Local golf on course for more growth?

University of Iowa Hall of Fame golfer Sean McCarty has qualified for three major championships and played in 11 PGA Tour events overall during a nearly three-decade pro career. However, the 11-time Iowa PGA Section Player of the Year felt a bit unprepared for an end-of-October appearance in the PGA Senior Professional National Championship in […]

University of Iowa Hall of Fame golfer Sean McCarty has qualified for three major championships and played in 11 PGA Tour events overall during a nearly three-decade pro career. However, the 11-time Iowa PGA Section Player of the Year felt a bit unprepared for an end-of-October appearance in the PGA Senior Professional National Championship in Florida. “I can't even get on my own golf course anymore to practice,” laughed Mr. McCarty, director of golf at Brown Deer Golf Club in Coralville. “Honestly, I've been out there only three to four times this year.” The 51-year-old West Branch native’s game has been the unfortunate victim of a golf explosion that courses across Eastern Iowa have seen since the COVID-19 pandemic hit in March 2020. “Golf was one of the few things you could do with friends and still be socially distanced,” recalled Jon Waddell, the longtime head professional at Palmer Hills in Bettendorf. “That really brought a lot of people back to the game that maybe had left -- and also introduced tons of new people to golf. We were just fortunate to be in an industry that benefited from COVID -- similar to biking and camping and fishing and anything outdoors.” The numbers are staggering, according to Dave Roe, the superintendent of golf operations for the City of Cedar Rapids. While the three 18-hole city courses under Mr. Roe’s purview averaged a combined 80,000-85,000 rounds before the pandemic in a typical year, the figure has ballooned to around 120,000 rounds combined in the fiscal year completed in June.  Just from fiscal year 2021-2022 to fiscal year 2022-2023, he added, the number of total rounds increased by 20,000. “And it’s still growing,” said Mr. Roe, who oversees Ellis, Gardner and Twin Pines golf courses. “Each month since July in this new year so far has been bigger than the same month last year.”

Mr. McCarty said with decent weather expected to allow golfers to play in November and early December, Brown Deer anticipates being close to 36,000 rounds by the end of this calendar year. That is an increase of roughly 10,000 rounds, he said, from a pre-COVID year. “We're poised to do close to 40,000 rounds this year -- and that's a number that we've never done before in all my years here,” added Mr. Waddell, who celebrated his 28th anniversary in June as Palmer’s head pro. “Pre-pandemic you could pretty safely call the morning of and get a tee time that afternoon – but certainly you want to plan farther ahead these days,” he said. “The prime times are pretty tough. The mornings from our first tee time until 11 a.m. -- those book out probably three days in advance. Same with the weekends.” Similar conditions are reported at other Quad Cities courses including Red Hawk Golf & Learning Center – which is unique among Davenport’s three public courses because it is a nine-hole facility, and it does not take tee times – with a focus on being a great place to start playing golf. “It’s finally been slowing down for us since the high school boys’ golf season ended” (on Oct. 7), said Red Hawk’s Head Pro Brant McGivern. “But there have been some Sundays where we were out of carts starting at 10:30 a.m., so you would get done playing your nine holes and somebody is standing there waiting for your cart. “May’s numbers were up 50% – no rainouts had something to do with that – but we’re up about 30% on the year overall and that’s a lot.”

Common links to successes

Mr. Waddell said local golf course operators saw the start of this wave just prior to the pandemic when they were busy combatting what had been a dip in participation by adding new programs and amenities to grow the game. For instance, the nonprofit youth program First Tee Quad Cities launched in 2001 and has been bringing more and more youngsters to the links. “There are so many young girls now, I can't believe it,” said Mr. McGivern, one of three coaches on the First Tee staff – with Red Hawk among the program’s host courses. “There's some classes where we only have one or two girls, but we have a lot of classes where there are 12 girls and two boys. First Tee also has helped a lot of kids play high school and college golf.” The growth of girls’ golf also has translated into more and more women playing the sport, which has resulted in an ever-increasing demand for Ladies Leagues. “Some nights we have 100 women come out to play on a Tuesday night,” Mr. McCarty said. “Pre-COVID we were averaging about 80, which was great. But now it’s really skyrocketing.” Ladies Leagues used to be a morning activity mostly for housewives and retirees.

“But now they are even in the evenings with big companies forming their own Ladies Leagues for their employees to improve their networking and team building,” Mr. Roe said while noting golf is no longer confined to executives or the male-dominated board rooms. Both of the Ladies Leagues at Palmer Hills are maxed out as a result of that change. “We don't have a whole lot of room for leagues -- everybody wants to play after work and there's only so many of those times to go around,” Mr. Waddell said. “But there is a wee little spot next year that I think is going to get filled with another Ladies League.” While First Tee is talking about expanding to Iowa City in the near future, the Cedar Rapids public courses offer a Junior Golf Academy and “Get Golf Ready” classes for women during the summer. Palmer Hills also has a wide variety of classes and clinics for youth, women and beginners. Additionally, Mr. McCarty reports seeing more couples and families playing together than ever before. “There's just a nonstop wave of new golfers. It's incredible,” said Mr. Roe, who this summer celebrated his 31st year in Cedar Rapids’ golf industry. “I think a lot of it is when your friends start golfing and they want to hang out – and a golf course is a great place to hang out.” Many courses also have remodeled facilities recently – especially their driving ranges – with Mr. McGivern citing a study by the PGA finding more people practice golf skills than actually play the game. For instance, Duck Creek Golf Course in Davenport is among the courses nationally that started a “Cosmic Driving Range” in 2023 to attract players of all abilities to a fun sundown experience with neon lighting, glowing targets and quirky sounds. And besides a renovated driving range, Palmer Hills also added in 2021 The Forge – an 18-hole putting course planned prior to the pandemic to help include even the non-golfers in an office golf party or corporate golf outing. “Not everybody golfs, but everyone can putt,” Mr. Waddell said, also noting an uptick in corporate events since starting The Forge. All of that bodes well for the future. “What we're going through right now probably isn't just some little blip where we have a few good years,” he said. “Just looking at the junior numbers makes you think this boom we're in is going to last a while.”

Other factors for increases

Drought conditions again this summer kept courses from suffering many rainouts. Instead of the usual five per month, Mr. Roe said, the Cedar Rapids courses lost only a half day to rain from their March opening until September.

A hotter-than-normal summer also led to more cart rentals, Mr. McGivern added, with the only downer being increased maintenance costs to battle the effects of hot and dry conditions on the courses. “It was kind of a crappy spring, but man, when it finally warmed up, it was just beautiful,” Mr. McCarty said of those favorable conditions. “Every weekend we were just packed and even on weekdays it was hard to find a tee time.” There are 306 slots on a full tee sheet at Brown Deer – but Mr. McCarty reported reaching a high of 299 slots filled only once. “But anything over 200 rounds a day to me is a lot,” he added, “and we had a lot of days like that.” Some rural and smaller courses in the Corridor and Quad Cities markets closed during the pandemic and have not reopened, the operators all noted, which also has driven players to the existing courses. “The little nine-hole courses in our area closed,” Mr. Roe said. “Those courses weren't able to hang in there because of the increasing cost of maintenance. Even grass seed has doubled in price since COVID. Staffing also became tougher for them, too.” More companies are working hybrid schedules -- or allow employees to work remotely. “I see a lot of people doing work on their phones or meeting customers on the course,” Mr. McCarty said.

Supply & demand apply?

Despite the increasing demands, there are no plans by Cedar Rapids to add any golf courses in the near future. “I would have to see this continue for a couple more years before recommending adding a course,” Mr. Roe said. “Because the last time this happened -- back when there was the ‘Tiger (Woods) effect’ and golf courses exploded -- we ended up losing a lot of them because they just couldn't survive when the interest in golf went down.”

In Bettendorf, Mr. Waddell said there are no significant additions planned at the city-owned Palmer Hills – or any other course in the area right now. Mr. McGivern agreed – especially with the new Iron Tee indoor golf facility added to the Quad Cities landscape in 2024 at the TBK Bank Sports Complex. “We'll just kind of take care of what we've got right now,” Mr. Waddell said. “I don't think what they're (Iron Tee) offering is in direct competition, but hopefully it's something that introduces more people to the game, and we all benefit from that.” Golf courses in the Corridor have the same sort of addition to their local links menu with a new golf attraction there starting leagues in November. A new PinSeekers, which has been under construction for months, offers 56 heated driving suites along with mini golf, mini bowling and a full restaurant off of Interstate 380 in Tiffin. Mr. McCarty said even though he believes there are enough courses in the Corridor to manage even more growth in the future, a new course in the right area would be a huge hit.   “I was thinking it was going to eventually stop, but it got even busier this year,” Mr. McCarty added. “Every month was busier than the same month last year, which set records, so why not try and ride this wave?”