With multiple golf courses and myriad activities, the property on Skidaway Island, Ga. saw the need for a signature clock that could help keep everyone on pace. After members rallied to support the cause, enough donations were in hand to get not just one clock, but five.
The Landings Club on Skidaway Island is a private, residential golf and athletic club located 12 miles from historic Savannah, Ga. Members have access to six championship golf courses, 31 tennis courts, 11 pickleball courts, eight bocce courts, seven unique restaurants, four clubhouses, five swimming pools, and a 52,000-sq. ft. wellness center.
What members didn’t have, though, was a signature clock that could be well-positioned on the property to alert golfers of their upcoming tee times.
Talk of adding clocks originally began in 2019, when the club embarked on a $25 million revitalization project, which culminated in the unveiling of the new Marshwood Clubhouse. If there was any extra money after that project, member Tom Souls reports, one of the items on a “wish list” would be to use it for a clock.
“[It turned out] we didn’t have money in the project for doing that, but we were sitting around and I was kind of frustrated,” Souls says. “I was talking with John [Palermo, another member] and Cliff Frohn, who at the time was our President, and said, ‘You know, we’re building this beautiful place—why can’t we have a classy clock like every other classy club has?’”
The first thought was to sell personalized bricks to raise some money for a clock purchase, but then the mindset quickly shifted. “We thought, we can get this done—there are people around here who will donate to this,” Palermo says.
“As we were talking among ourselves, someone else said, ‘I’ll put $1,000 in. Are you good?’” Souls adds.
It quickly snowballed from there—in one night while sitting around over drinks, eight members committed to $8,000. And in only two days, reports Gary Lorfano, the club’s Marketing Strategist, members raised a total of $130,000.
That led to the decision to procure not just one, but five clocks that could be placed strategically around the property, to help keep golfers on time and on pace at all of The Landings Club’s courses.
After looking into getting a well-known brand of clock, but discovering it can only be put on courses that host PGA Tour events, The Landings Club turned to The Verdin Company, the six-generation, Cincinnati, Ohio-based family business that has made cast-bronze bells, carillons, tower and street clocks, and other streetscape furnishings since 1842.
“[The Verdin clocks] work a hell of a lot better than the [other] clocks anyway,” Palermo jokes.
In fact, a big draw of the Verdin clocks, Lorfano adds, is their lack of required maintenance; now that they are in place at The Landings Club, he says, the staff’s only job is to keep them clean.
The first clock—for the Marshwood Clubhouse—was ordered in March 2020 and installed in June of that year. The remaining clocks (colored black with gold accent painting) were ordered that June and installed in September. Each is equipped with a custom header panel that reads “THE LANDINGS CLUB.”
After they were custom-designed, manufactured and delivered, The Landings Club’s Verdin clocks were placed on a campus-by-campus basis, in strategic positions where the most people would be able to see them—either on the driving range or near the practice green. Gone were the old “sandwich board” clocks, in what Lorfano refers to as a “significant upgrade.” The fifth and final clock was placed at the Franklin Creek Tennis Center.
“The biggest benefit was the enhancement to the club,” Lorfano says. “[The clocks reflect] pride in ownership and really elevate the club experience.”
And having active members like Souls and Palermo made raising funds for the cause a breeze, he notes.
“If you have members who want to donate, it’s a very easy way to fund it,” Lorfano says. “Don’t be afraid to ask your members. It’s always better when members are asking members.” C+RB
Tell Us What You Think!
You must be logged in to post a comment.