The Week That Was, april 7, 2019

     The transaction mostly went unnoticed, but a subsidiary of the PGA of America has acquired Nextgengolf, a Boston, Massachusetts-based group that organizes tournaments for a market that the golf industry is desperate to tap: High-school and college students and young adults. Unlike so many previous golf-industry partnerships that have aimed to grow the game, most of which seemed ill-fated from the get-go, this one appears to have potential. For starters, synergies are in play: Nextgengolf has nicely staked out a position with a desirable demographic, and its reach will be enhanced by the PGA’s considerable financial and marketing resources. More importantly, though, as the PGA’s chief innovation officer noted in a press release, “Nextgengolf provides authentic experiences that speak to the next generation of golfers.” Could a blend of competition and community, spiced with a little fun, be the recipe that cracks a very tough nut for golf?

     By now most everyone knows what Rick Reilly reported about Individual #1’s golf behavior in his new book, Commander in Cheat. To those with an interest in business, however, the more noteworthy part of this whole sad discussion is what Reilly has to say about the president’s golf properties.
     Doral, I went there and it was so empty you could shoot a machine gun, Reilly told Rolling Stone. In fact, the day I left someone did come in and sprayed the place with a machine gun and no one got hurt, because no one was there. I walked all over, and I saw one group. I walked every hole at Aberdeen and saw one group. Eric Trump lied at an opening and said, “Oh, we’re so busy here at Trump Ferry Point.” And I said, “Oh really?” So I went online Saturday night to get a Sunday tee time. I had my choice of the whole day.

     Greg “the Living Brand” Norman has arguably become the most influential person in Vietnam’s golf industry. Named last year as the socialist republic’s tourism ambassador and this year as an advisor to its newly created Golf Tourism Association, the Great & Powerful LB has set out to create what he promises will be “30 years of prosperity and growth for Vietnam.” And what’s in it for him? “If I do it the right way,” he recently noted to an interviewer, “I’ll be rewarded.” Such is the self-obsession that beats at the heart of the LB, who’s so far designed three golf courses in Vietnam and has commissions in hand for a handful of others. The LB believes that “there is a massive opportunity” in Vietnam, and to ensure that the opportunity is fully and completely realized, he hopes to star in a documentary that will focus on – you guessed it – “my time in Vietnam, building golf courses, following the journey.” Before any more checks are written, someone should remind Vietnam that the LB’s journeys tend to be ego trips.

     While the LB chases opportunities in Vietnam, he’s lost one in Hawaii.
     Pacific Links International, which has in recent years been selling its U.S. golf properties, has hired Tiger Woods and Gil Hanse to design what’s been described as “world-class, tournament-quality golf courses” for its Mākaha resort on Oʻahu. PLI will be working with Hanse for the first time, but it has some history with Woods, because several years ago it commissioned the Jupiter, Florida-based “signature” architect to create a new course in metropolitan Beijing, on property formerly occupied by Beijing Tian’an Holiday Golf Club.
     Mākaha once boasted a pair of 18-hole tracks, the West course (Makaha Golf Club) and the East course (Makaha Valley Country Club), and PLI had asked Norman to downsize. At one point the plan was to turn the West track into “an unforgettable championship course” and shrink the East course to nine holes, but PLI bailed when the construction costs got too high.
     The courses by Woods and Hanse will serve as drawing cards for a venue that will operate as Mākaha Valley Resort, a 644-acre spread that will also feature housing, time-share condos, an arts center, and health and wellness facilities. A construction schedule hasn’t yet been set, but PLI expects to deliver a “unique and memorable golf experience for players of all levels.”

     Are you wondering how much of a week’s golf news I cover in this blog? The answer, unfortunately, is just a fraction of what passes my way. The golf business, particularly the development side of the golf business, has unquestionably perked up over the past year or two, and there’s no way for me to address all of it. So if your business requires a more comprehensive news digest – a weekly compendium of stories collected from newspapers, magazines, and other sources – contact me via e-mail at golfcoursereport@aol.com. I’ll send you a sample issue of either U.S. or International Construction Clips, depending on your needs.