Brian Boyle is the PGA director of golf at Skytop (Pa.) Lodge.

In order to increase participation and sales, I created a points system for Skytop’s tournament program. Tournament participants receive points based on their finish in points-designated events, which are always four-person scrambles. Event winners get 125 points each, the second place team gets 100 points each, and the third place team receives 75 points each. I also added a slight twist to our points race: In addition to earning points through tournaments, our members can receive 25 points by attending our post-tournament dinners, even if they don’t play in the event. Because the year-end prizes for the points system are substantial ($1,000 golf shop gift card and plaque for first place, $500 gift card for second and $300 gift card for third), many of our members try to accumulate as many points as they can. If they can’t play in the tournament, they’ll do their best to attend the cocktail party after the event. Plus, the dinners are always fun because we announce the event winners and updated points standings.

We hold 12 points-designated scrambles per season. Each event has approximately 35 participants, and even more come for dinner afterwards. We only charge $5 for the actual tournament, but we charge $22.50 for dinner. The tournament income helps supplement our prizes for the points system and the dinner accounts for thousands of dollars in food & beverage sales that we may have otherwise not had. Since incorporating the points system into our tournament program, our normal events have grown from only four to eight people per tournament to 35 participants per event. Overall, this new system has provided a lot of fun and excitement to our tournament season at Skytop and has helped our business as well.