Here’s three top golf industry trends from April 2022

Alistair Dunsmuir
By Alistair Dunsmuir May 2, 2022 10:45

The 2022 golfing season properly took off in April, and with it came new signs of how much the industry has grown in the last two years.

Many clubs that saw Covid losses are now soaring

While most golf clubs performed strongly in the first year of the pandemic despite course closures, those that relied heavily on international visitors, accommodation and their food and beverage offerings pre-2020 typically struggled.

That now seems to be changing though.

For example, Lahinch Golf Club, which is usually popular with overseas visitors, suffered an operating loss of more than a quarter of a million pounds in 2020. But according to its latest annual report for the club, it has recorded an operating surplus of more than £800,000.

Golf can now be considered a unisex activity

One of the reasons why every men-only golf club in the UK opened up to female members in the last decade was to help increase the proportion of women who play the game, but for years it stubbornly stuck at around 13 percent.

Then came the pandemic and the latest figures show that 34 percent of full length golf course users are now women – perhaps the biggest change in golfing demographics in recent history.

The messaging about the health benefits of playing golf has been helped by Covid

The golf industry has been promoting the health benefits of playing the game for years but it might be that the pandemic has broken the message through.

The American Heart Association, one of the world’s leading sources of information on cardiovascular disease, has said that ‘unhealthy lifestyle behaviours’ picked up in the last two years has meant that many people, especially older adults, need ‘an enjoyable activity that can feed our hearts and our souls’, and golf fits the bill.

It has been citing studies that highlight the health benefits of playing golf at least once per month.

 

Alistair Dunsmuir
By Alistair Dunsmuir May 2, 2022 10:45
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1 Comment

  1. Peter May 2, 18:16

    YEP !! There are real and good reasons to be optimistic !! However, that optimism, needs to be based in reality !! Extreme optimists, will stop paying attention, take their eye off the goal and find their orgnizations in trouble again !!

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