Re: Golf Is Having A Bad Year...Why?
- From: "The_Professor" <dbid@xxxxxxx>
- Date: 30 Sep 2005 12:11:24 -0700
#1.
I witnessed a great increase in interest in golf in the early 1990's,
resulting in a lot of golf courses coming on line around 1998-2002 or
so (note that it takes about 7 years to get a golf course built in most
places...so courses inspired by Tiger Woods are just coming online
now...and there are a few of them).
For whatever reason, a lot of these new owners went more for walk on
business than signing up members. Up till that time, golf was based
more on memberships than anything else, at least in my experience.
Up until about 1998 or so, I could go to my local club and get a decent
game any time. Dogfight like events had 50+ participants every saturday
and sunday. Club events regularly signed up 150+ people at a decent
club, and usually at least 100.
With the addition of the new clubs, and their desire for walk ons came
an emphasis on the worst thing in golf, the company outing. More and
more of these nasty nasty pieces of garbage polluted the golf scene,
taking up course time and drawing people away from regular club events
and into them, like evil black holes.
More courses diluted memberships. Lucky to get 20 people in a local
weekend dogfight like event, let alone 50. Lucky to get 50 in a club
event, and most went right down the drain, both because of diluted
memberships and the evil influence of company outings (and their
ilk...I forgot to include their ilk!).
With the decline of member related events, clubs go more for walk on
type things. Ignore members even more, restricting access and services.
They want you to sign up for a tee time as a 4some, for example...so
the only time you can play is when you have a 4some..not everywhere
everytime, but a lot of places a lot of the time. Add in the evil black
hole phenomena, and there is little time to golf.
Now add in again discounting walk on tee times during slow times! The
basic idea of going to the golf course and finding a game is pretty
much a thing of the past for almost all golfers. Whereas 15 years ago,
that would be routine for anyone, today it is so out of the ordinary
that people would not even think of golfing anywhere without a pre
arranged tee time!
So now the only time a lot of people golf is when they have a
4some..extremists like me notwithstanding. So when do you have a 4some
vs when do you feel like playing?
I call it lazy golf management in an oversupplied market. Nice thing is
that the courses are really empty these days, and I can get around a
lot more courses in a decent (3hours or less) time.
#2.
Stupid retirees. The guys who retire and take up golf and sudenly are
golfing legends in their own mind. This does not make up a majority of
recent retirees taking up golf, but a good number. No course etiquette,
take 5+ hours to play and never let anyone play through. Five of these
groups on a course and you are looking at 5 hour rounds regardless of
any other factor. I personally won't play when these turkeys are out
there. Fortunately, these guys usually don't last long because they
don't get any instant gratification (ie it takes a while to learn this
game, and starting out as an old geezer? Lucky to ever break 90!).
#3.
Cost. Most peoples limit for a round of golf is about $40.00 per round.
I personally see no reason to pay like $100.00+ to play golf on some
masterpiece of landscape architecture. I can see a lot better scenery
for free, and play golf for $25.00 per round and get in a lot more
golf. Better scenery, more golf, who needs course charging more than
$40.00 per round in any event? Resort destination courses have become
complete ripoffs, even to the point of gouging tourists while charging
locals 1/2 that price of less. Why pay $5K to play Pinehurst over a 2
week vacation when I could play a lot of nice courses locally for
$500.00 and have $4500.00 left over, and I don't think it will make any
difference to the actual golf.
.
- References:
- Golf Is Having A Bad Year...Why?
- From: Cal Golfer
- Golf Is Having A Bad Year...Why?
- Prev by Date: Re: Poor Rejected Liberals
- Next by Date: Re: Poor Rejected Liberals>Tex
- Previous by thread: Re: Golf Is Having A Bad Year...Why?
- Next by thread: Statistics for all players in 500+ rounds
- Index(es):
Relevant Pages
|
