/bars and their own homes, have become cozier/more fun at a faster rate than golf clubs/country clubs. If you're an average private club member (or an average avid public golfer) your home is probably pretty nice. You may well have a better TV than your club does, and a comfier chair and room in which to watch it after golf. Plus you can change the channel when you want, watch Netflix, check your DVRed programs, grab yourself a beer you've already bought whenever you want, etc. etc. The evolution of the whole "man cave" concept is affecting how people hang out, such that your club would need a uniquely awesome (but somehow not prohibitively expensively made, to keep from pricing too many people out) vibe in order to consistently pull you away from your living room or the newest hip craft beer place in town.
And on the private side, most importantly, you can happily invite whoever you want to come over and watch the golf tournament or the football game at your place, whereas there's still a measure of potential discomfort/awkwardness involved in being a guest at your friend's private club - be it the course or the bar/restaurant or both - especially multiple times in a relatively short period.To this point, I'd wager that the vast majority of F&B operations at private golf clubs simply aren't good enough to limit themselves to a maximum clientele size of, say, 300 people + periodic guests. And F&B operations at most municipal and public courses will never attract non-golfers. Furthermore, restaurant food is getting better and more interesting all the time, and yet all golf clubs' lunch menus continue to look virtually (boringly) identical. Note to Lovely Hills Golf Course: best of luck making a cheeseburger that's blows away what can be enjoyed less expensively at the Five Guys a couple miles down the road.If you do want F&B to work for you, then I think the play is to 1) get better by hiring a real chef with some potentially bold ideas, and 2) if you're an otherwise private club, open the restaurant up (and, for goodness' sakes, market it) to the wider public at least a few nights a week. But again, no one's going to come if it sucks.It comes down to the need for creative solutions and outside-the-box thinking from an industry that seems to be less disposed to it than others, for a variety of reasons that I won't enumerate for fear of derailing this thread, which I've found interesting and important so far.