Weather Or Not, Participation Is A Concern
November 1, 2009 by Ian Hutchinson
Weather is undoubtedly the factor that the golf industry is concerned most with as we steam towards the 2010 season, according to the latest GNN Poll.
While economic influences are also a concern in many people’s minds, the weather got 33 per cent of the vote in the poll that asked which factor do you see impacting your business most in 2010?
The introduction of the Harmonized Sales Tax in British Columbia and Ontario, and sure to come in other provinces, drew 24 per cent of the vote, while the overall economy was top concern for 14 per cent of respondents with a high Canadian dollar accounting for 10 per cent of the votes.
While the weather and economic factors were big concerns, a decline in golf participation drew the third-highest number of votes at 19 per cent, a significant number in an industry that has very little in the way of recent numbers on that matter.
However, when the National Allied Golf Association unveiled its economic impact statement earlier this year, one dark note was that participation had declined by as much as 10 per cent in 2008. As much as we would like to blame that on the economy, that number was decided before the recession hit late last year.
Weather could be a reason for the decline in participation, which is a popular theory, but merely speculation. The question now is has participation in the game declined even more and will it continue on that downward spiral?
You be the judge, based on your own experience as somebody working within the golf industry. Perhaps, you feel the game has actually grown or stayed at the same level of participation the past few years. If not, how much would you say participation has declined?
The new poll is now up on the GNN home page, so we look forward to you adding your opinion. As always, you can expand your thoughts inside the GNN Forum, which also has a new posting for a superintendents position and chat about new products that caught people’s eyes during the buying shows.
Ian Hutchinson is a veteran Canadian golf writer, whose history in the game includes an extensive background with Canadian golf trade publications. A golf columnist with Sun Media, Hutch is also a regular contributor to publications and websites in Canada and the United States.
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It is not the weather as much as the errantly negative weather forecasts that put it in peoples’ minds that it might rain – so they do something else….
Don