The golf industry is facing many challenges, an aging population and a younger generation that has the choice of many other entertainment options. There is also the third party tee time booking companies that diminish the margins for daily fee courses and an excess of golf courses, plus a number of other threats. Golfaround is impacted by these changes and we felt in order to stay the best that we can be we needed to explore what we do and how we do it. More importantly we need to listen and learn from our members to see how we can better meet their needs. We recently gathered a group together that represented our teaching professionals, seasoned and new members from our leagues both in Calgary and in Edmonton so that we could hear your thoughts on what we offer. It was an excellent exercise and we thought it prudent to summarize some of the outcomes.
When it came to the league the majority thought we offered a great selection and lots of choice with cost and location consideration. A suggestion was for less choices and utilization of handicapping when developing tee times but this contradicts one of our core values about being a non-competitive environment. We are aware that there needs to be some consideration about skill level matching and we are working on some ways to address this. Slow play was a concern and we are racking our brains as to how better to manage this. When it came to lessons the newer members enjoyed what we offered and expressed positive evaluations for the teaching professionals. For the long term members they are bored with what is offered and we do think that for some we cannot meet their needs so we are considering a league only option for those who have been a full time member for 10 years or more. Some time management and consistency issues were discussed and we plan to find ways to try to eliminate these problems.
Thanks to those of you who got back to us after the last newsfeed, we were thrilled to see that some of you do check these out. Your feedback was very helpful in these discussions. There were suggestions for some get-a-ways that were planned for gals only and closer to home as our international travel has gone up in price which is due in part to the value of our dollar and inflation. We were ahead of the game here and have a Golf and Spa Trip planned in the beautiful Comox Valley this May long weekend.
It was stated that we do do a lot of things very well, however we feel you should never “rest on one’s laurels”. There are opportunities for us to flourish and to escape the threats. This will help Golfaround remain on top of the heap, being the best that we can be, better meeting our members needs in a changing but exciting environment.