Regional courses diversify, renovate to deal with decline in golf interest - Fredericksburg.com

Imagine a golfer on one of Fredericksburg’s numerous courses.

Chances are he is middle-aged and wearing traditional golf garb: a sweater vest, knickerbockers, cleats and a hat. He’s carrying expensive clubs, has a caddy and a golf cart. He’s paid his greens fees and is a member of a club, or a couple of clubs, locally.

That image is part of golf’s problem. The sport, so rooted in tradition and perceived as too expensive for the average person as the county comes out of a recession, is having trouble reaching a new generation and drawing back the players it has lost in recent years. It’s a problem nationally, and local golf courses are feeling the pressure.

There was a time when it was easy to find members for local golf clubs, but that time has come and gone, said general manager and head professional Mike Byrd at The Gauntlet Golf Club. He has worked as a golf professional since 1986, when the sport started to gain traction.

It hit its peak popularity in 2000, and leveled out in 2001.

Ever since then, he said, golf has been in steady decline, and recent economic hardships have sped up that decline. He said the biggest problem was that too many golf courses sprung up too fast during that peak and had no time to grow loyal clientele.

“It’s hard to balance what the younger generation wants with the tradition of the game,” Byrd said.

He said the course now averages about 30,000 rounds of golf per year, but 2014 saw a decline in part due to weather.

2014 was also the first year he did not see any growth in the 18-hole championship golf course club’s membership. Byrd said he and his staff are doing everything they can to bring in new revenue streams, such as holding events there, partnering with the Stafford County recreation department to bring in golf camps, and even renovating the traditionally challenging course to appeal to less skilled golfers.

According to the National Golf Foundation, 160 of the country’s 14,600 18-hole equivalent golf facilities closed last year. The organization cited it as the eighth straight year of net closures.

Also last year, according to the NGF, about 25 million people played golf, which is 18 percent less than the number of golfers in 2006.

A large part of the problem is luring younger players. Bloomberg recently quoted the National Golf Foundation as saying 200,000 players ages 35 and younger “abandoned the game” over the past year.

But outside of that age group, another 200,000 players also abandoned the game in that same period, according to the same article.

U.S. golfers played a total of 462 million rounds last year, according to Golf Datatech, a golf industry market researcher. That is the lowest number since 1995.

As people had less disposable income during the recession and time to play, the decline in interest also hurt the retail side of golf.

Dick’s Sporting Goods fired all the PGA professionals it employed in the golf sections of its more than 560 stores in July 2014 when faced with a decline in the golf equipment industry.

Steve Lovelace, owner of Fredericksburg Golf Center,e said he’s combating the decline in interest by offering unique services.

Without golf professionals at Dick’s Sporting Goods, he said his shop is the only place in the region where customers can be fitted for clubs. He also offers club repair, unlike many sporting stores.

Lovelace’s father started the store in 1991, when golf was gaining in popularity. He said that the Fredericksburg area has fared better than most, with the influx of high income families. However, he said the sport needs to combat the idea that it is only for old men and needs to be more cost-effective for younger people to get involved.

“It’s a sport for all ages,” he said.

David Finocchiaro, general manager and PGA golf professional at Stafford’s 18-hole Augustine Golf Club, is in the process of turning around membership rates.

When new ownership took over in 2011, he said the course was in bad shape. But renovated greens and improvements to staffing levels and food quality are bringing members back.

Last year, the course saw about 27,000 rounds of golf played and a total of 100 members. He said the weather kept people away in March and April, and he expects 2015 to feature larger growth.

Finocchiaro said he thinks the industry is stabilizing. With many golf courses closed across the nation, he said the ones that remain have the task now to increase their quality of service.

He believes the industry should learn how to work as one and offer comparable rates for play rather than play a cost-cutting game. That model, he said, is unsustainable and has led to the closure of courses such as Fredericksburg’s Cannon Ridge.

Augustine also supplements golf income with a thriving banquet business. He said that portion on the company grew 13 percent between 2013 and 2014, and he expects it to grow similarly in the next year.

One local golf course that has dramatically increased membership is Lee’s Hill. Located in Spotsylvania, the 18-hole course went under new ownership in December 2007, just as the recession began unfolding.

While owner and PGA golf professional Jamie Loughan said those first couple of years were hard, he’s hopeful that the sport is rebounding.

His secret sauce for success has three ingredients: a renovated course, knowledgeable staff with low turnover who have formed relationships with members and positive word of mouth from those members.

Loughan started with 73 members and has grown that membership to 250 in seven years.

After inheriting 26,000 rounds of golf annually, he and his staff have brought that number up to a peak of 40,000 in 2013. Rounds decreased to about 38,000 in 2014, but he attributes that to the severe and long-lasting winter.

Loughan feels that he could have turned the course around in less time if the recession hadn’t hit when it did. What he’s done in seven years, he could have done in three or four, the nearly 30-year veteran of the industry said.

“We talk to other businesses and they tell us we are the exception to the norm,” he said. “The game isn’t growing in a big way anymore, but I think courses can turn it around like we have.”

​Lindley Estes: 540.735-1976