The year 2016 was either a very strong one for golf in Colorado — at least based on number of rounds played — or it dipped a bit compared to 2015.
It all depends on the data utilized, and the types of courses included in surveys.
For instance, Golf Datatech earlier this year in its “National Golf Rounds Played Report”, noted that rounds played in Colorado in 2016 were up 6.5 percent from 2015.
That’s pretty impressive — one of the highest figures for a given state or group of states, according to Golf Datatech. In fact, Colorado’s percentage increase was surpassed only by those of Georgia (10.8%); Indiana (9.8%); Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont (7.5% combined); and Oklahoma (6.8%). Nationwide, Golf Datatech reported that rounds played increased 0.6 percent from 2015 to ’16.
According to the golfdatatech.com website, “Golf Datatech’s report is designed to statistically measure golf participation by tracking rounds played from a representative base of courses throughout the country. … All golf courses in the U.S. are invited to participate in the report.”
However, the CGA collects data of its own — aimed at only public courses, unlike Golf Datatech — and its results are markedly different. Based upon 70 public courses that responded to the survey and that reported specific figures for both 2015 and 2016, the Colorado Public Golf Course Rounds and Revenue Survey indicated that rounds in 2016 were down 0.8 percent compared to 2015.
So what does CGA executive director Ed Mate make of it all?
“As usual, it’s a derivative of weather,” he said. “It was a great fall (in 2016). I don’t think (less than) 1 percent is a material change. It was definitely trending way below that, but the strong finish to the year brought it back up closer to what would be considered average.
“The credibility of the numbers is mixed. It’s like any stats: You hope there’s enough good data in there. Some courses don’t respond (to the surveys), and some of it is guesstimates.”
Regionally in the Rounds and Revenue Survey, metro Denver courses were down an average of 1.5 percent in rounds played in 2016, while North Region courses were up 2.1 percent, and Colorado Springs and Pueblo courses together were up 4.6 percent. In each case, that’s for courses reporting figures for both of the past two years.
“There was a slight dip for some facilities, but there are plenty that saw an increase,” Colorado PGA executive director Eddie Ainsworth noted in an email. “With such a slight percentage drop overall you can definitely attribute this to the weather we experienced. Our (Colorado PGA) tournaments were down quite a bit last year and it was 100 percent weather-based. Having said this, I believe our PGA professionals have done an outstanding job in stabilizing the game of golf of the past several years and with great weather in 2017 we will see rounds increase considerably.”
In both 2014 and ’15, rounds at Colorado public courses were up compared to the previous years, according to the CGA’s Rounds and Revenue Survey. They increased 3.6 percent from 2013 to ’14, and 1.2 percent from ’14 to ’15. Prior to that, rounds decreased from the previous season in three of the four years from 2010 through 2013.
Though Colorado public course operators share their statistics on the condition that data from individual facilities aren’t divulged publicly, trends and averages from the survey can be reported.
As for green-fee revenue, it was down slightly on average last year — 0.2 percent for the facilities that reported figures in both 2015 and ’16.
