How the pandemic led to golf’s spike in popularity both in Sacramento and nationwide
Golf can be an immensely frustrating game.
Golfers use an odd-shaped club to whack a dimpled ball hundreds of yards at a time — toward a hole a few inches wide. It can feel impossible to those who have never done it before.
But then comes practice, eventually hitting the ball off a sweet spot of the club face and seeing it launch farther than what seemed possible, almost effortlessly somehow. It happens again and again until the new golfer is hooked on the feeling of hitting it pure while finding that green or fairway.
For all the difficulties and frustrations, it’s the reward of the good shots that keeps golfers coming back, whether they’re just trying to break 100 for the first time or shoot an even-par 72. Channel 10 producer and former 1140 KHTK sports radio host Matt George, 27, got seriously hooked by those sweet shots during the pandemic.
“It’s like a drug in that way,” George said. “There have been many times where I have been frustrated to the point of saying, ‘Man, I just want to take a break, I don’t want to play anymore.’ And then I’d get home and two hours later, I’m already in the backyard working on the swing, trying to fix it.”
That druglike high has been chased at a rate never seen before both nationally and regionally in Sacramento since the pandemic began in March 2020.
Mike Woods, vice president and general manager of the popular Haggin Oaks Golf Complex a few miles northeast of downtown Sacramento, said the number of rounds played has increased 30% to 40% since the pandemic began.
According to financial reports obtained by The Bee, the public Cordova Golf Course more than doubled its yearly income from June 2020 to June 2021, from $654,440 to $1.328 million.
Those increases fall in line with a nationwide trend. The National Golf Association reported numbers earlier this year that surpassed increased expectations brought on by the pandemic. A record 6.2 million people either took up golf for the first time or returned to play regularly after starting years earlier. The only other time golf has seen a similar uptick came in 1997, when a 21-year-old Tiger Woods won his first green jacket at the Masters by a record 12 strokes.
From June 2020 through the end of the year in the United States, more than 75 million more rounds were played than over the same stretch in 2019. The number of rounds played in California in April 2021 versus April 2020 was up 207%.
“What we saw was demand go through the roof,” Woods said.
Golf well-suited to weather a pandemic
What led the sport that many consider stuffy, time-consuming and expensive to become one of the most popular pastimes in the country? The game’s strong points were highlighted by the pandemic.
“What was very clear when COVID hit,” said Woods, “was that people were looking for a safe, outdoor, recreational activity, and we were all trying to figure out what is this COVID thing and how does this work and how does this restrict my life and how do I stay safe? And it became really clear, very quickly, that golf — at any golf course — really fit that bill really well because it naturally spaces you out.”
Golf, of course, could be played outside and allow people to remain social while still distancing properly, even while the pandemic was at its peak last summer and through the holiday season. It gives people a chance to get outside, enjoy fresh air and get away from the happenings of the world or quarantining inside the house. Golf saw a similar uptick to other popular outdoor hobbies such as hiking, biking and camping.
But unlike those hobbies, golf can more tangibly scratch a competitive itch. It was especially helpful with team sports and gyms that were shut down throughout the area amid coronavirus protocols, while golf was still accessible.
“I used to play softball. That’s a team sport, and team sports were shut down, so it definitely let me get some competitiveness out,” said Nate Lee, a 31-year-old teacher at SAVA Charter School in south Sacramento who began playing golf for the first time during the pandemic.
“I’ve definitely always had a competitive drive. Because it was more than just exercise. I have a road bike, and road biking is fun, but you’re just by yourself and there’s no competition really. Golf was a cool thing to do where I could compete with myself, if not with other people around, because you’re wanting to hit a shot, you’re wanting to a par a hole.”
Lee’s and George’s stories are similar to the millions of others who began golfing as a pandemic respite. They both invested in clubs, either new or second hand, and began going to driving ranges or playing rounds multiple times a week as their schedules allowed. Like so many others, they became hooked. They might not have if the pandemic hadn’t change everything about daily life.
Supply, demand for equipment
The spike in new golfers has also led to a worldwide surge in demand for equipment. Golf-fitting stores during the pandemic saw wait times for appointments reach weeks or even more than a month. Lessons and fittings at Haggin Oaks, Woods said, would have to be made multiple weeks in advance despite the complex having 16 PGA-licensed coaches.
Which also meant the supply of equipment struggled to keep up with demand.
“Just like the rest of the world, the supply chain in equipment has been completely broken and there’s massive challenges with delivery times,” Woods said. “And so those individuals getting new clubs, they tend to get fitted for the clubs; we order them for them in the specifications that fit their body and their swing. You used to be able to get them in two weeks, no problem, and it’s more common now that it’s going to take four, six, eight, 10 weeks.”
The slow turnaround times aren’t slowing down equipment sales. According to the National Golf Foundation, equipment sales reached a record $1 billion in the third quarter of 2020 — 42% higher than the previous year and 18% higher than the previous third-quarter high in 2007.
On a recent Tuesday morning at Haggin Oaks, well before lunch time, dozens of golfers were on the driving range, which boasts the new Toptracer technology added to each stall.
Toptracer comes with a touchscreen at every stall, allowing golfers to track their shots and even play holes virtually. It’s one of the many upgrades the Haggin Oaks complex has made thanks to increased revenue since the pandemic began. The Toptracer technology is rented from Top Golf. It was installed in July, to rave reviews.
Other ways golf courses are reinvesting their new profits from the pandemic include rebuilding bunkers, resurfacing greens, improving irrigation systems, buying more golf carts and paving cart paths for a smoother ride than trekking over gravel.
All of which is much needed for courses throughout the area, Woods said, because of a long-term decline in golf’s popularity before the pandemic.
“We were, and golf in general was, in a mode of rising costs and diminishing revenues,” Woods said. “And we were running our business and doing what we do with less, and we were on kind of a 15-year slide of trying to make golf facilities work when the revenues were shrinking a half a percent each year.”
The increased revenue allowed Haggin Oaks to do “things that you just didn’t have to do, that you really wanted to do, now you do them and invest into the property and make things better for the golfers and invest in the future,” Woods said.
The challenge for Woods at Haggin Oaks and other courses throughout the area is finding ways to improve the experience for golfers while knowing the spike in golf’s popularity is likely to cycle back as the pandemic slows.
“The long-term trend of working from home is going to continue to go a direction of more people working more days from home remotely,” Woods said. “I think as long as that goes, golf is going to be in a really good place. People, when they work from home, I think are going to have more control over their time, and they want to get out and socialize with their friends, they want to get outside, and people have found golf as a perfect avenue for that.”
This story was originally published November 5, 2021 at 5:00 AM.
