The Pellucid Perspective - May 2020 - 10

WEATHER
IMPACT

APRIL

GPH drop swallowed
by COVID

pril's weather impact went slightly south but, with
the number of geographies stymied for the month
by state actions prohibiting golf, it's likely we're not
going to feel much weather-related pain as Golf Playable
Hours (GPH) were down 6% nationally. That's our first
month in the negative column this year and erodes the Yearto-Date (YtD) result to +7%. YtD regional GPH breadth
remains positive however registering 2:1 with 27 favorable
regions outnumbering 12 unfavorable regions, while 6 are
in the neutral zone of +/- 2% and all regions now, at least
by our weather rules, in season. Looking at weather impact performance by day-of-week for the YtD period, both
weekparts (weekday vs. weekend) remain in positive territory but with variance across the individual days (Mon-Sun).
The Year-End (YE) forecast is still a gain vs. '19.
Played Rounds for March published by Golf Datatech reflected the impact of COVID restrictions as they dropped
9% despite GPH favorability of +24% for the month. For
the year they're reporting +4% against our +19% GPH but,
given the current pandemic backdrop, all bets are off regarding the expected correlation between weather and rounds
demand. In light of the widespread closures during March
(and will also be reflected in April), Golf Datatech is not
reporting market-level results. Not surprisingly, Utilization
is down 14 points for March and down 7 points YtD due to
better weather being interrupted by the state-by-state shutdowns.
Jim Koppenhaver comments, "There's not much to be said
regarding the current situation except it has to get better in
May and beyond. The most recent NGF projection is in
the first half of May we'll hit 95%+ of courses being open/
play allowed by the various state governments (thank you
MA for being the last holdout, I fail to see what was so
"special" about their situation but that's why the government officials get paid the big bucks I guess). That said,
we're "open" in a number of states with severely curtailed
output rules (i.e. IL is 2 golfers per tee time, walking only,
15 min spacings) which will dampen both rounds (walking
only or single rider carts) and revenue (cart revenue in particular will take a sizeable hit followed F&B revenue losses
for the golfers who actually do make it out to the course
(due to delivery mode and dining restrictions). Despite all
this, it does appear that the weather will attempt to pull us
along for the balance of the year so that will be a muchappreciated tailwind for a change when we desperately need
it. It's going to be a tough season for many and, even with
the favorable weather, I believe COVID will accelerate a

10 The Pellucid Perspective

Pac
NW Cst N
/

Pac
NW Cst S
/

No
CA Coast
/

Pac
Inland N
/

No
Rck Mtn
/

Pac
Inland S
/

C CA
Valley N
/

C CA
Valley C
/

So
CA Coast
/

No
NV
/

No
Int Mtn
/

So
NV
/

Cen
CA Val So
/

C
Rc

So
Int Mtn
/

Des
SW West
/

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

culling of the herd among golf courses by the end of the '20
season. While it sounds harsh, that won't be a bad thing for
the industry in general and it won't necessarily constrain the
demand for golf in that it will be lower while we continue to
operate under restricted play rules and the fact that we still
had ~8% too much supply coming into COVID. Good luck
to all in being one of the survivors and likelier a healthier
competitive market in '21 and hopefully we'll get back to
pre-COVID playing conditions (despite all those folks saying "we're never going back, I think that much of the way
golf was played will return to a normalcy that is closer to
pre-COVID than in-COVID)."
May 2020

De
SW E
/

The Pellucid Perspective - May 2020

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