Jake Belveal is the PGA Head Professional at Four Seasons Resort at Hualalai, in Kailua Kona, Hawaii.

Jake Belveal on the importance of hosting fun family events:
Having a core set of golfers that supports your club events and remain reliable players every weekend, is essential to continued success at every golf facility. However, it is also nice to see their spouses and children at the club now and again. With that in mind it is important to create fun playing and social opportunities for families to come together to enjoy the amenities that their club offers, and further build upon the relationships that are forged throughout the year. We facilitate several such events each year that our members love and support. One of them is a Par-3 tournament held on our driving range. We transform our practice facility into a course with holes between 40 and 100 yards, enabling most players to utilize only three or four clubs during the event. Members form their own teams that play the tournament using the Peoria scoring system. With a summer-themed menu including, hamburgers and hot dogs, the laid-back atmosphere during the tournament is the biggest attraction to our highly-active and very busy members. Also popular among members is our series of Night-Golf events. With about ten such occasions annually, these 5-hole events are immensely popular with our young families and their kids. Regardless of your facility type and the amenities you offer, all clubs can offer these enjoyable events that bring families together. There are many options on what to offer in tournament format and prizes, as well as whether to have food and drink, and even what you charge to participate.

Jake Belveal on the business impact of hosting fun family events:
It is important to engage your youngest members and families as often as possible. When you consider that in addition to the revenue generated now, they are your core golfers of the future and should be made to feel like a major part of the club, just as much as your current golfers whose names appear on the tee sheet every Saturday and Sunday. There are many clubs out there that can increase their efforts to engage families and young members, and in addition to your youth camps and clinics, these fun events are ideal to not only engage kids, but those young golfers and their parents as well. Also, these events bring non-golfers to the course, highlighting the laid back, fun side of the game that we all know exists, but is often hidden to those who don’t play often or at all. Through these family-friendly events, we also increase participation in our youth camps and clinics, as well as boost lessons, driving range usage, food and beverage revenue, and golf shop sales. We all know that the more people are on site, the better the club does financially. The responsibility is ours to be creative, engaging, and proactive in offering ample opportunities for families to enjoy their club, as a family.

If you would like to email the author of this Best Practice directly, please email jake.belveal@yahoo.com