The industry found itself in a hole and it simply stopped digging.

With the number of golfers in the U.S. having dropped significantly over the last decade, then the economy tanking starting in 2007 or ’08, the market response has been a notable net loss in the number of courses in Colorado — and nationally, too. While more than a handful of courses have closed in the state over the last five or six years, no new ones have opened and few are in the works. This after no year passing between 1980 and 2009 in which at least one new Colorado course — and usually more — opened for business.

Considering the human toll, it’s hard to watch courses close. But sometimes such closures contribute to the health of several other facilities.

Whatever the case, the Colorado golf industry appears to be stabilizing after several rough years. The recently released Colorado Public Golf Course Rounds and Revenue Survey seems to point in that direction.

The results from 2014 were distributed and discussed last week at the Public Golf Operators Meeting, held in conjunction with the G4 Summit at the Broadmoor Resort in Colorado Springs.

After the number of rounds played at public courses dipped, on average, most of the previous five years, 2014 was a small step in the opposite direction.

With more than 70 Colorado courses reporting data — par-3 facilities included — both rounds and revenue increased slightly compared to 2013.

For the 68 courses that provided numbers for both 2013 and ’14, 18-hole-equivalent rounds increased by 3.6 percent, on average, last year compared to ’13. And green fee revenue per 18-hole round inched up 1.9 percent over the same period. With par-3 and executive courses included, the average green fee revenue per 18-hole round went from $27.99 in 2013 to $28.53 in 2014.

Though Colorado public course operators share their statistics on the condition that individual facilities aren’t named publicly, trends and averages can be reported.

Of course, comparing one year to the next isn’t an exact apples-to-apples situation. The weather always varies, and in the case of 2013 and ’14, the September 2013 floods had an effect on numbers in 2013 and ’14 at some facilities.

Noting the results of the recently released survey, CGA executive director Ed Mate said, “The one word I would say is ‘flat’ — or, more optimistically, ‘stable’, ‘solid’. The one thing I looked at is 2014 compared to the five-year average — which is better because things tend to average out over five years — and it’s (largely) flat. The good news is, we’re not going in the wrong direction, and if the good weather is there, people will come play.”

Colorado PGA executive director Eddie Ainsworth noted that year-to-year fluctuations are often weather-based, but he likewise took some heart in things leveling off after several worrisome down years.

“We’ve stabilized,” he said. “We definitely saw a decline, but we’ve stabilized. The market is correcting itself.”

Ann Guiberson was hired as the CWGA’s executive director about 11 months ago, and she’s happy to hear things are on a bit of an upswing.

“It sounds positive for Colorado golf,” she said. “We’re heading in the right direction.”

According to PGA of America’s PerformanceTrak data, when accounting for weather, a total of 29 states in the country showed growth in rounds played per day open in 2014.
 

The CGA compiled figures from 74 Colorado public golf facilities that responded to a rounds and revenue survey based on the period from January through August. The association reported the results earlier this month at a public golf operators meeting.

The figures show a marked improvement over the same period last year. Rounds were up an average of 8.9 percent, while green fee revenue jumped 9.5 percent.

“The positive outtake is that when the inventory is there, it’s going to get used,” CGA executive director Ed Mate said. “So there is a desire among our core golfers to play more golf if the weather is conducive.

“But my takeaway isn’t, ‘Wow, golf is growing again?’ No.”

Figures nationally are also up. The National Golf Foundation reports that, through August, rounds countrywide had increased 7.7 percent compared to the same period in 2011.

That’s at least a step in the right direction after the number of golfers in the U.S. dropped from 30 million in 2005 to 25.7 million last year, according to the NGF.

“My overall feeling is it’s great that revenue is up (in Colorado), but a lot of it for sure is based on weather,” said Colorado PGA executive director Eddie Ainsworth. “But there are a lot of individual operations that are really trying to implement programs that get that golfer to come back, whether it be through retention programs or new player development programs.”

The Colorado rounds and revenue survey results are shared by the public course operators on the condition that numbers for specific individual facilities aren’t divulged.

Only a half-dozen non-par-3 courses that responded to the survey reported rounds down in the first two-thirds of 2012. And increases range up to 46 percent compared to the same period in 2011.

On the green fee revenue side, one course’s numbers jumped 25 percent. Only two reported green fee revenue dropping from last year.

Overall, the facilities received an average of 15 cents more in green fees per round ($24.68 vs. $24.53) than for the same period in 2011.

Regionally, northern Colorado courses collectively posted the top increases, with rounds up 11 percent and green fee revenue up 12.5 percent.

“We probably need to dig a little deeper into the analysis to figure out what’s going on because the raw gross numbers of rounds and revenue don’t tell the story,” Mate said. “It’s not like a hotel business where your inventory from year to year is the same. So you need to have apples to apples, and we’re not comparing apples to apples (year to year). Over a 10- or 20-year period when you measure this stuff, weather kind of works itself out where you’ll have ups and downs and ebbs and flows.

“But year over year, this year underscores the need to do some sort of playable-days analysis as well. Because my sense was from May to September rounds were pretty flat (compared to 2011). It was March and April that really made the difference.”

While Ainsworth realizes the weather was the main driving force in the rounds and revenue increases this year, he believes that other factors can have a significant effect over time. This year, PGA of America sections have put a heavy emphasis on “Get Golf Ready”, a nationwide program in which PGA and LPGA professionals teach people everything they’ll need to know to play golf with confidence — in five lessons, usually for $99 total. The idea is to bring new and former golfers into the game as seamlessly as possible in a no-pressure environment.

Ainsworth said the Colorado PGA, with more than 120 facilities offering Get Golf Ready, leads the PGA of America in the utilization of that program.

“I think where the rubber will meet the road will actually be next year,” Ainsworth said. “I think everyone is trying to make golf more welcoming in reaching different markets. So next year will really be the tale of the tape.”
 

So when the Colorado public course rounds and revenue survey conducted by the CGA showed a bit of an uptick for the first eight months of the year, it was a welcome — albeit small — respite from longer-term trends that golf is trying to reverse.

The data from Jan. 1 through Aug. 31, collected from more than 60 public courses primarily along the Front Range, show that taken collectively, the number of rounds was up 2.2 percent compared to the same period in 2010, while green fee revenue increased 1.4 percent.

“I attribute it to an increased inventory of golf days” due to better weather early in the year, CGA executive director Ed Mate said. “But anything in the black is a good thing. And maybe it’s a sign of things to come.”

If so, it would be a welcome change of pace from recent years. The final rounds and revenue report, including numbers for all of 2011, won’t be complete for several months. But the full-year report for 2010 showed that rounds were down 2.3 percent from 2009, while green fee revenue per round was up slightly.

“I don’t have a great outlook (for a major turnaround), but the fact that rounds are up a little is promising,” CWGA executive director Robin Jervey said. “Some of it hinges on weather, but hopefully some of it is based on the economy getting a little better.”

Of course, while the numbers are generally positive, those are just averages. There are still some facilities that experienced double-digit percentage drops in both rounds and green fee revenue.

“Some areas took longer to come out of the (winter) weather, conditions-wise,” said Colorado PGA executive director Eddie Ainsworth. “I’ve heard everything from ‘we’ve had a terrible year’ to ‘we had one of our best years’. Nothing surprises me based on the economy and what’s going on. I’m just thankful the report numbers aren’t any worse than they are.”

Indeed, given that the National Golf Foundation estimates that the number of golfers in the U.S. has dropped from 30 million in 2005 to 26.1 million in 2010, those in the golf business appear to have their work cut out for them. That’s one of the reasons the Colorado PGA, CGA, CWGA and other members of the state’s allied golf associations are getting together for a Colorado Golf Summit on Monday (Nov. 7). The hope is that by sharing ideas that have worked for individual facilities, the game will have its best chance to succeed over the long haul.

As for how things look for the more immediate future, it depends on who you’re asking.

Including par-3 courses as separate entities, 38 facilities reported in the rounds and revenue survey that rounds increased from the first eight months of 2010 to the same period this year, while 31 said the numbers were down. And of those that provided green fee revenue figures for both years, 36 facilities noted better numbers for the first two-thirds of this year than in 2010, while 23 said intake was down this year.  

“Weather is a huge factor in the survey,” Mate noted.

And considering the fall of 2010 was better than normal, weather-wise, the final comparison of this year’s numbers vs. last year’s may tell a different story than the report for the first eight months did.

Generally speaking, the reports for January through August of this year were fairly positive in the Denver metro area and along the northern Front Range, while the few reports received from southern Colorado show business dropped in the majority of cases there.

Among all the respondees, nine courses (all in the metro Denver region) said that rounds were up by double-digit percentages, while six were down by double digits. In green fee revenue, three facilities were up by more than 10 percent, while four dropped more than 10 percent from 2010 to 2011.

Courses participated in the survey with the understanding that information for specific facilities would not be made public.