The Pellucid Perspective - March 2015 - (Page 2)

Player develoPment Is Topgolf a bridge to Millennials? By Jim Koppenhaver I 'm going to open this conversation under the assumption that no one in our readership is going to dispute the fact that golf is less relevant to today's millennial generation than it was to their predecessors during that same lifestage (defined roughly as age 14-35). Some of that is in their "DNA," which has been shaped by their almost constant "technology tether" in life. (Think video games in their younger years, now it's smartphones and social media). Another key component, in my opinion, is they're entering and participating in the workforce in a much different way than the Baby Boomers who preceded them, many of whom got introduced to golf as part of their early "corporate life" experience, and walking an even harder path than the Gen Xers immediately before them. The other major difference in the Millennial worldview as it relates to golf is that a significant number of them are caught between the rock of underemployment and the hard place of significant student loan debt. Add those up and it's not hard to see why the ME generation is largely running from vs. embracing golf as a recreational activity. I know a little about this generation beyond what I read in the general press because I have 2 male Millennials (ages 19 and 23) and the way they navigate life and make decisions regarding their time, expenses and interests on any given day continues to amaze and surprise me. As we all also well know, in 2014 the general media seemed to have some "epiphany" that it was time to write about the golf industry and, inevitably, somewhere in that story was the obvious fact that Millennials aren't coming "10-on-a-mule" (I guess that would be "10-to-an-app" for them) to take up or play golf. Similarly, without a single exception by my count, every writer who typed the phrase Millennial in the story didn't finish that selfsame paragraph without linking it to Topgolf as golf 's bridge to Millennials. Being both curious and an analyst by trade and at heart, I decided that one could not make this assessment without going to experience Topgolf and observing the customers and their behavior. I also thought it would be fun to have a Millennial non-golfer's firsthand perspective on it, so I talked my older son into going along with me on a Thursday night last fall here in the Chicago suburbs. I called ahead and got information about how busy they were, wait times, etc., (something that no upstanding Millennial would do, they'd just ask on Facebook, check on Yelp or trust what's out on the website as gospel) and we tried to time it so that we didn't have an hour or longer wait to play. My initial impression was, "A three-tier driving range meets Dave & Buster's." The place was definitely hopping. There was a DJ in the lobby mixing tunes and doing mash-ups, they had the omnipresent Red Bull signage that defines many bars today as being "hip" and appealing to the adrenaline rush of youth and, despite a fairly smooth check-in process, we still ended up waiting about 30 minutes to get a bay. I spent some time at the payment counter 2 The Pellucid PersPecTive (needed all my math skills to figure out what the best deal was among the options) and he filled me in on the Callaway clubs that we rented for my son's use. I was pleasantly surprised that they had decent, branded clubs available, but it was also very apparent that most of them had struck objects other than golf balls multiple times in their short life, given the condition of the faces and shafts. Such is inevitable when you mix drinking, genders and rigid construction beams in close proximity. I will say that Callaway was smart hooking up with Topgolf and getting that as a trial vehicle. On the other hand, I don't think that Callaway's statements that the Topgolf alliance is going to significantly alter their market share and revenue fortunes holds any water based on what I saw (sorry, Casey). To Stuart Lindsay's point that he makes every year at the State of the Industry, however, how can Topgolf find a top-notch partner and ink a deal in its relative infancy and yet Get Golf Ready still hasn't figured out a) they need a club borrow/rent component as integral to their program and b) how to convince a single one of the major club manufacturers to partner with them for mutual fun and profit. I won't bore you with all the details of our 3 games that we played once we were assigned a bay or the accompanying meal and drinks but it was, in a nutshell, a very enjoyable evening of recreation, social time and just being part of the atmosphere created by the place, the music and mostly the never-ending parade of people and laughter over good shots (few) and incredibly errant ones (majority). On the plus side, there was an abundance of Millennials playing golf that night and nearly all were having fun. (When's the last time you saw those two things together in one place or sentence?). A lot of it was "date night" stuff; guys and gals doing the courtship dance at a driving range with beer, food and music. The guys were trying to bomb everything to the net, the girls were generally giggling and wiggling around in shorts when the ball didn't get airborne or to the closest, really big target collection. (The gals and guys on the upper deck had an unfair advantage; you could top the ball and it still landed somewhere for points, but we were on the ground floor so no points for being "thin"). My summary observation? Topgolf is succeeding in the initial mile of getting Millennials interested in golf, which is just showing up and having an enjoyable experience. I asked my son on the ride back home what his take was on its appeal and ability to get him (as a proxy for the MEs) to play the game with any regularity and aspire to become a better player. "Not so much." Albeit a sample of one and having lived through growing up with a Dad who spends much of his waking hours thinking about, analyzing and espousing on the virtues and shortcomings of the game, he said he'd come back out and do it again or he'd think about it as a special occasion date night venue but, outside that, it was the right dose of golf in the right environment for his tastes vs. whetting his appetite for the full-on March 2015

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of The Pellucid Perspective - March 2015

TOC
Is Topgolf a bridge to Millennials?
The NGCOA tee time task force – Will this be a legendary fail?
Golf and fitness model bulking up
February golf weather impact: Taking back part of January favorability
Politicians, if not politics, good for DC golf
The shows must go on ... closer together

The Pellucid Perspective - March 2015