The economic revival of Newcastle United Golf Club
3rd February, 2012 by admin
Newcastle United Golf Club was registered in June 1892 as Newcastle United Workmen’s Golf Club. We are still a working-class golf club and that will probably never change.
A key problem the club has had since its inception is that we are always the first and hardest hit during a financial downturn. And the current one has probably hit us worse than any other.
As with a number of other private members’ clubs, we have never really looked at ourselves as a business – prior, that is, to recent events. Our membership decreased from around 700 in total to 430 when the recession started. This had a dramatic effect on our income and our golf course reflected this. One of the key influences for the high turnover in member numbers was the timing of our annual membership subscriptions: The first of November.
In early 2009 our club was really struggling to pay our way. We were reducing costs, including expenditure on the course, but still losing money. Although we own our clubhouse, the land is leased. The lessee is The Freemen of Newcastle upon Tyne, which only allows a 21-year lease. This makes the clubhouse worthless when trying to raise cash against it. Things were looking bleak until a chance suggestion from a financial adviser gave us an idea. He suggested that we approach our members for a loan. We had an EGM in February 2009 and put it to our members that they could loan the club an amount, in sums of £1,000, at an interest rate of four per cent. The interest could be taken annually, left invested in our club or be taken off the following year’s fees. The response was fantastic and kept our club afloat.
We were able to keep all four greenkeepers employed, and invested in our club. But we were still losing money as there were a number of lease agreements which we were unable to get out of and our income from the bar was steadily decreasing.
In October 2010 we contacted a management company and created a formal business plan for our golf club. We looked to increase the three key income streams: membership, visitor green fees and bar takings. We changed our club certificate to a club licence, which allowed us to hire our function room for private functions. It took some three months to change the licence as we had a couple of local objections. Our bar takings since August 2011, when we were able to start seeing the results of the new licence, were 15 per cent higher than the same period a year earlier. And this when all bookings to date have been by word of mouth as we have still not formally advertised availability.
Moreover, visitor income to the end of July 2011 was up some 30 per cent on the previous year, which was down to signing agreements with three online green fee booking companies and two holiday companies, and the improvements to our golf course. I believe we are still some 40 per cent short of what our visitor income could be.
We have, in 2011, introduced a new payment method for golf fees, that is a monthly standing order payment of £43 for a full member. This has proved extremely successful and we now have over 200 members paying on this scheme. We are still around 100 short of our target but believe we will achieve this in 2012.
In May 2010, I contacted a number of local golf club managers to see if they were interested in forming a cluster or group. The Newcastle and District Partnership was created with two aims: benefits for members and clubs. Initially we had five clubs represented and agreed a reduced green fee rate for members of participating clubs. We have now closed representation with 12 clubs involved. We now find that the key benefits are also for each manager from our bi-monthly meetings, where problems are resolved.
We have recently appointed a young person – Andy McDonald – to formulate a youth and community plan for our club. We do not have a very large junior section, which considering our position in a large conurbation, is strange. We have come to realise that if youngsters won’t come to us then we must go to them. Andy is now part of a national youth panel looking to grow the game. His personal target is to get golf on the curriculum of all schools in the west end of our city.
In 2011 our management committee believed that the way forward for our club was to market ourselves better; considering our name, Newcastle United Golf Club, and our location, a few minutes’ drive from the centre of Newcastle, this should not be too difficult. We have attended marketing courses from England Golf and used the excellent literature in the GCMA library.
However, we soon realised that we were not marketing professionals. I was asked to see if I could identify a local marketing company which could assist at a reasonable price. I found this difficult until a young marketing executive called Laura McDonald was introduced to me. She was very keen on golf and was looking to see if her company could assist in formulating a marketing plan and work with us on our marketing of the club. She was also willing to do a deal for our partnership. Laura came to our December meeting and informed all managers what she could do for the clubs. Laura has now set us up on both Facebook and Twitter. If only one of the three enquiries I have had for a corporate day comes off then this will virtually cover a full year’s cost for her time. I believe this may be the way forward for other clubs – group together and see if you can obtain local assistance from a marketing specialist.
We know we still have a long way to go but with our core membership and forward looking management committee, we are on the right track.
Peter Jobe is the secretary and treasurer of Newcastle United Golf Club