Unless you have a plan that is followed up with a budget, you don’t have a plan—you have a prayer, and it is one that is rarely answered.
Mr. Carson and the Club Market
We face the challenge of attracting new, younger members who do not necessarily hold older values, and simply have too many alternatives for their leisure time.
What A Well-Managed Facility Looks Like
It’s one thing to have a signature course, but combining golf with the overall hospitality experience makes for a truly remarkable destination.
Scorecard On the Best Idea in Golf
There are lessons here that can be applied to any club or golf course that wants to do something similar—and you should, if you’re serious about attracting younger players to the game.
A Brilliant Solution
Discussions of expanding the game are sort of like discussions of weather: Everyone talks about it, but no one does anything about it. Birchwood Farms and its staff are to be commended on a truly great idea.
What One Night Can Mean
Jim James demonstrated that he had goals and standards for service and they were inviolate. He trained what is largely a temporary staff to that standard, and they delivered.
Golfing on Mars
Iceland is a mostly desolate, treeless, lava field where absolutely nothing is growing. Other parts are a little more physically hospitable, but mostly, it’s Mars. But here is the shocker: Golf is the number-one sport in Iceland.
A Letter from London
The stubborness of London clubs in altering their dress-code policies will get in the way of new member marketing. The next generation is not going to want to join clubs that are so restrictive.
An American Publisher in London
In London clubs, dress codes are rigidly enforced. Since they, too, have membership marketing issues, they may have to revisit this.
A Radical Proposal
We have a demographics problem and the health of our industry depends on us solving the puzzle of new membership marketing.
Rory McIlroy is Not Bear Bryant
There are too many other recreation and entertainment choices for families, and we must be their first.
Looking Back at 10 Years
We must have active member-marketing budgets with real money behind them. If you aren’t spending on this, you aren’t serious.
Kids Can’t Make Dinner Reservations
If the club is children’s dining destination of choice, it’s a win-win across the board—and you’ll have dinner reservations for six.
Mike Keiser Does It Again
Regardless of our health as an industry, one could assume that building a new golf course in a remote area, and not on “golf’s highway,” is a sucker’s bet. But Mike Keiser is having none of it.
What “I Hear You” Really Means
I made my presentation and the customer said, “I hear you.” What I didn’t know at the time was that was a nice way for my customer to say “no.”