The Pellucid Perspective - June 2019 - 10

WEATHER
IMPACT

M AY

Ugly against a
beatable "comp"

ay's results basically sucked, any way you want to look
at it, either vs. Year Ago (YA) or the 10-yr Avg., take
your pick. Golf Playable Hours (GPH) registered a 7%
decline compared to the same month last year. That basically
erased the entire first fourth months' favorability resetting the
Year-to-Date (YtD) figure to +2%. YtD regional GPH breadth
also reset to neutral at 1:1 with 17 favorable regions countered
by 21 unfavorable regions (with 7 in the neutral zone of +/- 2%
with all 45 regions now "in season" based on Pellucid's weatherbased rules). Looking at weather impact performance by day-ofweek for the YtD period, it's all over the board both by weekparts
(weekday vs. weekend) and dayparts (Mon-Sun) with Saturday
being the "biggest loser" (ouch). The lone encouraging figure is
that the Year-End (YE) forecast held its own vs. the April reading (our subscribers know this number, everyone else will have to
either guess or order one of
In fairness, we've
our weather impact reports/
services (see link below) to
seen over the years
put you "in the know").
that rounds will rarely
Played Rounds data for
follow the positive GPH
April published by Golf
elevator to the top floor Datatech registered up following our previously-rebut the demand figure
lagged positive weather ported GPH gain but the
upward movement trailed
by under half so we
the weather favorability
didn't even get to the
which yields a 2nd straight
mezzanine level for April. drop in the key Utilization
metric. That drop compounded the YtD Utilization unfavorability so, once again, our
ability to generate demand even matching weather continues to
lag (Played Rounds down vs. Available Rounds flat). As always,
beneath this national picture, there are winners and losers in both
Played Rounds and Utilization Rates among the 61 key Markets
(including Pellucid's designated Top 25 markets) and this nextlevel-detail of results is also available to Pellucid Publications
members and Geographic Weather Impact report subscribers.
Jim Koppenhaver comments, "Though I'm by nature a realist
vs. optimist, even the optimist's side of me can't find much happiness here. The May number for last year was a very beatable figure (it moderately lagged the 10-yr average) but Mother Nature
didn't even deliver clearance over her '18 low bar. I predict (with
fairly high confidence) that the May rounds numbers are going
to be red and ugly at the national level based on the headwind
we had to fight for the month. The April figures for rounds offer some encouragement on the surface (+7%) but when Pellucid
brings the reality check of GPH and Utilization, we significantly

10 The Pellucid PersPecTive

Pac
NW Cst N
Pac
Inland N

No
Rck Mtn

Pac
NW Cst S
Pac
Inland S

C CA
Valley N
No
CA Coast

C CA
Valley C

So
CA Coast

No
NV

No
Int Mtn

So
NV

Cen
CA So

C
Rc

So
Int Mtn

Des
SW West

Key
>+2% vs. YA
+/- 2% vs. YA
>-2% vs. YA
No arrow = NA

lagged the gift that weather provided us for the month. In fairness, we've seen over the years that rounds will rarely follow the
positive GPH elevator to the top floor but the demand figure
lagged positive weather by under half so we didn't even get to the
mezzanine level for April. Among Pellucid's Top 25 US Golf
Markets for the YtD period, Philly and St. Louis are the leading
gainers in Utilization while Minneapolis and Chicago vie for the
leading laggard title. Again, if you want to know which of our Top
25 Golf Markets posted Utilization gains, how much and what
the dynamics are behind those gains, just go to our website and
get on the Monthly Weather Impact subscription or sign up for
Cognilogic (facility-level access via the web)." Click here.
n
June 2019

De
SW E

https://www.pellucidcorp.com/reports

The Pellucid Perspective - June 2019

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