November 9, 2015

Pellucid Corp. Releases October Golf Playable Hours Report

At the national level, October weather came in mathematically flat as Golf Playable Hours (GPH) registered -0.2% vs. Year Ago (YA). That result had little impact on the Year-to-Date (YtD) figure which remained at +1% vs. YA or statistically flat. The YtD regional positive/negative breadth ratio remained positive at 3:1 with 20 regions having favorable weather against 6 regions with unfavorable weather (the remaining 19 regions fall in the neutral zone of +/- 2%). Looking at YtD weather impact performance by day-of-week, favorability is relatively balanced across weekdays vs. weekends with a marginal edge to weekdays. Looking to the year-end forecast for GPH, we’re seeing an uptick from previous projections now forecasting that we’ll see a modest gain vs. both the previous year and the 10-year average. The supporting figures for the 2015 full-year comparative GPH for Total US, the comparison to the 10-year average and the day-of-week breakdowns are available to Geographic Weather Impact Tracking report purchasers or Pellucid Publications Members via the Client Login section at the Pellucid website (go to www.pellucidcorp.com to subscribe or for more information; for information-seekers we’ll send you a sample of the ’14 1st half actual results to review).

Looking back at September rounds played as reported by Golf Datatech/NGF to calculate the facility % Utilization Rate (UR), the rounds demand increase was better than the GPH figure producing a gain in Utilization for the month (that’s the second month we’ve beat the weather, albeit only marginally both times). For the YtD period, marginal rounds demand gain trails the modestly positive GPH figures resulting in fractionally lower Utilization through September vs. YA. The supporting figures are also contained in the Geographic Weather Impact Tracking report or Pellucid Publications Membership monthly updates.

Jim Koppenhaver comments, “From a weather perspective, Mother Nature appears to be intent on giving us pretty much what we had last year which, interestingly, is also +/- 1% from the 10-year average. So, this is pretty much about as “normal” a Fall as you’re going to see at the national level on the weather front. Beneath the basically flat national picture however is a tapestry of ups and downs. Texas wasn’t as fortunate in October as we saw all three regions with declines in GPH of >2%. The Phoenix area also took a meaningful hit in GPH for the month which we anticipate seeing reflected in next month’s rounds numbers for that market. On the positive side of the ledger, the Upper Midwest and Great Lakes region (including Pellucid World HQ) are seeing some very benign Fall weather which is giving football a run for its money in share-of-mind up here. Atlanta is also having a good season as it relates to weather (unfortunately that’s not translating to rounds however as subscribers to the market-level data will see in the falling Utilization rates). As mentioned above, we did see some meaningful changes this month in the YE forecast for GPH to the upside which are likely reflecting some of the very mild Fall weather. The other potential upcoming factor is that the world weather prognosticators are projecting that a strong El Niño season will bring a drier warmer pattern to the north (won’t necessarily help golf that much) and a cooler, wetter pattern to the more southern latitudes (which potentially will put a damper on some of our counter-seasonal GPH). We’ll see how it turns out, in the words of the immortal Yogi Berra, “It’s hard to make predictions, especially about the future.”

A broader and more detailed scorecard of the monthly key industry metrics, including the Revenue and Rate figures, can be found in Pellucid’s free digital magazine, The Pellucid Perspective. To register to get the current and future editions, go to www.pellucidcorp.com/news/elist, fill in the information and you’ll be registered for the next edition on 11/15/15.

Intelligent, curious and courageous industry stakeholders wanting the detailed metrics and monthly updates on weather impact at the national, regional and market level as well as utilization and the full year forecast numbers have two subscription options:
Subscribe to the Geographic Weather Impact Analysis Trackingservice ($299, 12 reports annually at national, 45 weather regions and 61 key markets levels) or
Subscribe to the Pellucid Publications Membership (Outside the Ropes monthly newsletter, 2014 State of the Industry, 2013 Industry Golf Consumer Franchise Scorecard, Geographic Weather Impact Analysis tracking, 2014 Top 25 US Golf Markets reports, Golf Participant Base Projection analysis) for $495 annually.

For individual facility owner/operators who need facility-level history, current year results by month and day-of-week and full year forecast data, Pellucid/Edgehill’s self-serve, web-delivered, real-time weather impact service product, Cognilogic, is your answer. It’s available for $240 for the year-end report and unlimited annual access via the Cognilogic web portal or $120 for a single year-end report. For more information, contact Stuart Lindsay of Edgehill Golf Advisors (mailto:edgehillgolf@msn.com) or click here Order Cognilogic

You can order any of the above information services via Pellucid’s Online Store.

Contact:
Jim Koppenhaver, President, Pellucid Corp.
jimk@pellucidcorp.com
pellucidcorp.com