The Week That Was, april 24, 2016

     If a new report on golf participation in Europe teaches us anything, it’s that those of us who work in the U.S. golf industry should count our blessings. No matter how bleak things may occasionally look to us here at home, we’re far better off than virtually every other golf market on earth.
     According to KPMG’s Golf Advisory Practice, last year Europe had just 4.14 million golfers and a pathetically low participation rate of just under 1 percent. In fact, only two European nations can nowadays claim a participation rate higher than 4 percent: Sweden (4.7 percent) and Ireland (4.1 percent). Scotland, which brags about being the home of golf, has a participation rate of only 3.8 percent, good for third in KPMG’s ranking, and no other nation can post a number higher than 2.7 percent.
     By contrast, reliable sources say that the United States has roughly 24 million golfers and a participation rate in the neighborhood of 8 or 9 percent.
     Before we go any farther, and to be as fair as possible to Europe, it’s important to note that in “Golf Participation Report for Europe 2016” KPMG is merely counting “registered” golfers -- that is, golfers who are members of their national golf associations. If KPMG could have factored unaffiliated golfers into its data, Europe’s statistical profile would certainly look better.
     But how much better? Even if we arbitrarily doubled the number of golfers in Europe, something nobody in his right mind would ever do, the Continent would still have only about one-third of the golfers we have in the United States.
     If you’re beginning to think that maybe it might be nice if Europe’s golf market was bigger, consider this: Only 12 of the 46 nations that KPMG surveyed have 100,000 or more registered golfers, while 27 have fewer than 10,000. Heck, 16 have less than 1,000, a number hardly worth counting.
     The closer one looks, the more obvious it is that Europe consists of a few “haves” and a bunch of “have-nots.” The two nations with the most golfers, England and Germany, account for 31 percent of Europe’s total. The top five nations -- England, Germany, Sweden, France, and the Netherlands -- account for 62 percent. And the top 10 nations account for 85 percent.
     It goes without saying that Europe, like the rest of the world’s established golf markets, has been losing golfers since the onset on the Great Recession. Between 2009 and 2013, according to KPMG, golf participation on the Continent fell by 4 percent. Between 2014 and 2015, the decline was somewhat less noticeable -- 0.3 percent -- but the number was nonetheless down.
     Because last year’s declines were less apparent, KPMG feels justified in putting a positive spin on Europe’s future. “Europe’s golf markets displayed positive signs of stability and growth in 2015,” it contends. The evidence, however, is nothing to get excited about: Of the nations surveyed, 14 registered growth, 15 showed declines, and 17 were flat. I’m just guessing, but I’m thinking that most people would view those numbers as pretty much an even split.
     Dig a little deeper into the numbers, however, and trouble rears its ugly head. Of the 20 nations with the most golfers -- the industry’s most important markets -- seven were down, 10 were flat, and only three were up.
     Anyone looking for the 11 other nations that registered growth in 2015 can find them among the remaining 26 that KPMG surveyed -- the bottom of the barrel, as it were, all of them nations where the game doesn’t have deep roots. And sadly, their “positive signs of stability and growth” are so negligible that they’re almost embarrassing to report. The big winners in this group were Poland, Estonia, and Russia, each of which added about 300 golfers. Hungary added about 150, Lithuania about 120, and Liechtenstein about 100. These six were the only ones that added golfers in triple digits.
     Across all 46 nations, the gains of 2015 amount to 25,749, the losses to 37,951. The net is a loss of 12,202 golfers.
      It’s a small number, to be sure. But in Europe, even the big numbers are small.