Jim Smith Jr., the former President of the Philadelphia PGA Section, the 2006 Philadelphia PGA Golf Professional of the Year, the 2007 & 2013 Bill Strausbaugh Winner, and the 2004 PGA Merchandiser of the Year for Private Facilities, is PGA director of golf at the Philadelphia Cricket Club in Flourtown, Pennsylvania.
Being a 45-hole facility with three clubhouses, a large staff and an extremely active calendar, it would take thousands of individual emails annually to make all our members aware of every event we have going on. That’s just unrealistic and frankly annoying to the recipient. So eight years ago we decided to pick out the most important 30-50 items and put them into “Golf at a Glance”, a document emailed to all members at the start of the year and available in print in the golf shop. (The 2016 version is 49 pages.) Like the recycling calendar you get at home, ours contains event dates and details, a staff directory, hyperlinks to find out more information on a given person or topic and more. Most importantly, it has helped established members keep abreast of everything we have going on and the acclimation process for new members who might feel overwhelmed at the sheer size of our facility. That was the big goal: make it easier for members to have all the information in one place for all our events.
It’s worked. By raising awareness it has helped our event participation double in the last 10 years, with every event sold out (that’s 5,000 “uses” of events, clinics or programs annually), and new members and veterans alike remarking how nice it was to have everything organized. When you become friendly with everyone and like what the club has to offer, you use club services more. The average number of rounds played by members has increased 50 percent in the last six years, with the average rounds per member going from 33 in 2006 to 51 last year, in large part due to newer members playing more golf. That’s increased purchases in the shop, food & beverage usage, and total lessons taken, and consequently club revenues have increased 80 percent while total membership amount has stayed basically flat. Dining room usage is also up 100 percent in this span from new and established members alike, which shows an engaged membership. Our club has almost zero membership turnover and referrals have helped us add 70-90 new members in some years. While all of that isn’t solely because of Golf at a Glance, it’s always good to try getting all your important information into one document. You may just see event participation skyrocket.
If you would like to email the author of this Best Practice directly, please email jsmith@philacricket.com
Editor’s note: The above comments reflect the opinion and experiences of the submitting PGA Professional and are not endorsed by PGA Magazine or the PGA of America.