Andy_Sorby
Newbie
To all golfers playing our great game,
I read with interest every month all of the letters that are printed in the golf magazines and they pretty much follow a familiar theme; too expensive, slow play and falling membership numbers.
It is being reported in the news that more and more golf clubs are closing due to falling membership numbers. It is important for golf clubs to maximise revenue and remain financially sustainable. However, with golf membership at clubs falling by an average of negative eight each year, then this is becoming increasingly difficult to achieve.
Currently there are approximately 750k members in England with 2.5m ‘Pay & Play’ (P&P) golfers. Therefore, it is easy to do the math that we need to turn more P&P golfers into members but the difficulty is that more people want to become P&P golfers so that they can play a variety of golf courses. This makes commitment to playing golf regularly difficult because they have not made a financial outlay to motivate them to make sure they get value for money. However, being a P&P golfer is becoming increasingly and unnecessarily expensive as they are subsidising the loss of members from golf clubs. It can easily cost upwards of £100 to play four rounds of golf every month on average golf courses at a peak time. This financial outlay could be more expensive than a golf membership that would allow you to play as often as you like.
So why are golfers turning away from playing golf on a regular basis? I think it is important to put this into a social context;
I work for a Sports Governing Body and know all too well how crucial participation figures are to England Golf. Reduced participation figures will ultimately lead to reduced funding from Sport England in the next funding cycle (2017 – 2021), which will impact upon grassroots amateur golf. From what I understand, England Golf have chosen two key strategies to address the falling participation figures; juniors and families. It is easy for an outsider to criticise but I believe that these two strategies are flawed.
The average age of a golfer member is 65+ and this is for obvious reasons because they have more time and increased disposable income. At what point do we concentrate on golfers from the age of 25 to 65? At present, it is too easy for them to drift to other sports and interests. We should be nurturing this key age group of golfers to become the members of the future when they have more time, disposable income and have finished being a nomadic P&P golfer.
Anyone else agree?
I read with interest every month all of the letters that are printed in the golf magazines and they pretty much follow a familiar theme; too expensive, slow play and falling membership numbers.
It is being reported in the news that more and more golf clubs are closing due to falling membership numbers. It is important for golf clubs to maximise revenue and remain financially sustainable. However, with golf membership at clubs falling by an average of negative eight each year, then this is becoming increasingly difficult to achieve.
Currently there are approximately 750k members in England with 2.5m ‘Pay & Play’ (P&P) golfers. Therefore, it is easy to do the math that we need to turn more P&P golfers into members but the difficulty is that more people want to become P&P golfers so that they can play a variety of golf courses. This makes commitment to playing golf regularly difficult because they have not made a financial outlay to motivate them to make sure they get value for money. However, being a P&P golfer is becoming increasingly and unnecessarily expensive as they are subsidising the loss of members from golf clubs. It can easily cost upwards of £100 to play four rounds of golf every month on average golf courses at a peak time. This financial outlay could be more expensive than a golf membership that would allow you to play as often as you like.
So why are golfers turning away from playing golf on a regular basis? I think it is important to put this into a social context;
- We live in a world of competing demands with hundreds of TV channels and we are able to watch them when we want and not when TV networks show them. Who sits down to watch F1 at 2pm on a Sunday afternoon anymore? We all Sky+ (other devices are available!) and watch it in the evening when relaxing or the kids have gone to bed.
- The 30+ years of age golfer is the first generation of golfer faced with large mortgage repayments, due to the property boom of the 2000’s. This causes a considerable squeeze on household income and an additional £850 (average golf membership cost) may be the first thing to be slashed from the household budget.
- This first generation of the modern family promotes more family time spent together at weekends. In the past, male golfers would be allowed the flexibility to spend time away from the family because they had been working all week.
- A bigger pull on free time from a large number of newly accessible sports, such as year round indoor skiing.
- People are choosing to have children later in life, which means that historically, when people started to have more disposable income during mid-thirties, they are now faced with large mortgages and family commitments, such as nursery fees.
- We live in a world of vouchers so people do not expect to pay full price anymore and will always seek a bargain. Looking for a deal does not promote brand loyalty.
I work for a Sports Governing Body and know all too well how crucial participation figures are to England Golf. Reduced participation figures will ultimately lead to reduced funding from Sport England in the next funding cycle (2017 – 2021), which will impact upon grassroots amateur golf. From what I understand, England Golf have chosen two key strategies to address the falling participation figures; juniors and families. It is easy for an outsider to criticise but I believe that these two strategies are flawed.
- Families; I can see why England Golf have chosen this as a strategy as golf is likely to appeal to families and will deliver large returns for participation quickly. It is a strategy that has been very successful for British Cycling and delivered huge participation returns. Golf is a difficult sport to master and enjoy. It is unlikely that the average family of four would all like golf and continue. It would only take one family member not to enjoy it and the rest of the family would fall away as well. How many golfers have ever seen a family on the golf course? I can’t think of seeing it too many times. In addition, there is a cost factor. To kit four people out with clubs, bags, clothing, footwear, golf balls etc and then green fees is a very large expense that would be out of reach for most families.
- Juniors; firstly, there are too many other interests to distract kids from a game that essentially can take four or five hours to complete. Particularly, if your friends are not playing it as well. Whilst it is cheap for a junior golfer to become a member of a golf club, it relies on an adult to take them and keep them engaged. A key age for when people leave golf is 18 because other interests begin, such as education, time and money. If England Golf continue to concentrate on juniors, then we are only storing up the problem for a future generation as we would continue to lose golfers at 18+.
The average age of a golfer member is 65+ and this is for obvious reasons because they have more time and increased disposable income. At what point do we concentrate on golfers from the age of 25 to 65? At present, it is too easy for them to drift to other sports and interests. We should be nurturing this key age group of golfers to become the members of the future when they have more time, disposable income and have finished being a nomadic P&P golfer.
Anyone else agree?
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