GolfStinks

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POLL: Are Deal Sites Killing Golf Businesses?

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As websites like Groupon and Living Social become more and more in vogue, these so-called “deal” sites (where visitors are presented with daily deals and coupons for products and services in their local area) are starting to make money… and lots of it.

And, it didn’t take long for entrepreneurial-types to bring the deals to the golf industry. In fact, just two months ago, we here at the Golf Stinks blog told you about one such website that we rather liked.

But a recent email exchange* between a new golf deal site (that shall remain nameless) and a few folks on this company’s spamming mailing list became rather heated. The email, which was announcing the launch of the new golf deal site, elicited the following response from one recipient:

“I personally believe discount sites like yours are the kiss of death for businesses, especially for golf as a business already experiencing many challenges. Training consumers that paying retail prices is unnecessary is going to crush most businesses and eventually will cause a complete degradation of service as companies struggle to deliver a discounted product. While consumers must like the deep discounts, they will ultimately lose as the quality of their golf experiences is worsened.”

The previous response was followed by another:

“Could not have said it better myself. For those of you considering using these sorts of services, please be aware that listing your product at cut rates to get traffic is not “advertising” (something many discount providers will try to convince you it is). This is training your consumers that your services are not worthwhile and rewarding them for the least desired behavior. I know of two golf courses who have run promotions and both have been unhappy with the resulting discounted consumer they attracted. They are not getting these discounted consumers back at the full rate and are finding themselves fielding frustrated phone calls from consumers that had the integrity to pay full rate at their facility and are now being punished for it.”

And another…

“It is important not to allow these types of programs to exist that basically whore ones services and products to new lows. The golf industry does not need this.”

But that was followed by someone taking the deal site’s side:

“I see a guy just trying to make a buck in a tough economy.”

And finally, by another golf deal site trying to explain to the group that not all deal sites are bad for business:

“We tried this many times and also found it only attracts the client who is looking for a deal and not one really interested in good value. As soon as the deal ends, the client moves on. In the meantime, the regular clients get annoyed that they are being penalized for paying normal prices. A better strategy I have found is to work on client retention and offer deals to existing clients who bring or introduce their friends. This benefits and rewards everyone as well as expanding the client base and winning new business by word of mouth and referrals. This year we are up around 40% and it is all through word-of-month and referrals from existing clients.”

Typically, all these emails would be rather annoying in general, but I think there is a good discussion point here: With the economy still struggling, these deal sites have a strong following. But is the practice hurting the traditional golf businesses that are also trying to survive in tough economic times? And furthermore, if deal sites are here for the long-term, will we see a negative net effect within the conventional retail golf industry?

Weigh-in by taking the poll below:

Are Deal Sites Killing Golf Businesses?


*It should be noted that Golfstinks, LLC became privy to this exchange by being one of the more than 100 recipients on the email. It should also be noted that Golfstinks, LLC did not opt-in to this company’s mailing list, nor had Golfstinks, LLC even heard of said company before receiving the email in question.

Are all Golf Courses Basically the Same?

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To all you non-golfers; It may appear on TV that all golf courses are the same. And, believe it or not, I once thought that too…at least for a period of time.

As some of you may know, I’ve played many, many different golf courses in my 20+ years on the links (including my quest to play all the public 18-holers in my state). But after you play so many, they tend to mesh together in your mind like a hodgepodge of flag sticks, sand traps, ponds and grass.

When you’re new to the game of golf, typically you frequent one course that you feel comfortable on. And that level of comfort pretty much keeps you loyal until the day a golfing buddy invites you to play somewhere else. Going to that “new” course can be exciting and it will seem like everything is different – the scenery, the layout, all of it.

And in reality, it was all different. But then you play a another course and another and before you know it, they all start to look similar. Well, after playing at all these different places, I developed a problem:

If a person mentioned a particular course to me, I would quickly tell them, “Oh, I’ve played there and it was decent.” When they’d follow-up with, “What did you like about it?” I would hesitate. I couldn’t, for the life of me, remember any details of said course! I would try to remember – I’d think of a particular par 3 with a pond and 30 par 3’s with ponds rushed into my mind.

So what did I do? Were all those courses I experienced – that I spent my hard-earned money on – lost somewhere in that vast (and mostly empty) noggin of mine? I prayed not. The solution? I began writing reviews for each course – complete with my own rating system – which seemed to jog the old memory!

Much of that system is still intact and can be found on golfstinks.com – except now I’ve gotten your input too. If you took the survey (see the results HERE), you had a say in how the rating system should work. I know there are more of you out there – golfers that love playing at different courses. Well, you’ll never have to forget the details again – just rate and post a review for any of the thousands of courses in our database.

But, shameless plug aside, I think I’ve come full-circle. When I first started golfing, every course I played was unique. Then, eventually, one track bled into another. And now, I’ve learned to take notice, appreciate and file-away the idiosyncrasies of each place I visit.

I once penned an entire post on why golf is unique compared to the other sports – and one of the biggest reasons is no two courses are exactly alike. Think about that for a second. Football fields (both American and European) conform to exact specifications; baseball diamonds and hockey rinks do too. But not golf – every single course is unique to itself.

Of course, I knew this all along. But it sure is fun remembering it all over again! So don’t just play golf…experience it. Travel, discover and enjoy – even if it’s just to the course in the next county over.

Film Review: Scotland’s Caddies

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scotland_caddies_dvd_cover“It must be a great feeling when you’ve set your heart on coming to play golf in Scotland on one of these fantastic courses. You get on the first tee, you hit your drive, you hand that driver to your caddy and he’s off with your bag and you’re just walking up the fairway.” – From the documentary, Scotland’s Caddies

I’ve never been one to fantasize about playing golf in the birthplace of the game. No matter how many times I would read about the hollowed grounds of St. Andrews or the majesty of a links course carved out of a rugged coastline in the North Sea, I never really had the urge to play in Scotland.

Until, that is, I watched Scotland’s Caddies. This documentary (produced in 2010) has literally inspired me to plan a trip to the cradle of golf (at least at some point in my lifetime).

I now join the ranks of countless other golfers whose dreams are to play where Old Tom Morris chased around a ball stuffed with goose feathers. I dream of this not because I long to see the Scottish countryside, but because in Scotland, it seems, golf is still played the way it was intended to be played two-hundred years ago.

The film (which is just over an hour) follows the director’s (Ron Colby) journey across Scotland as he visits some of the country’s best-know links. But the focus is not on his golf game, but rather the caddies he encounters.

It seems caddies are a breed all their own – from their interesting origins to the present day loopers – all there to help you get the most out of your round. Listening to these guys talk about what it means to caddy – especially in Scotland – can inspire any golfer to start surfing Priceline.com for airfare and accommodations.

They’ve carried bags for presidents, celebrities and tour pros – and they have great stories to boot. They’ve also carried for hacks and average golfers of all nationalities – and can tell you who will tip the best based on the country they are from!

Scotland’s Caddies is a fascinating window into an otherwise unappreciated occupation. The film not only touches on the history of caddies, but provides their modern-day counterparts with a voice (albeit one with a heavy Scottish accent) to tell their story. This film is well-worth the hour on the couch.

As a special bonus, the good folks over at Scotland’s Caddies have shipped us a free copy of the DVD to giveaway to one lucky Golf Stinks reader! We’ll be choosing a winner at random from our Facebook page one week from today. So make sure you like our page and good luck!

Why the Polara Ball will Hurt, Not Help Golf

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Last week, The New York Times published an article about a golf ball that doesn’t slice. I’m sure you probably read about it – there was much re-posting going on in the golf blogosphere.

The basic theme of many blog posts regarding the new ball was: “This is great – a ball that flies straight! The only catch is it’s not sanctioned by the golfing gods. But [they ask as a devilish smile widens across their face] should we use it anyway?”

Obviously, professional golfers won’t be using this ball. So that leaves the rest of us. In fact, “the rest of us” is exactly who the developer had in mind when marketing this illegal orb:

“It’s for the other [non pro] golfers, the ones who rarely hit it straight…It’s for people who want to be embarrassed less, play faster and enjoy it more. I respect the U.S.G.A., they help identify the best golfers in the world, but what about the rest of us?”

The audacity of this company to assume that deep down, “the rest of us” are all just a bunch of cheaters. You see, it’s this kind of crap that’s killing golf. It’s been emblazoned into our ethos…right down to the molecular level – that we’re failures if we’re not good at something. Golfers are self-conscious about their swings and their high handicaps. They’re self-conscious about flubbing one when everyone is looking or missing a 1-footer for par.

Marketers love the idea of the self-depreciating golfer. They think: I know what we can do…let’s produce a product that breaks the rules to make all these golfing failures feel better about themselves! That’ll really sucker them in!

Ah, but they’re missing one major point: Golfers don’t really quit the game because they’re poor players. I mean, when was the last time you heard something like this: “I’ve had enough! After playing this game every weekend for 40 years without much success, I’m quitting!” The truth is, you just don’t hear stuff like that. And you don’t hear it for one reason: People play golf not because they are good at it, but because they love it.

Don’t believe me? Then ask yourself why high-handicappers still play. Why do golfers that have averaged in the 90’s or higher their entire lives continue to hit the links? Why go through the agony of another embarrassing flub? I think it’s obvious: We play this game because we love it – regardless of whether we’re good at it.

But what this Polara ball will do is diminish the game’s integrity by fueling the following notion: That the ultimate goal of recreational golfers should be to get better. And since golf is so hard, you’re going to have to cheat to do so.

Look, if you really want to change the way you golf, change your mental approach to the game. You don’t have to make the main focus about getting better – instead make it about having fun; or being outdoors; or spending time with friends; or just the fact that you are out doing something you love to do. And if you really need a ball that only flies straight to attain that satisfaction…then you, my friend, are no lover of golf (or any other sport for that matter).

The Quest to Play Every Golf Course in my State

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Stinky Golfer Greg in 2014; Trying to "keep it real" out on the course.
Stinky Golfer Greg (photo by Sonny Vega)

Every now and then, you reach a point in your life when you feel the need to accomplish something for you and only you. Things have a way of carrying on in the same manner; a routine sets in and before you know it, it’s been months, perhaps even years since you’ve done something truly unique.

For me, the year was 2003. By then, I had been playing golf for 14 years and I hadn’t gotten any better. It’s strange, actually; My golf game had gotten smarter – I learned to lay-up to the 150-marker so I could hit 8-iron into the green every time; I learned to hit a 5-wood off the tee to sacrifice distance for control; I learned to, well…I learned to play it safe.

I knew I couldn’t compete on any pro tour or even have a chance to win a local tournament. Yet I continued to suck all the fun out of golf by focusing only on that silly number written down with those silly little pencils. I knew something had to change – I needed to shift that focus from my score, to the game itself.

And that’s when I decided to embark on my quest: To play every 18-hole public course in the state of Connecticut. Now it may not have been the most adventuresome quest in golf (people that set-out to play the top 100 courses in the country, or even the world have got some time and money on their hands), but it wasn’t exactly something to sneeze at either (after all, The Constitution State had…at the time…66 golf courses meeting my criteria).

I quickly drew up a schedule for 2003 (and 2004, 2005, 2006 & 2007 to boot). Being married and working a full-time job, I knew this quest would take a few years. That being said, I settled on a schedule that would keep half my summer weekends free, while still enabling me to complete said quest within a reasonable amount of time – I would play roughly two rounds a month for seven months of the year (April – October) for five years.

Of course, no quest would be complete without people to experience it with. So I emailed the schedules to all my golfing buddies – hoping at least one of them would accompany me at every course (and that pretty much happened – at least one golf buddy played with me at each course along the way).

So I had this quest, and I had people to experience it with. But what about documenting it? Rather than keep a diary in the traditional sense, I decided to photograph and review every course I played. But as I reviewed them, I realized many of the course descriptions sounded similar on paper. So I began compiling a rating system based on a set of six criteria to help me distinguish between the courses (you can learn about those criteria HERE).

The more courses I played (and subsequently the more courses I rated and wrote about), the more I began to realize what makes a good golf course (at least in my opinion). This quest took me to the lushest of courses; where greens-fees greatly exceeded $100; where bag-boys loaded your clubs on the cart at the beginning of the round and cleaned them for you at the end of the round; where every blade of grass reminded you of Augusta. Yet the same quest took me to the shabbiest of courses; where chain-link fences protected tee-areas from errant shots; where driving range mats replaced worn-down tee-boxes; where the fairways were so dusty, you’d swear the carts ahead of you were part of Rommel’s tank battalion.

After completing my quest at the end of the 2007 season, it took two years for me to embark on my next adventure – contributing to this blog and helping to develop golfstinks.com. And this too benefited from my quest – a new feature you will be seeing very soon on this site is the ability to search and rate golf courses the golfstinks way (not-to-mention you can read all my ratings and reviews for those Connecticut courses too). But I’d have to say the real benefit was to me. I learned a bunch in those five years…mainly to forget about my score and just have fun playing the game I love.

So get out there and experience what golf has to offer. Drop a C-note on an awesome track once in a while; drive two hours to experience the latest Nicklaus or Jones design; get out there and forget about the rest of the world…Don’t worry, your home course will be waiting for you when you get back.

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