Speaker 1: I miss a green, for example, I'm already upset.
Speaker 2: When I find my ball in the bunker, I'm really upset.
Speaker 2: And when I find my ball in a brid Egg
Speaker 2: Friday Egg, the dreaded Frida Egg, Frida Egg, Frida Egg, Egg,
Speaker 2: Frida Egg, Bride Egg.
Speaker 1: Lie, I'm about ready to run off of the hump.
Speaker 1: Welcome to the Frida Egg Podcast. I'm Garrett Morrison, and
Speaker 1: today we're checking in on the health of the golf
Speaker 1: industry as a whole. So during the COVID nineteen pandemic,
Speaker 1: recreational golf had a major moment. People were working from home,
Speaker 1: desperate to get outside, and golf was one of the
Speaker 1: few safe activities available. We saw rounds go up, we
Speaker 1: saw equipment sales boom. We saw things in twenty twenty
Speaker 1: and twenty twenty one basically that we haven't seen since Tigermania.
Speaker 1: And the big question going into twenty twenty two was
Speaker 1: whether the golf industry could keep it up. Here to
Speaker 1: talk with me about whether it has is Greg Nathan
Speaker 1: Greg is the chief business Officer of the National Golf Foundation,
Speaker 1: which does research on the business of the game. He's
Speaker 1: been with the NNGF for fifteen years and has a
Speaker 1: very informed view of where the golf industry has been
Speaker 1: recently and is right now. So Greg, first of all,
Speaker 1: could you give me a basic sense of what the
Speaker 1: National Golf Foundation does? I know that's a big question,
Speaker 1: but what's the kind of elevator pitch for the National
Speaker 1: Golf Foundation?
Speaker 2: Thanks Garrett Love the Friday. Thanks for having me on.
Speaker 2: First of all, you know the NGF, We're eighty six
Speaker 2: years old right now, known primarily for being the independent
Speaker 2: and objective reporter on the vital sign to the golf economy.
Speaker 2: And just like any industry, you have to look at
Speaker 2: the look at the dynamics of supply and demand in
Speaker 2: order to figure out what's going on, what's in balance,
Speaker 2: what's out of balance, And any business that operates in
Speaker 2: golf those who like to have data and an independent
Speaker 2: point of view on where things are. That's what the
Speaker 2: NGF is best known for. We are the association for
Speaker 2: the golf business. And what's unique is that we're the
Speaker 2: only organization that works with every vertical. So whether you're
Speaker 2: a golf course owner, an operator, you're a retailer, you
Speaker 2: make clubs and balls, irrigation, mowing equipment, chemicals, et cetera,
Speaker 2: et cetera. We work with the leaders in each one
Speaker 2: of those spaces. So personally, when you love golf, when
Speaker 2: you're a golf crazy lunatic and you love business, I'm
Speaker 2: one of the luckiest people on earth. Excellent.
Speaker 1: So we're talking today mainly about the impact of the
Speaker 1: pandemic on the golf industry and how the golf industry
Speaker 1: is doing as the danger of the pandemic kind of subsides. Right,
Speaker 1: we're entering a new era in golf, it feels like.
Speaker 1: And so just to set that up, could you give
Speaker 1: me an idea of what the basic condition of the
Speaker 1: golf industry was before COVID nineteen hit.
Speaker 2: I would have answered that question pretty similarly. For let's
Speaker 2: just say the five years prior to the pandemic, I
Speaker 2: would have said that golf is competitive. What you had
Speaker 2: leading into the pandemic was since two thousand and six,
Speaker 2: you had more closures than openings on an annual basis
Speaker 2: starting in two thousand and six, and you had a
Speaker 2: stable green grass golf participation dynamic. You know, somewhere between
Speaker 2: twenty three and twenty twenty four million green grass golf participants.
Speaker 2: So if you think about what we do in the
Speaker 2: supplying demand sides of the economy. That's the simplest way
Speaker 2: to look at it. And as it relates to rounds,
Speaker 2: the weather has the largest effect on rounds played from
Speaker 2: year to year when you have a stable base of participants.
Speaker 2: So that's really the main dynamics that we're dealing with.
Speaker 2: You had a zero sum game to a degree in
Speaker 2: terms of golf businesses who are selling things to golfers
Speaker 2: because roughly the same number of customers out there, and Garrett,
Speaker 2: even the way that we look at it is if
Speaker 2: you say that there's twenty five million en course golfers,
Speaker 2: half of that number, you know, twelve to thirteen million
Speaker 2: spends ninety percent of the money in golf and plays
Speaker 2: over ninety percent of the rounds. So that's what I
Speaker 2: mean when I say competitive. And then on the golf
Speaker 2: course side, we deal with a lot of folks who
Speaker 2: are suppliers to golf courses, whether they sell mowers or
Speaker 2: irrigation systems or software. And if you have a declining
Speaker 2: net number of golf facilities, you would understand why that's
Speaker 2: a competitive environment too. So that's sort of the lead in.
Speaker 2: You know, some people have it in their heads that
Speaker 2: every business in golf should be successful, and that's this
Speaker 2: doesn't make sense relative to any economy or any industry.
Speaker 2: So the narrative of this is the other main thing
Speaker 2: I'll touch on leading into the pandemic is the narrative
Speaker 2: about golf. The media coverage of golf, and I'm not
Speaker 2: talking about golf media was extremely negative.
Speaker 1: There's a kind of trope in not golf media, as
Speaker 1: you say, but general national media. There's a trope about
Speaker 1: how golf is dying, or at least there was before
Speaker 1: the pandemic. This was an article that would pop up
Speaker 1: every few years or so in a major publication. Where
Speaker 1: do you think that came from.
Speaker 2: An easy one to pick, Garrett, is that the course
Speaker 2: is closing. Okay. So the fact that courses, more courses
Speaker 2: were closing than opening between two thousand and six to
Speaker 2: the present created a thing, an event that was happening
Speaker 2: in markets all around the country where, oh wow, this
Speaker 2: golf course closed, Golf must be in trouble, okay, When
Speaker 2: the truth was very different, and you won't be surprised
Speaker 2: to know that. You know, sometimes journalists who have that
Speaker 2: they don't want to let the facts get in the
Speaker 2: way of their agenda, and so they wouldn't always call
Speaker 2: us for perspective. And the perspective that we would have
Speaker 2: given is that golf experienced this massive golf course building
Speaker 2: boom between nineteen eighty six and two thousand and five,
Speaker 2: where more than four thousand new golf courses came into
Speaker 2: the population of places where people could play. So someone
Speaker 2: who was a developer, they would build a golf course there.
Speaker 2: Let's say Nicholas or Rhys Jones or Tom Fasia were
Speaker 2: building a lot of golf courses at that time to
Speaker 2: have an amenity with a big name to sell real
Speaker 2: estate and homes, and so they knew that they were
Speaker 2: going to sell the homes and then they were going
Speaker 2: to get out a dodge. Okay, So the due diligence
Speaker 2: required as to whether this particular market could sustain another
Speaker 2: golf course was not the most relevant conversation. So what
Speaker 2: happens when supply and demand get out of whack. There's
Speaker 2: a natural correction that happens. Every one of those businesses
Speaker 2: cannot be successful. And most of those courses that were
Speaker 2: Bill Garrett, let's just say there wasn't a lot of
Speaker 2: accessible affordable golf built during that time. It was a
Speaker 2: lot of the same really high end product, expensive to build,
Speaker 2: expensive to maintain, high green sphae, and while the demand
Speaker 2: for that was significant, it gets fulfilled. And so when
Speaker 2: you think this is all about that negative narrative, a
Speaker 2: lot of it can be spurred on by a course
Speaker 2: in Des Moin closing and the media picking up on
Speaker 2: that and saying, oh wow, GoF is dying, but they
Speaker 2: don't reference the fact that eight new eighteen hole golf
Speaker 2: courses were opened in Des Moines in a twenty year
Speaker 2: period without a massive increase in the number of golfers.
Speaker 2: So that's that's one thing, and then the other real quickly,
Speaker 2: Garrett would be Look, golf is not without its baggage. Okay,
Speaker 2: So whether you think about golf being perceived by some
Speaker 2: as racist, sex, is bad for the environment, a number
Speaker 2: of things that sometimes people will touch on, Whereas the
Speaker 2: truth is three out of every four golf courses in
Speaker 2: America is open to the public. The average cost of
Speaker 2: a round of golf is under forty dollars. So there's
Speaker 2: certain things that are skewed just because golf became a
Speaker 2: magnet for some of that negativity as a result of
Speaker 2: just the way that people think about things they're not
Speaker 2: involved with.
Speaker 1: And I would say that those perceptions come from somewhere,
Speaker 1: There are some legitimate sources of that perception, and that
Speaker 1: perhaps golf needs to do a better job of putting
Speaker 1: forward some of the positive side of its image right,
Speaker 1: and the golf industry has not always been particularly proactive
Speaker 1: in putting that counter narrative forward. But to get back
Speaker 1: to what you're saying about golf course development in the nineties,
Speaker 1: especially eighties, nineties, maybe early two thousands, I find it
Speaker 1: really interesting what you're saying is that we didn't necessarily
Speaker 1: overbuild golf courses in general. We overbuilt a certain kind
Speaker 1: of golf course. We overbuilt kind of high end residential
Speaker 1: golf courses. Is that accurate?
Speaker 2: I think you could argue, just by looking at golf's
Speaker 2: equilibrium being out of whack, that there was there was
Speaker 2: an overbuild relative to satisfy having the right number of
Speaker 2: eighteen whole equivalents to satisfy demand. But what I am
Speaker 2: saying is that in order to grow golf participation, accessible
Speaker 2: and affordable golf is what is required, that what that
Speaker 2: is what helps to grow people engaging in the game
Speaker 2: one part of that formula. And so if you're consistently
Speaker 2: building a homogeneous product, you're going to end up with
Speaker 2: a bit of an issue.
Speaker 1: Let's fast forward to twenty twenty. Give me a sense
Speaker 1: for what happened there. Obviously, for a while, a lot
Speaker 1: of golf courses were shut down, and it was unclear
Speaker 1: where this was going. But in the summer of twenty twenty,
Speaker 1: something unexpected, at least to me, happened, and recreational golf
Speaker 1: saw a real boom in popularity. So from your perspective
Speaker 1: at the NGF, what happened there.
Speaker 2: The way that I like to look at it is
Speaker 2: that the pandemic actually created a situation where golf's amazing
Speaker 2: intrinsic values, the things that attract people to the game,
Speaker 2: became so front and center and needed. So what I'm
Speaker 2: talking about is an activity that outdoor exercise can be
Speaker 2: an outlet for competition. It's social, and it's naturally social
Speaker 2: distance and say you don't share equipment. And so golf
Speaker 2: showed itself for many of the great things that attracts
Speaker 2: us to it because we had this amazing opportunity where
Speaker 2: everything else shut down and NGNGF has been studying what
Speaker 2: we call latent demand. What the latent demand measure is
Speaker 2: is how many Americans who don't currently play golf have
Speaker 2: interest in playing golf on a golf course. And so
Speaker 2: that number the number one answer of people who don't
Speaker 2: currently play but are interested in playing golf on a
Speaker 2: golf course. I mean, it's sixteen, seventeen, eighteen million Americans.
Speaker 2: So there are the interest in the game has been
Speaker 2: very high, and during the pandemic, they had more flexibility
Speaker 2: to play time wise, work from home wise, and golf
Speaker 2: was allowed to stay open because of the safety factor.
Speaker 2: So in a way, it was the perfect storm to
Speaker 2: remind people, hey, I really should get out on the
Speaker 2: golf course. It's something I can do that has all
Speaker 2: these great qualities. So golf was very well positioned, just
Speaker 2: through the way it is the dynamics of the game.
Speaker 1: What were the demographics of the people who came back
Speaker 1: to golf or who picked up the game for the
Speaker 1: first time during this period. Where was the demographic of
Speaker 1: that population different from what we saw previously from golf.
Speaker 2: The best answer I can give you on that, Garrett,
Speaker 2: is there were some notable cohorts that grew during the
Speaker 2: COVID period. You know, we grew by about six hundred
Speaker 2: thousand juniors, about six hundred thousand female players, and we
Speaker 2: grew by about four hundred thousand in non Caucasian You
Speaker 2: could argue that there is the effect of top golf
Speaker 2: and other alternative forms of the game. And what I
Speaker 2: mean by that is that we've studied off course participation
Speaker 2: for many years, and if you look at the demographics
Speaker 2: of those who go to top golf or those who
Speaker 2: play in simulators or driving ranges, it's much more of
Speaker 2: what the encourse game wants. It's younger, it's more female,
Speaker 2: it's more minority. So you could argue that the table
Speaker 2: was set nicely by people starting to be engaged in
Speaker 2: the game in different ways from different demographics. That the pandemic,
Speaker 2: you know, was a situation that you know, I like
Speaker 2: to say, got them from the couch to the course
Speaker 2: in a way that previously they may not have done that.
Speaker 2: But when you're home and you're stir crazy and you
Speaker 2: are interested in golf and you've hit a ball before
Speaker 2: with a real club, boom, okay, here's this opportunity, and
Speaker 2: golf is ubiquitous. Garrett there really isn't any market in
Speaker 2: the US that doesn't have a place for you to
Speaker 2: go play, and so boom, there you go.
Speaker 1: We saw this growth during twenty twenty, or these promising
Speaker 1: signs during twenty twenty, how would you say that continued
Speaker 1: or changed in twenty twenty one, Because by the summer
Speaker 1: of twenty twenty one, vaccines were starting to become more
Speaker 1: widespread and the danger of the pandemic had kind of
Speaker 1: tapered off a little bit. And so twenty twenty one
Speaker 1: was kind of this interesting period I think for golf,
Speaker 1: where that initial impetus to get out on the course
Speaker 1: because it was maybe one of the only activities available
Speaker 1: to you, wasn't there as much because other things were
Speaker 1: starting to come back online. So what did you make
Speaker 1: of that?
Speaker 2: Well, I'll start with a little perspective just in terms
Speaker 2: of quantifying the activity. So in twenty two twenty, you
Speaker 2: had fifty percent half of golf courses in America closed
Speaker 2: during the real you know, March April of twenty twenty,
Speaker 2: and so we were down tracking down twenty million rounds
Speaker 2: in twenty twenty, and we ended up up sixty million rounds.
Speaker 2: So that's a full eighty million round swing in that
Speaker 2: period of time, finishing the year up fourteen percent in
Speaker 2: twenty twenty, and that's the biggest rounds played increase, you
Speaker 2: know it rivals where we were back in the Tiger
Speaker 2: the Tiger Boom days. So if you think about the
Speaker 2: end of twenty twenty where this happened, there would have
Speaker 2: been a lot of discussion or thinking about, Wow, what's
Speaker 2: going to happen in twenty twenty one? Can we go
Speaker 2: up more than that? And the answer ended up being yes,
Speaker 2: it went up another five percent in rounds in twenty
Speaker 2: twenty one. Now, I will tell you that in both
Speaker 2: of those years twenty twenty and twenty twenty one, the
Speaker 2: weather was extraordinarily favorable for golf. So in twenty twenty,
Speaker 2: the one I just said was up fourteen percent, we
Speaker 2: probably would have been up five six seven percent anyway.
Speaker 1: So because golf has some positive things going for it
Speaker 1: at this point, is that why you think that there
Speaker 1: is the potential for more stability going forward, even if
Speaker 1: say we hit a recession again.
Speaker 2: Golf is certainly not recession proof. That's proven to be
Speaker 2: the case. But you've got pretty much improved balance between
Speaker 2: supply and demand now than you had for the recession
Speaker 2: in eight oh nine. So that's that's a real plus
Speaker 2: for stability, and because golf is a pay for play activity,
Speaker 2: attracts people who have a little bit of money, and
Speaker 2: an activity like golf would be one of the last
Speaker 2: to be impacted heavily by recession and one of the
Speaker 2: first to come out when it ends.
Speaker 1: All right, so why don't we get some details on
Speaker 1: twenty twenty two. So far, we're at the end of
Speaker 1: the summer and we've gotten a sense for what golf
Speaker 1: looks like in twenty twenty two at this point, even
Speaker 1: if the year isn't over. So how would you assess
Speaker 1: twenty twenty two in comparison to twenty and twenty one?
Speaker 1: You mentioned earlier that the weather for the past couple
Speaker 1: of years was good at an unsustainable rate. Twenty twenty two,
Speaker 1: my sense is that in general the weather hasn't been
Speaker 1: as favorable, and that's you know, obviously not great for
Speaker 1: rounds played. But even factoring that in, how has the
Speaker 1: performance of the golf industry been this year so far?
Speaker 2: Well as the as the organization as NGF, being the
Speaker 2: organization for businesses, I can tell you that the businesses
Speaker 2: feel quite good about twenty twenty two in terms of
Speaker 2: their performance. Rounds have been down because the weather has
Speaker 2: not been as good. Rounds are down about four percent
Speaker 2: roughly year to date, but t sheets have been so full,
Speaker 2: so much more full than they have been that the courses,
Speaker 2: as I said, have been able to get higher rates,
Speaker 2: and private clubs have been very heavily utilized. So the
Speaker 2: people who work at the golf course, Garrett, have been
Speaker 2: really busy, and I would say they're a bit tired.
Speaker 2: And so the fact that rounds might be modulating a
Speaker 2: little bit for some of those people, it's a little
Speaker 2: bit of a breath while they're still making some money. Now.
Speaker 2: Something near and dear to both FRIEDA Egg's part and
Speaker 2: my part are what's going on with golf courses. And
Speaker 2: we have noticed recently the last couple years the trajectory
Speaker 2: of the closures has really flattened out. When we look
Speaker 2: at our estimates through the year of the number of
Speaker 2: closures that we'll have by year's end, it's significantly lower.
Speaker 2: We're tracking to be around ninety five eighteen whole equivalent
Speaker 2: closures this year, which would be the fewest since two
Speaker 2: thousand and five. The closures now are also quite different
Speaker 2: than they were. The closures were a natural correction from
Speaker 2: the imbalance of supply and demand, but that's pretty much
Speaker 2: played its way out. So the interesting thing is that
Speaker 2: the closures now, they're not generally sob stories. They are
Speaker 2: situations where as we say, the dirt is worth more
Speaker 2: than the grass, So it's generally going to be a property,
Speaker 2: a golf course that's not as competitive in their local market.
Speaker 2: You know, they've built five, six, eight, twelve new courses
Speaker 2: in the past thirty years in these markets, and some
Speaker 2: of them they're just not They're not going to be
Speaker 2: competitive anymore. And eighty plus percent of golf courses are
Speaker 2: independently owned and operated. So the Johnson family who owned
Speaker 2: a particular golf course for the last fifty years, finally
Speaker 2: can sell that golf course to a developer. And so
Speaker 2: even though we may have ninety five closures, when you
Speaker 2: have sixteen thousand golf courses, that's a really tiny amount.
Speaker 2: And they're not all bad stories. In fact, most of
Speaker 2: them are good stories.
Speaker 1: Now, hey there, wanted to pop in real quick to
Speaker 1: talk about something that's going on in the Frida Egg
Speaker 1: Pro shop. We have our new fall line of merchandise
Speaker 1: coming out next week Tuesday, September thirteenth. We're going to
Speaker 1: have vests, long sleeve t shirts, performance sweatshirts, new winter hats,
Speaker 1: drink where tumblers, hoodies, quarter zips, all manner of kind
Speaker 1: of fall themed stuff. So if you want to get
Speaker 1: something new, then go to proshop dot Thefrida egg dot
Speaker 1: com and check out our fall line starting on Tuesday,
Speaker 1: September thirteenth. Okay, that's it. Back to the interview. Okay, Well,
Speaker 1: I'd like to get into golf courses and golf course
Speaker 1: development a little bit later, but before that, I'd like
Speaker 1: to find out a little more about kind of how
Speaker 1: golf course operators can go about sustaining interest in the game. Obviously,
Speaker 1: twenty twenty twenty twenty one was a big moment for
Speaker 1: golf course operators to just bring new people into the fold.
Speaker 1: People are arriving at the golf course who haven't been
Speaker 1: there in a while, or who have perhaps never been there.
Speaker 1: And now the big thing for golf course operators is
Speaker 1: how do we keep those people coming back? Right? How
Speaker 1: can we provide an experience that is such that those people,
Speaker 1: even if other activities open up to them, they choose
Speaker 1: to come back to golf. So, just in general, what
Speaker 1: has been your standard advice to golf course operators about
Speaker 1: how to improve the experience so that they keep bringing
Speaker 1: new people to the game and bringing back people who
Speaker 1: came back during the pandemic.
Speaker 2: Golf's front door, and I'm discussing the US is the
Speaker 2: United States sixteen thousand golf courses, fourteen thousand facilities as
Speaker 2: golf's front door. I have not historically been particularly strategic
Speaker 2: or aggressive at selling golf versus other forms of recreation,
Speaker 2: and selling golf doesn't have to mean in the traditional
Speaker 2: sense of sales. But what it does have to be
Speaker 2: is golf needs to compete on a basis of being
Speaker 2: a fun thing to do for people who are not
Speaker 2: already in the franchise, who are not already hooked. So
Speaker 2: if you're running a golf course, lots of people in
Speaker 2: the golf business during these these these surging, surging times,
Speaker 2: you know they look in the in the mirror. We
Speaker 2: all can look in the mirror like, wow, we're really handsome,
Speaker 2: Like business is just amazing. We're doing an exceptional job.
Speaker 2: But the reality is we need to use times like
Speaker 2: these to reinvest in the product. And unless you're Seminole
Speaker 2: or Pine Valley or Mirefield Village, you need to compete.
Speaker 2: And that means competing for recreation time, and that means
Speaker 2: what are the amenities? What are the ways that I
Speaker 2: can create pleasing, positive experiences for people who are not
Speaker 2: already hooked on the game. And so those who are
Speaker 2: at golf's front door, this is a call, okay, this
Speaker 2: is a call to them to look at their operation
Speaker 2: while they have some money and think about what's going
Speaker 2: to happen when things are not as good? Am I
Speaker 2: looking at my property and how to make it competitive
Speaker 2: versus the other places and the other forms of recreation?
Speaker 2: That that's our view? What can I do to make
Speaker 2: my business more fun? To it's more fun to be there?
Speaker 1: Right? And so speaking of entry points to the game,
Speaker 1: it's not just green grass facilities. What is the importance
Speaker 1: of places like top golf or or you know, things
Speaker 1: like simulator golf to getting people into the game. I
Speaker 1: mean to be honest, in the past, I've been a
Speaker 1: bit of a skeptic about whether those things would indeed
Speaker 1: help help grow the game, to use the old tired phrase,
Speaker 1: but it seems like you might believe that there is
Speaker 1: a genuine connection between people who go to a top
Speaker 1: golf facility and people who might be interested in going
Speaker 1: out on a golf course at some point. So could
Speaker 1: you maybe make that connection for me?
Speaker 2: Of course, first of all the things that have been
Speaker 2: trotted out over the years, Garrett, in terms of why
Speaker 2: why doesn't golf grow as much as it as much
Speaker 2: as it should? It always comes down to people saying
Speaker 2: it takes too long, it costs too much, and it's
Speaker 2: too difficult. Well, starting more than ten years ago, we
Speaker 2: started studying that a little bit differently. We started studying
Speaker 2: what does it take for someone to get hooked on
Speaker 2: the game. And it comes down to it comes down
Speaker 2: to four things. And it won't surprise you and maybe cliche,
Speaker 2: but each of those four things are the most important
Speaker 2: because they're most closely associated with the perception that golf
Speaker 2: is fun and what I mean by that, And I'll
Speaker 2: talk about these two areas comfort and competence. And I'm
Speaker 2: going to take competence first. So the two keys and
Speaker 2: competence as to why someone would get hooked, why would
Speaker 2: you come into the game. The first one is I
Speaker 2: play well enough to enjoy the game. It doesn't mean
Speaker 2: I shoot in the nineties or the eighties or the seventies.
Speaker 2: I can get the ball around. I play well enough
Speaker 2: to enjoy the game. And the second one is I
Speaker 2: get shot euphoria at least one or two times every
Speaker 2: time I go out okay, So that's part. The other
Speaker 2: side that the comfort part, which is really important, is
Speaker 2: I feel comfortable in the golf course environment or I
Speaker 2: feel and I feel comfortable with other golfers. So this
Speaker 2: is where golf's front door could do a much better job.
Speaker 2: It's not while time, money and difficulty are really there.
Speaker 2: Real the bigger reason why golf hasn't grown in the
Speaker 2: way that it should is because golf is so intimidating.
Speaker 2: Is because people have a fear of embarrassment. Golf's orthodoxies
Speaker 2: get in the way from a mindset standpoint, and so
Speaker 2: if you think about the growth, the huge growth in
Speaker 2: top golf and golf entertainment and simulator play in different ways,
Speaker 2: those are less intimidating ways that someone can engage in
Speaker 2: this game. And there isn't an activity or a sport
Speaker 2: in the world, Garrett that wouldn't beg Borrow and steal
Speaker 2: to have this. You could say it's a farm team
Speaker 2: for the big leagues, you know, it's a way to
Speaker 2: and look, they run their own businesses. They should be
Speaker 2: and are in the business to make money. They're not
Speaker 2: in the business necessarily to grow the green grass game.
Speaker 2: But if you think about this is an opportunity for
Speaker 2: someone to hit a real ball with a real club
Speaker 2: and feel shot euphoria. It's less intimidating, it's technology, it's gaming,
Speaker 2: and it's all about fun. And so the growth here
Speaker 2: top golfer example, it's fifty to fifty golfers and non golfers,
Speaker 2: so that in itself you've got someone who took this
Speaker 2: bridge from this is a bridge from the couch to
Speaker 2: the course. And someone who goes to top golfers plays
Speaker 2: in simulator because it's fun and less intimidating, might hit
Speaker 2: some good shots, might get a feel for the game
Speaker 2: and say, you know what, I think I could go
Speaker 2: and try this on a real course. So the issue
Speaker 2: then becomes are they entering a system that's well equipped
Speaker 2: to receive them and give them a great experience. And
Speaker 2: that's where the NGF really spends a lot out of
Speaker 2: time and thinking and money, trying to prove how that
Speaker 2: should be done.
Speaker 1: In addition to alternate ways to experience shot euphoria, as
Speaker 1: you've put it a couple of times hitting the ball.
Speaker 1: In addition to those possible ways to get into the game,
Speaker 1: do you think that golf on television, that professional golf
Speaker 1: is an important potential entry point for people as well for.
Speaker 2: Any sport to grow. We've had different points in time
Speaker 2: as the NGNGF where we've looked at international markets, because
Speaker 2: we maintain the database of every golf course in the world,
Speaker 2: where we've tried to put together what are the underpinnings,
Speaker 2: what are the things that must be in place for
Speaker 2: a golf to grow in a country, and having heroes
Speaker 2: is one of those things, having people that you see
Speaker 2: in our case, Look, the United States is the eight
Speaker 2: hundred pound gorilla, the biggest market forty five percent of
Speaker 2: the world's golf courses or in the United States, Well,
Speaker 2: we've got plenty of professional golf heroes to watch on television.
Speaker 1: And so something like Live Golf right, this new disruptor
Speaker 1: league that's not yet on television, but that certainly poses
Speaker 1: something of a competitive threat to the PGA Tour I'm
Speaker 1: not exactly sure how I feel yet about the prospects
Speaker 1: of live golf as it relates to golf on television
Speaker 1: and the importance of that to keeping people interested in
Speaker 1: the game. But I wonder if you've thought at all
Speaker 1: about that, like what, you know, if you've kind of
Speaker 1: looked into the crystal ball at all and thought, like,
Speaker 1: what could it look like if live golf really does
Speaker 1: take a big chunk out of the PGA Tour, how
Speaker 1: will that affect the way that people experience professional golf
Speaker 1: on TV and therefore the way that a lot of
Speaker 1: people might get interested in the game in the first place.
Speaker 2: You know, Garrett, there is already so much professional golf,
Speaker 2: so much competitive golf available to golf fans, and by
Speaker 2: the way, there are is a much larger population of
Speaker 2: people who engage in the game, whether it's watching it,
Speaker 2: reading it, or playing it. And playing it is what
Speaker 2: we care about, that's what our organization is all about.
Speaker 2: So from a recreational golf standpoint, I can't say it's
Speaker 2: going to have that, you know, more more exposure, more
Speaker 2: opportunity to see professional golf. I don't know if it's
Speaker 2: going to have any significant impact on recreational golf with
Speaker 2: doctor Bettett's our CEO. I've had conversations over the years about,
Speaker 2: you know, the popularity, for example, of Tiger Or we'll
Speaker 2: talk about how popular Frank Sinatra is as a singer,
Speaker 2: and we may love Frank Sinatra and you know, listen
Speaker 2: to his music back in the day, and golf is growing,
Speaker 2: and we might sing in the shower. But just because
Speaker 2: we like Frank Sinatra or we like Tiger Woods doesn't
Speaker 2: necessarily mean we're going to go and play the recreational
Speaker 2: game and be like, hmm, I might try it. I
Speaker 2: might try singing because I like Eddie Vedder, you know,
Speaker 2: but it doesn't mean I'm going to be a singer.
Speaker 1: That's a reassuring answer to me, because I think that
Speaker 1: sometimes people overestimate the portion of the health of the
Speaker 1: game that professional televised golf accounts for. And we often
Speaker 1: do this thing where we take the temperature of the
Speaker 1: game as a whole by taking the temperature of professional golf.
Speaker 1: And I think that what you're saying here is sort
Speaker 1: of reassuring in the sense that golf is a lot
Speaker 1: bigger than just the professional game. So if the professional
Speaker 1: game is suffering that doesn't necessarily mean that the industry
Speaker 1: as a whole, that recreational golf what we all actually
Speaker 1: care about in the end, doesn't necessarily mean that that's
Speaker 1: suffering as well. And so I think that that's a
Speaker 1: good thing to keep in mind throughout all of this.
Speaker 2: Golf being cool, whatever that means, golf being ubiquitous, golf
Speaker 2: being on television all the time, it certainly is a positive,
Speaker 2: you know, for the recreational game. It is from the
Speaker 2: recreational golfer from whom all blessings flow as it relates
Speaker 2: to the golf industry that I serve.
Speaker 1: All right, so why don't we get into golf course development.
Speaker 1: You've talked little bit about the recent history of golf
Speaker 1: course development, the way that the industry sort of overbuilt
Speaker 1: a certain kind of course in the nineties and the eighties, nineties,
Speaker 1: early two thousand's, residential golf kind of got a little
Speaker 1: bit too big, and the demand just couldn't sustain that supply.
Speaker 1: And so I'm really curious about where golf course development
Speaker 1: is going next, because golf course closures are continuing. As
Speaker 1: you've said, they have certainly slowed down. So I guess
Speaker 1: the simple question is do we need more golf courses,
Speaker 1: And if we need more golf courses, what kinds of
Speaker 1: golf courses do we need.
Speaker 2: It's a really fun subject in certain ways and not
Speaker 2: in others. So you're if you're Toro or Rainbird and
Speaker 2: someone who supplies golf courses around the world, we just
Speaker 2: let's just think about the United States. We're not likely
Speaker 2: to go beyond twenty new eighteen whole equivalents in the
Speaker 2: United States in any particular year. So there are some
Speaker 2: really cool things happening out there for destination golf, things
Speaker 2: that are getting built because they're special or you know,
Speaker 2: there's a lot of discussion about par three and short
Speaker 2: courses being built because there are so many high profile
Speaker 2: ones like you know at Pinehurst, at the Preserve, Abandon
Speaker 2: the Sandbox, the sandbox at Sand Valley, and these are
Speaker 2: really intelligent things for these properties to do, because if
Speaker 2: somebody arrives with their party at four o'clock in the afternoon,
Speaker 2: they have something amazing to go and do. But in general,
Speaker 2: there isn't there isn't a ton of construction going on,
Speaker 2: and the construction that is happening, the projects that are
Speaker 2: happening are generally going to be things that are and
Speaker 2: I'm talking about new They're going to be for the
Speaker 2: most part, special places that have their own draw But
Speaker 2: every market in the US has supply, you know, So
Speaker 2: there's not going to be a general a general build
Speaker 2: that's going to continue to happen at any level around
Speaker 2: the world. Is where a lot of the focus has
Speaker 2: gone in terms of building building courses. Back around twenty twelve,
Speaker 2: a number of the really big companies, the global companies
Speaker 2: in golf, they came to the NGNGF and say, hey,
Speaker 2: can you do what you do with the database of
Speaker 2: golf courses in the US around the world, because they
Speaker 2: it was becoming very obvious. I told you, two thousand
Speaker 2: and six is the first year of more closures than openings.
Speaker 2: And these companies started to realize, you know what, our
Speaker 2: growth isn't going to come from the United States. We
Speaker 2: need to have more tools to figure out what where
Speaker 2: are we going to grow. So like Vietnam, for example,
Speaker 2: is really fast, you know, fast growing in terms of
Speaker 2: the building of new golf courses, but seventy five eighty
Speaker 2: percent of golf supply around the world is in twenty countries.
Speaker 2: Yet there's two hundred and six countries that have a
Speaker 2: golf course. So it's a real interesting time. But you
Speaker 2: asked about development, mostly it's going to happen overseas, and
Speaker 2: there's going to There has been a tremendous amount of
Speaker 2: investment in upgrading the physical plants of golf courses here
Speaker 2: in the US, So the number of renovations happening that's
Speaker 2: quite significant. I think we estimate that in the past
Speaker 2: five years more than nine billion dollars has been invested
Speaker 2: in significant renovation work at golf courses in the United States, right.
Speaker 1: And this is something that Andy and I have talked
Speaker 1: about a lot, because quite a bit of that movement
Speaker 1: towards renovation and restoration has happened at private clubs, right,
Speaker 1: just as quite a bit of the new golf course
Speaker 1: development has been at these high end, premiere destination resorts.
Speaker 1: And so something that we've discussed a lot is when
Speaker 1: is this trend going to really start to hit public golf,
Speaker 1: local golf in a big way. And so I'm curious
Speaker 1: about your thoughts on that. You know, is some of
Speaker 1: this investment coming to the lower end or to the
Speaker 1: middle tier of courses.
Speaker 2: It is, and it already has been. It's just not
Speaker 2: as high profile. But the reality is that we would
Speaker 2: estimate that in the past five years close to eighty
Speaker 2: percent of public facilities have had some kind of renovation done.
Speaker 2: Eighty five percent of private have had some sort of
Speaker 2: meaningful renovation done. And it doesn't mean like gill Hants
Speaker 2: has come in and redesigned all eighteen holes and that
Speaker 2: sort of high profile work. It is investing in your
Speaker 2: course to be competitive. You know, you still, unless you're
Speaker 2: abandoned Dune's or you're a real high attractive resort property,
Speaker 2: you're competing against the courses in your trade area. Golf
Speaker 2: is local for the most part, so how are you
Speaker 2: going to compete in any business? You got to invest
Speaker 2: in your product and make it better so that people
Speaker 2: want to come to your restaurant versus the other one.
Speaker 1: So what has the character of this kind of improvement
Speaker 1: at the public and local level looked like. If it
Speaker 1: hasn't looked like the big, ambitious Gilhants restoration that also
Speaker 1: includes you know, precision air systems under the greens and
Speaker 1: things that just frankly cost a lot of money, then
Speaker 1: what have the improvements at public courses generally looked like.
Speaker 2: Uh, they're gonna be bunker work, They're gonna be new turf,
Speaker 2: They're gonna be work on work on the greens. You know,
Speaker 2: there's always going to be you know, you can keep
Speaker 2: a golf course open and fix t's and what the
Speaker 2: NNGF tracks, Garrett, are courses that close a minimum of
Speaker 2: nine holes for a minimum of three months. Okay, So
Speaker 2: our standard for renovation, it's a high standard. You got
Speaker 2: to close some holes for a period of time as
Speaker 2: as we measure it. We measure those more significant renovations.
Speaker 1: Got it. I guess that my interest, you know, since
Speaker 1: on the Frida Egg we often talk about golf course design,
Speaker 1: and I'd love to see a lot of public courses
Speaker 1: kind of upgrade their designs and make their courses more
Speaker 1: fun to play. I know this is hard to see
Speaker 1: from the kind kind of ten thousand foot view that
Speaker 1: you have to take when you're assessing the golf course
Speaker 1: industry as a whole, But do you see a possibility
Speaker 1: that more public courses will kind of go and introduce
Speaker 1: some fun design concepts into their renovation so just you know,
Speaker 1: rather than just getting new turf for the greens or
Speaker 1: the tea boxes, our courses getting more interested in what
Speaker 1: architecture can bring to their facility.
Speaker 2: I believe that they. I believe that they have. There
Speaker 2: are certain things that you and I both know are happening,
Speaker 2: Like Seth Rayner right now, everything that Seth Rayner ever
Speaker 2: did is being looked at and like, oh wow, we
Speaker 2: need to make sure that we are paying very close
Speaker 2: attention to this amazing classic architecture and making sure that
Speaker 2: if I own that property designed by Seth Rayner, that
Speaker 2: I'm going to make sure that I get to take
Speaker 2: advantage of what was there. But they don't necessarily think
Speaker 2: that that means that we're going to see a huge
Speaker 2: numbers of high budget complete architecture renovation happening. The numbers
Speaker 2: at that threshold that I described earlier, they're pretty small.
Speaker 2: I mean that happens between one hundred and two hundred
Speaker 2: times a year at fourteen thousand goth facilities sixteen thousand courses, Right,
Speaker 2: It's pretty small in terms of going through that type
Speaker 2: of renovation.
Speaker 1: Well, I mean there's a major cost associated with it,
Speaker 1: not just for the work itself, but also the closure
Speaker 1: of a portion of or all of a course. That's
Speaker 1: a huge decision to make. And you have to be
Speaker 1: convinced that it's going to pay off in the end.
Speaker 1: And so I guess the hope is that facilities see
Speaker 1: some kind of advantage in introducing cool design concepts to
Speaker 1: their course, that that actually improves their business to the
Speaker 1: extent that they're willing to take on some of that risk.
Speaker 2: I suppose. Yeah. You know, one of my golf Golf
Speaker 2: editorial golf writer idols, George Pepper, was an editor of
Speaker 2: Golf magazine for twenty five years. He wrote an article
Speaker 2: somewhat recently, I think it was published in Links magazine
Speaker 2: that this whole idea of the name architects and people
Speaker 2: beyond the golf course junkies like we are to even
Speaker 2: be made aware of that is a relatively recent phenomenon.
Speaker 2: You know, the fact that mackenzie is a hero, or
Speaker 2: McDonald or Rayner, you know, these classic classical old architects.
Speaker 2: People hadn't paid attention much to that except for maybe
Speaker 2: the past, you know, twenty thirty years.
Speaker 1: That's true. But the hope is that everybody pays attention
Speaker 1: to how fun the golf course is that they're playing,
Speaker 1: even if they don't attribute the fun that they're having
Speaker 1: to the design of the golf course, even if it's
Speaker 1: just like, wow, that was that was kind of cool.
Speaker 1: I kind of want to come back to that place
Speaker 1: and play around again, even if they don't say that
Speaker 1: it's architecture that created that experience for me. If they're
Speaker 1: having fun, then that's the whole point, right, yes.
Speaker 2: And the trend that we've all seen, those of us
Speaker 2: who are golf course nuts is an emphasis on fun absolutely.
Speaker 2: All right.
Speaker 1: Well, Greg, thank you so much for sitting with me
Speaker 1: for this interview. There's a lot of really good information there.
Speaker 1: Where can people find more of the National Golf Foundation's work? Like,
Speaker 1: where where can people kind of dig in more to
Speaker 1: the research that you guys are doing.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Thanks for asking. NNGF dot org. Is the
Speaker 2: is the easiest way for someone to go and take
Speaker 2: a look at the type of information that we publish.
Speaker 2: You know, at our core, we're a five oh one
Speaker 2: c membership organization. There's quite a bit of industry research
Speaker 2: that's in the vault that is exclusive for our members. However,
Speaker 2: we do publish significant free content in what's called Fortnite
Speaker 2: and the last you know, every Fortnite issue we've published
Speaker 2: since we started doing it at the beginning of the
Speaker 2: pandemic is available at NGF dot org in the left
Speaker 2: side column. So that's the primary way. But one of
Speaker 2: the things that most people don't know about the NGF, Garrett,
Speaker 2: is that we also do a tremendous amount of three
Speaker 2: quarters of our business is in private work that we
Speaker 2: do to help golf companies compete, you know, whether it's
Speaker 2: private research or digital or email marketing work. I spend
Speaker 2: a lot of my time on that, along with our
Speaker 2: team being experts on the golf industry and helping businesses
Speaker 2: be more successful.
Speaker 1: All right, thank you so much, Greg, Thank you, Garrett.
Speaker 1: This episode of the Frida Egg podcast was edited by
Speaker 1: Meg Atkins. If you've been enjoying the pod, by all means,
Speaker 1: leave a rating and review in iTunes. Just doing that
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Speaker 1: an independent shop if you don't have the backing of
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Speaker 1: to spread the word, which all of you have done
Speaker 1: wonderfully so far. Thank you for listening and we'll see
Speaker 1: you again next week.