Golf in decline?

[mtsalmela80]

There is nothing going on to suggest that golf is on the decline. The $13 per 9 muni is packed Sat and Sun every weekend, but the $60-$100 "nicer" course is also packed.

Golf enthusiasts don't play based on who is winning on the PGA tour, they play because its a personal challenge every single time and a opportunity for fellowship with friends and strangers.

[acetoolguy]

I respectfully disagree. Over the course of a year if you play 2 rounds a week you are going to spend a lot more then you would on any other sport twice a week. I played baseball football and tennis through hs and expenses were minimal. Maybe 500 a year. Soccer? Really? None of those other sports cost you 30-300+ each time you "play" it and then you gotta include the additional stuff. If i want to play basketball i grab my ball and go to the court. Baseball i need a glove bat and ball. Soccer and football u just need a ball.Yea if your a kid in hs there are added expenses but thats not the demographic we are really talking about.

That's the economic difference between golf and the other sports you mention. You don't have to pay to use the field.

[Jakester23]

I respectfully disagree. Over the course of a year if you play 2 rounds a week you are going to spend a lot more then you would on any other sport twice a week. I played baseball football and tennis through hs and expenses were minimal. Maybe 500 a year. Soccer? Really? None of those other sports cost you 30-300+ each time you "play" it and then you gotta include the additional stuff. If i want to play basketball i grab my ball and go to the court. Baseball i need a glove bat and ball. Soccer and football u just need a ball.Yea if your a kid in hs there are added expenses but thats not the demographic we are really talking about.

Compared to any shooting sports it's not expensive at all. Not to mention it's cheap or free to practice.

[nevets88]

The Death of Golf [Men's Journal]

Quote:

It's expensive, difficult, and demands the kind of time most people get only when they go on vacation — or retire. From the dried up fairways of Southern California to the vacant course-side condos ion the Carolina coast, we survey the sport's demise — and the entrepreneurs hoping to reinvent it for a new, less patient generation.

http://www.mensjournal.com/magazine/print-view/the-death-of-golf-20150625

[imsys0042]

What are the numbers from 1990 for people playing, and 1995?   The "death of golf" is starting to sound like "Death of TaylorMade" where TM is in huge trouble, but they rode a bubble and then left with huge inventory and returned orders.   But they are down from highs that could not be maintained due to their product cycle.   And they are probably still selling what they did several years ago when they were viewed as successful.

There is always going to be a game of golf in this country.   There are too many people who love and appreciate the game.   Whether the same number of club manufacturers are around, or the same number of courses remains to be seen.   Depending on the area you live in, you might have a single course that is convenient and it'll always be busy.  50 miles away there may be a glut and some will close.

At a very high level golf was in a bubble for a long time in several areas:

1 -  Equipment makers -  glut of product, despite them being good products.   But for some it wasn't sustainable.

2 -  New golf courses -  simply put, there were too many built.  The booming economy of the late 90s + Tiger + dot com boom + real estate booms of the late 90s (when credit was cheap) and the 2001 - 2007 stretch when real estate was crazy too.   Too many new courses put pressure on the existing ones.   When you get a decline for everyone, everyone suffers.   Golfers are a zero sum game.  If people shift to new courses, the old ones lose out.   When the economy goes down and the new courses can't be justified for spending, then the new courses suffer because people go to cheaper, older ones.   Simply put, like Silicon Valley start-ups, too many people thought that the course they were building would be a success.   And like those start-ups, a number failed or are failing.

3 -  The economy itself has been very un-even and the recovery from the recent recession has not benefited many people.   So as more people shift from a single wager earner to 2 wage earners, or wages are stagnant, that means that less is going to be spent on golf.

Specifically for the number of golfers, there are a few things that I think affect the numbers:

1 -  baby boomers are getting older and I'm sure many of them are tapering off for golf

2 -  a lot of people were exposed to the game due to Tiger's popularity.   Many of them stayed, I'm sure.  At this point the younger ones probably have families and repsonsibilities now and they cannot play as much as they used to.   That affects total rounds and revenue.   Before I was married I played 4 times per week, now it's 2 (and I have a very understanding and wonderful wife, YMMV).

3 -  demographics happen to be changing.  people are moving closer to cities (as a trend) and that takes people away from where most golf is played.

4 -  I don't buy it at all that millennials are these ADHD weird people who are completely different from any generation before them.   They are people like anyone else.   What I do think is that they are going out into the world with a crappy economy and golf is a steeper curve that most sports, and that expense for someone at a young age these days is challenging.   I understand the cost argument there, but you can't tell me that people that age all of a sudden just can't handle doing something for 4 hours.

If anything, I think golf is starting to go into a correction because it enjoyed a sweet spot of a galvanizing star (Tiger) + excellent economic times + a number of golf companies that jumped all over themselves getting a big share of that pie.   Much like real estate was huge speculation that was brought down by the recession of 2008, golf has had a number of speculations and grown too fast in un-sustainable ways, and some of the house of cards are folding.   But not all.   What makes me the most sad are people who love the game and work at places that will close or are in areas that are being hit harder.   Golf becomes a passion for people who fall in love with it, and it's a shame to see major areas where it doesn't work out.

[dave s]

The Death of Golf [Men's Journal]

http://www.mensjournal.com/magazine/print-view/the-death-of-golf-20150625

I didn't read the entire article, but probably got the gist of it in the first 2-3 paragraphs.  The guy writing is correct.  Especially for girls.  Here's a couple of supporting examples:

Watch you local newspaper or websites for girls HS golf scores this fall.  You'll see that each school posts 5 scores for a match.  You'll also see that the scores can range from low 40s to high 60s for the girls who played a match.

Secondly, a guy on my golf league recruits high school girl golfers regionally to offer full-ride scholarships at colleges.  He has more scholarships than girls who can accept them.

If I were a young guy with a daughter over the age of 5, she's have a golf club in her hand and be playing every day if it was something she enjoyed.  Huge opportunities exist for young golfers the female persuasion.

dave

[jgreen85]

B-ball is "cheaper" but you need to have at least 5 others for a decent game. Golf doesn't require that. Just shooting hoops is more comparable to pitching/chipping/putting, which is mostly free.

Golf is the one sport where one can materially emulate the game played by the pros. Pads and refs and # of people are not cheap for American football. Soccer requires a lot of people, but may be the cheapest of all sports. B-ball needs indoor gym and people.

Most people don't make that apples to apples comparison. Golf is fine tho. Critical mass needed for golf is there. Industry probably needs to consolidate, but other than that average golfer has nothing to worry about imp.

[Chief Oceola]

That article should read "Golf enjoyed unsustainable high 8 years ago"..... or "breaking news... Great Recession leads to drop in Consumer spending" Parents still had kids 10 years ago, so balancing life and golf these days isn't drastically different. "Golf is expensive" yet people can afford top golf? It's like $100 in food and drink plus $7.00 for 20 balls, plus a 1 hour wait for a booth. Any hobby is expensive, hunting requires a truck, atv, lease money, gear, and lots of time. Fishing is the same way. Money, money, money, and Getting up at 3 am to be first at the boat launch, then home late at night. With people paying off debt, and a housing bubble, it shouldn't be shocking that there are some empty houses on golf resorts, and used clubs on ebay. Less hackers on the course isn't a bad thing, The industry will adjust, and We might have to wait 10 years for the Taylor made "Super fast adjustable aero speed burner R-37 Maximo awesomeness" driver. But that's okay.

[mcanadiens]

Calling their article "The Death of Golf" is obviously stupid. The question is what sort of pains we as golfers will go through as the sport shrinks or after it shrinks.

As someone who is a buyer of the less costly of golf's product offerings, I'm enjoying a pretty good spell at the moment. After things adjust, I might not have such an easy time of it. All the course closures will eventually pile those golfers onto my courses. Fewer people buying equipment will make it a more specialized industry and prices will presumably rise.

Of course, speculating about the long-term future of anything can be pretty dubious and understand that those who produce articles like the above referenced have a propensity for overstatement.

[finn0903]

I don't see it in a decline, instead i think its more popular now

[ScouseJohnny]

I can see the private course industry taking a big hit, but why should we really care about that? let the rich live that life, so grey collars have to stick to public, I would have no problem with that, I know modest income seniors that bounce around all week, seems like a good thing to me, I doubt I would ever join a private no matter how much money I had, its not my style and I like bouncing around.

So for that matter I would not use private course membership as accurate data for the games popularity, that may simply be that even those with money simply don't see the value in a private course lifestyle these days, and it's a snowball effect, golf buddies flock together.

I take your point, but I wasn't really talking about high-end private courses. I mean courses that are not publicly owned (i.e. not municipals or courses on military bases) - but which are technically private courses that allow the public to show up and pay & play.

Some interesting stats (OK, this data is from 2012, but that's still fairly recent):

http://golf-info-guide.com/golf-tips/golf-in-the-usa/by-the-numbers-usa-golfers-and-golf-courses/

• Total golf courses, public and private, in the U.S.: 15,500 (approximate)
• Public-access courses: 11,581
• Municipal courses (owned and/or operated by a city, county or township): 2,449

"Munis" only make up 15% of the total number of courses in the U.S., and only 1% of U.S. courses seem to belong to the private, members-only model. The bulk of courses fall into that middle bracket, public-access courses. I have played many of them across the south - the kind of places where you can show up on a weekday afternoon and play for $30 or so including cart. Those are the courses I worry about, in the future.

[teeitup22]

Obvioulsy these have already been mentioned but I think it is primarily the cost and time to play golf.

I am 25 years old and most of my friends do not golf very seriously. Oh sure they may play once or twice a summer or go to the driving range for fun, but they do not golf on a regular basis. Most of my friends have student loans and do not have the money to golf for that reason alone. I think my generation is finding other activites to do outside that are fun and cheap.

[Mop Bucket]

Obvioulsy these have already been mentioned but I think it is primarily the cost and time to play golf.  I am 25 years old and most of my friends do not golf very seriously. Oh sure they may play once or twice a summer or go to the driving range for fun, but they do not golf on a regular basis. Most of my friends have student loans and do not have the money to golf for that reason alone. I think my generation is finding other activites to do outside that are fun and cheap.

This is what I'm seeing too. I find most of my friends with the golfer mentality usually put their energy towards disc golf rather than (real) golf. It's pretty popular in the younger generations who don't have the money to spend on 40 dollar rounds plus equipment but still want to dedicate the time to learn a sport. It seems like the only people my age golfing still are the guys who went to college for it or scored a decent paying job right out of high school.

[RandallT]

http://www.mensjournal.com/magazine/print-view/the-death-of-golf-20150625

Key quote, perhaps:

By any measure, participation in the game is way off, from a high of 30.6 million golfers in 2003 to 24.7 million in 2014, according to the National Golf Foundation (NGF). The long-term trends are also troubling, with the number of golfers ages 18 to 34 showing a 30 percent decline over the last 20 years. Nearly every metric — TV ratings, rounds played, golf-equipment sales, golf courses constructed — shows a drop-off. "I look forward to a time when we've got the wind at our back, but that's not what we're expecting," says Oliver "Chip" Brewer, president and CEO of Callaway. "This is a demographic challenge."

During the boom, most of those 20-somethings who were out hacking every weekend were out there because of one man: Tiger Woods. Golf's heyday coincided neatly with Tiger's run of 15 major golf championships between 1997 and 2008. If you listen to golf insiders, he's the individual most to blame for those thousands of Craigs­list ads for used clubs. When Tiger triple-bogeyed his marriage, dallied with porn stars, and seemingly misplaced his swing all at once, the game not only lost its best player; it also lost its leading salesman. The most common answer given by golf industry types when asked what would return the game to its former popularity is "Find another Tiger."

I don't think there's much in the article that hasn't been covered. It follows the formula of a starting anecdote, then details, then little fun diversion to illustrate a point, then bring it home with reference to initial anecdote.

Edit: Oops- just saw this already posted! I thought it said August 2015. Duh