The Week That Was, february 26, 2012

croatia Hollywood on the Adriatic

My research is still a little spotty, but I can’t resist reporting that Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie have apparently become investors in a golf resort that will be built along Croatia’s Adriatic coast.

The resort, to be called Barabriga, will take shape on the Istrian peninsula, probably in a municipality called Vodnjan. (It’s just north of Pula.) As best I can determine, the site is among the many that were identified as suitable for golf resorts before the Great Recession ended most of Croatia’s development dreams.


Barabriga will reportedly consist of villas, hotels, a marina, and an 18-hole golf course. It’ll be built on property owned by Danko Končar, who’s said to be the nation’s richest individual. (A Croatian news source estimates that he’s worth $3 billion.) Končar, who’s been described as “mysterious” -- probably because he lives mostly in London -- is said to own some 2,500 acres in Istria County, and some of his property in Vodnjan is said to have been planted with olive groves and vineyards.

Yes, Končar is in the wine business, but vino isn’t the source of his wealth. Končar reportedly harvests minerals -- chromium, platinum, iron, zinc -- from mines that he owns in South Africa. In some circles, he’s known as “the King of Chrome.”

Like other celebrities, international businessmen, and power couples -- Jay Z and Beyonce, Bill and Melinda Gates, Prince Harry, Bernie Ecclestone -- Pitt and Jolie have warm feelings for Croatia. Jolie’s travels as a goodwill ambassador for the United Nations led her to write and direct a movie (In the Land of Blood and Honey) about the Bosnian War, and she’s said to enjoy vacationing on the Brijuni Islands, which are located just off Vodnjan. A Croatian newspaper wrote that the couple believes the islands are “a paradise on earth and ideal for children.”

I’m just guessing, but Pitt and Jolie probably met Končar through Rade Šerbedžija, a Croatian actor who’s said to be an investor in Barabriga. Šerbedžija has appeared in several dozen Yugoslavian movies as well as a few U.S. films and television shows, among them Mission: Impossible II, Eyes Wide Shut, season six of “24,” and In the Land of Blood and Honey.

cambodia Faldo’s Second Act

Later this year, construction is expected to begin on Nick Faldo’s second golf course in Cambodia.

The championship-length, tournament-worthy track will be the first of two 18-hole courses that Vattanac Properties plans to build at its eponymous, 1,250-acre resort in suburban Phnom Penh, the nation’s capital city. I can’t tell you anything about the property, but Faldo Design’s director of architecture, Andrew Haggar, says in a press release that the firm will “design a landscape and an identity for the site and at the same time create an iconic golf course.”

At build-out, Vattanac Golf Resort will include what’s been described as “extensive real estate,” at least one hotel, and a variety of sports, recreation, and entertainment venues. A date hasn’t yet been set for the groundbreaking on the resort’s second Faldo-designed course, but it’s expected to have a contrasting style.

Faldo’s first venue in Cambodia, at Angkor Golf Resort, opened in late 2007. The course sits at or near the top of the list of venues to which Cambodian tour operators send foreign golf travelers, particularly those who wish to experience the rich historical treasures of Siem Reap.

Some information in this post originally appeared in the December 2010 issue of the World Edition of the Golf Course Report.

australia Golf Digest’s Top 10

Let the bragging begin: Australian Golf Digest has identified the nation’s premier golf courses, via the publication of its annual Top 100.

As in years past, the cream of Australia’s crop is dominated by courses designed, co-designed, or influenced by Alister MacKenzie. Greg Norman is responsible for two of the nation’s most elite tracks, and U.S. designers -– Tom Doak and the team of Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw -– produced two others.

As we all know, top-whatever lists are created mostly to sell magazines. But Australian Golf Digest argues that it has a more noble purpose in mind.

“We hope this ranking encourages the proper custodianship of quality golf courses in this country,” writes Darius Oliver, the magazine’s architecture editor. “If we help a deteriorating club make a crucial decision on redevelopment, or equally prevent unnecessary change elsewhere, then we will have contributed in a small, but positive, way to the game we love.”

Here’s the top 10:

1. Royal Melbourne Golf Club’s West course in Victoria. Redesigned by MacKenzie. A true world-class layout. Doak once said that the West course “might be the place which has influenced my own design style the most.”

2. Kingston Heath Golf Club in Victoria. Designed by Dan Soutar and MacKenzie. Kingston Heath was the top-ranked track in 2011.

3. Ellerston Golf Course in New South Wales. Designed by Greg Norman.

4. Barnbougle Dunes Golf Links in Tasmania. Co-designed by Doak and Michael Clayton, an Australian architect. According to Oliver, some of the magazine’s evaluators “regard Barnbougle Dunes as Australia’s best golf course, while others are of the opinion that Lost Farm [#6 on the list] is an even better track.”

5. New South Wales Golf Club in New South Wales. Designed by MacKenzie. Down from #2.

6. Barnbougle Lost Farm in Tasmania. Designed by Coore and Crenshaw. Oliver: “By any definition this is world-class golf, and its best holes, such as the 5th and 14th, are among the finest in Australia.”

7. National Golf Club’s Moonah course in Victoria. Designed by Norman.

8. Royal Melbourne’s East course in Victoria. Designed by Alex Russell. He collaborated with MacKenzie on the redesign of the West course.

9. Victoria Golf Club in Victoria. Designed by William Meader and MacKenzie.

10. Metropolitan Golf Club in Victoria. Designed by J. B. MacKenzie. No relation.

And in Other News . . .

. . . united states What generates more money in Alabama, the golf business or crop production? The correct answer is crop production, but not by much: $818.7 million to $808.1 million. That’s the word from the first study of the golf industry’s economic impact on the state, courtesy of the Alabama Tourism Department and Golf 20/20. Notable factoids: More than half of the total revenue was provided by golf facility operations (252 golf courses, along with a few driving ranges and miniature golf courses, and the state’s golf industry supports 21,221 jobs. One other thing: In a story about the study, CBS News reports that the Robert Trent Jones Golf Trail, which features 26 golf courses in 11 locations, lures roughly 500,000 customers annually.

. . . wild card click I know what I'm watching tonight.

china Jones, Jr.: Back to Shanghai?

Sometime this year, the real estate affiliate of a powerful Chinese multinational hopes to start building an 18-hole golf course on an island along the Yangtze River in Shanghai.

The course has been designed by Robert Trent Jones, Jr., one of his profession’s elder statesmen and a familiar face in Chinese golfing circles. It’ll be the centerpiece of Shanghai Dongtan Jin Mao Noble Manor, a 290-acre community taking shape on Chongming Island, China’s second-largest island (after Hainan Island).

Franshion Properties (China), Ltd., a publicly traded, Hong Kong-based firm, describes Jin Mao Noble Manor as “a high-end, low-density residential project.” At build-out, it’s expected to include various forms of housing and some hotels, including an “apartment hotel.”

These days Franshion Properties is working on several development ventures in Shanghai’s central business district, including the Shanghai International Shipping Service Center and Shanghai Port, which it calls an “international passenger transport center.” The company has developed the Chemsunny World Trade Center in Beijing, and it owns several hotels (3,000 total rooms) in Shanghai, in metropolitan Beijing, and on Hainan Island, operated by such brands as Ritz-Carlton, Hilton, Westin, Grand Hyatt, and Marriott.

Franshion Properties is controlled by Sinochem Group, a state-owned entity that’s among the world’s largest multinationals -– number 203 in last year’s Global Fortune 500.

The course will be Jones’ seventh in the People’s Republic. The Palo Alto, California-based architect’s previous work includes Yalong Bay Golf Club on Hainan Island, Spring City Golf & Lake Resort in Kunming (Yunnan Province), and Enhance Anting Golf Club in Shanghai.

Some material in this post originally appeared in the November 2011 issue of the World Edition of the Golf Course Report.

The Week That Was, february 19, 2012

canada Revelstoke: A Job or a Snow Job?

Is it possible to read too much into a want ad?

I ask because Northland Properties is searching for “an environmental specialist” who can go to work on a “subdivision and golf course project” at Revelstoke Mountain Resort in British Columbia.

The original master plan for Revelstoke, whose ski area opened in 2007, calls for 550 single-family houses, 850 townhouses, 1,500 condos, 2,000 hotel rooms, a pedestrian village with retail and commercial space, and four golf courses. Way back when, the resort hired Nick Faldo to put his “signature” on the first of those courses, an 18-hole track that was supposed to be open by now.

I haven’t heard any golf murmurs from Revelstoke for years, but something is clearly happening with Faldo’s overdue course. Last summer, according to the Revelstoke Times Review, the resort began clearing property “in the area of the golf course” but was forced to stop because the work “infringed on some riparian areas.” Hence the need for an environmental specialist, presumably.

Unfortunately, Northland isn’t willing to shed much light on its construction plans. After what was described as “a brief conversation” with the company’s chief operating officer, the newspaper reported that “the job was posted so the resort could deal with the environmental issues before development of the golf course can begin.”

Small steps, apparently. Enough to keep hope alive.

Incidentally, Faldo was going to design the track with Brian Curley.

Some information in this post originally appeared in the September 2008 issue of the World Edition of the Golf Course Report.

united states Donald Trump, Now & Forever

I’m as tired of writing about Donald Trump as most of you are of reading about him. But after three weeks of operating this blog as a Trump-free zone, I can no longer deny the guy his keystrokes. He simply makes too much news.

Here’s a little of what the most polarizing figure in golf has been doing of late:

-- Trump’s on-again, off-again pursuit of the Point Lake & Golf Club in North Carolina is on again. A majority of the club’s members have come around to seeing things Trump’s way, and the Charlotte Observer believes a sale could take place “within weeks.” Trump, you’ll remember from posts in early and mid December 2011, has been trying to buy the Point and its Greg Norman-designed golf course for more than a year. He longs to make it “amazing” -- the best in the state -- and to give it a new name with real pizazz: Trump National Golf Club Charlotte. Like so many courtships, however, this one has had its ups and downs. Just weeks ago, when some club members got cold feet and went public with their reservations, Trump walked away from the negotiating table in a huff, fuming about “a lack of direction” at the club. Now, at least from his perspective, the members are clearly on the right track again. The club could hold a formal vote on the sale by the end of the month.


-- Trump has finally revealed why he’s so hell-bent on preventing Scottish officials from building a wind farm that would be visible from the fairways of Trump International Golf Club Scotland. “I am doing this to save Scotland,” he heroically acknowledged in a letter to a Scottish minister who’s capable of derailing the project. In other words, it’s patriotism, not profit, that’s led Trump to allocate what he calls “a substantial sum of money” (no sums were provided, alas) to underwrite “an international campaign to fight your plan.” Speaking like a true man of the people, Trump contends that “the people of Scotland will forever suffer” if the wind farm is built, largely because tourists who might have otherwise booked rooms in his high-priced hotel “will be going to other countries that had the foresight to use other forms of energy.” I’m not foolish enough to predict where Trump goes next with his vitriol, but I’m thinking his opportunity to win friends and influence people in the U.K. may be gone with the wind farm.

-- Trump wants to build a 1.5-acre cemetery along the fifth fairway at Trump National Golf Club Bedminster in northern New Jersey. “At some point you have to think about this stuff,” one of Trump’s associates told the New York Daily News. Plots will be made available to the club’s well-to-do members, and part of the grounds will be reserved as a tasteful final resting place for Trump and his family. No prices have yet been set, and no, Trump hasn’t said when he’s planning to move in. Whenever the day comes, though, may he rest in peace.

And in Other News . . .

. . . japan Japan’s moribund economy, coupled with last year’s earthquake and fallout from the ensuing nuclear disaster, has claimed a victim in the nation’s golf industry: Taiheiyo Club, a course management firm, has filed for the equivalent of bankruptcy protection. The company may be familiar to some of you. Taiheiyo Club made its presence felt on this side of the Pacific back in 1992, when it bought the Pebble Beach resort from Minoru Isutani and his rumored yakuza financiers. Seven years later, Taiheiyo Club sold the iconic resort to its current owners, a group led by Clint Eastwood and Arnold Palmer. Today the company’s portfolio consists of 18 golf courses, most of them in the suburbs of Tokyo, Kobe, Sapporo, and Fukushima. The Financial Times says that Taiheiyo Club “embarked on an aggressive growth strategy during the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s” but fell on hard times when financially squeezed corporations “stopped funding expensive golf junkets and the number of golfers in Japan began a steady decline, leading to a sharp drop in revenues.” The newspaper reports that Taiheiyo Club will be “rehabilitated with financial support from Accordia Golf,” a much larger management company whose finances are also nothing to write home about.

. . . china Here’s another chew-on-this tidbit from the interview with Ken Chu referenced in this blog last Sunday: When he was asked what golf means to him, the CEO of the Mission Hills resorts and their nearly two dozen golf courses said, “Golf is a business language, a social networking tool, a medium to link the East and the West.” Chu may have felt he was having a lost-in-translation moment, as he quickly added: “I didn’t think like this until I returned to Hong Kong from Toronto 16 years ago. Before then, I regarded golf as merely a retirement sport.”

. . . wild card click A lesson in how to conduct yourself at a job interview.

talking points Dana Garmany on Golf’s Future

Dana Garmany knows golf, particularly the management side of it, as well as anyone. His company, Troon Golf, reportedly manages more than 130 U.S. golf courses and something like 65 others in 23 foreign nations.

If you’re wondering, roughly a quarter of Troon Golf’s properties are part of private clubs -- and Garmany sees some trouble on the horizon for them. In a recent conservation with KPMG’s Golf Business Community, here’s what he had to say about the future of private clubs:

The days of big initiation fees are gone, and [private clubs] will need to find a new model. In the golf boom of the 1990s, golfers didn’t really play more golf, they just spent more money on it. They had two memberships, not one. They went on more than one golf holiday and bought more than one set of clubs. So private clubs will still need the annual dues (membership income), but they are going to have to find new ways to make money.

Obviously, private clubs make money by signing new members. But to do that, Garmany believes, they’ll need to make themselves attractive to younger generations that doesn’t necessarily do things the way their parents did.

It’s the next generation that is the challenge, Garmany told KPMG. How do we make golf fun for the under-40s, who do not have a competitive zeal and treat a day’s golf like a spa day? Their wants and needs are so different, and we have to recognize this. If a 38-year-old executive has managed to get away from the office to play golf on a Friday afternoon, you can’t then tell him he can’t use his cell phone or log onto the internet in the clubhouse. What chance is there of him becoming a member? If people quit the game, they don’t come back, so we have to keep people playing.

Garmany was also asked where in the world he believes Troon Golf’s best opportunities lie. His answer:

The USA market is going to remain flat for development in the next three to five years, so we want to expand internationally and build a profit base by getting to the right places, including Asia. . . . Morocco is a growing market for us at the moment. And while the Middle East has slowed down, it remains an important market.

And if you’re thinking about selling your golf course, you might want to reconsider. Garmany thinks golf courses are beginning to look like smart investments again.

There is probably a time coming again very soon that you do want to own a golf course, he said. When the market bottoms out, there may be some value. It may be risky now, but we think in 2012 and 2013, we will see more people taking a shot at it.

china The Sundance Kids

The crackdown on golf construction in China is starting to spread pain among course architects everywhere.

The latest one to feel the pinch is Bob Cupp, an Atlanta, Georgia-based designer who has three projects in the People’s Republic -– two in Yunnan Province and one on Hainan Island -– stuck on drawing boards.

“All projects are on hiatus until the central government can come up with new edicts,” says Steve Timm, Cupp’s partner and a former golf pro at Riviera Country Club in Pacific Palisades, California. “There are a number of projects that are being scrutinized very closely.”

Once the pressure is relieved, Cupp and Timm are hoping to begin construction at Sundance Golf Club, part of a community (including houses, a hotel, and a spa) that’s being developed by Guo Linning, a Chinese construction manager turned developer. Sundance will take shape in Xian Dian, a rural town in the hills northeast of Kunming that Timm says has “no trappings of a city,” not even a sewer system. The partners will co-design 36 holes for the community, with the courses stretching to 7,400 and 7,600 yards.

Cupp, who’ll be 72 later this year, is hoping that he doesn’t need to wait too long for golf construction in China to resume.

“It’s still fun to design golf courses,” he says. “I like doing it.”

Some information in this post originally appeared in the December 2011 issue of the World Edition of the Golf Course Report.