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Golf Meetings

Author: Karen Misuraca
July 2007

Features

Golf Made Easy

Want to build relationships with customers or coworkers? Or, do you need some fresh ideas for team building, client entertainment or incentives and rewards? One of the most popular ways to fulfill these needs is to combine business with pleasure in a golf outing. A day of golfing, along with fun contests and surprises, is a welcome group event, particularly when added to a conference or a meeting.


Even if you have never laid eyes on a golf course or tried to swing a club yourself, planning a golf tournament and other golf-related activities may be easier than you think. “We have put on corporate and other group golf events for literally decades, and now we do about 125 a year,” says Dan Edson, director of sales and marketing at Silverado Resort in the Napa Valley. “We often work with meeting planners who are not golfers,” he adds. “All we need to know is the group size, your budget and what kind of experience you want your players to have, and we take it from there.”


First impressions are on Edson’s mind when he sets up the players’ arrival area at Silverado. “Anticipation is high when they see a banner and the big “leader board” posted with their names, right at the bag drop,” he reports. “We usually set out continental breakfast, a ‘tee prize’ bag of goodies like tees, a sleeve of balls, maybe protein bars and sunscreen. Sometimes we include logo items like hats or towels. And, if our client wants to make this a once-in-a-lifetime experience, we can arrange to have a sports celebrity on hand to greet people, and even play golf with them, too.”


PUTTING THE PACKAGE TOGETHER

To work out a schedule, a budget and all the details, you may be working with a director of sales and marketing or a tournament director. At some clubs, your go-to person will be the director of golf; this is the trained professional who heads up the staff of golf pros and who sidelines as the tournament coordinator.


The club will help you with pairing (deciding who plays in each foursome) and advise you on a tournament format appropriate to your goals, the players’ skills and the length of time you have available. They will produce a pairing sheet and a complete schedule of activities for you. For a typical tournament like this, the package price usually includes a number of amenities such as practice range balls, use of golf carts and rental clubs; bottles of water and towels are packed in the carts.


Additionally, they will often have their pros organize a complimentary putting contest, which makes a nice icebreaker for the group.


Negotiable is the cost of food, beverages, prizes, the tournament format itself and such extras as welcome gifts, souvenir photos or DVDs, as well as special commemorative items like logo shirts, hats or towels. Corporate and company groups often want personalized signage, banners and even logo flags for each hole—all of which the club can make available.  


For tournament and contest prizes, the pro shop may offer better value than if you purchase prizes yourself. Further, pro shop gift certificates are among the most popular prizes. Through relationships with their suppliers, a pro shop can often help obtain sponsorships from companies that will donate or discount golf equipment and accessories, balls, logo flags and banners.  


Transportation may be part of the package, likewise staff assistance throughout the day—from attendants at the “bag drop” to club cleaning at the end of the round. Be sure to ask if staff tips are included in your package price.


Many courses and resorts host a hundred or more golf events a year. Every year, the Ko Olina Golf Club on the island of Oahu in Hawaii, for example, works with more than 40 groups of 50 people or more—as well as over 100 smaller groups—for such clients as the National Football League, Boeing and Sprint. The good news: a savvy staff will have tried-and-true golf outing programs. The bad news: the more popular the club, the more advance notice is required for booking. A minimum of three to six months is the usual lead time, although a high season booking may require a contract confirmed as long as a year ahead.


TOURNAMENT FORMAT

When choosing a tournament format, rely on the golf club coordinator to help you plan a day that will be fun for everyone. In the end, it’s not about the scores, it’s about having a good time and making memories. As a planner, your goal is to make it nonintimidating for every golfer, while giving the low-handicappers––the better players––a good challenge. A variety of tournament and contest formats are designed to do just that.


The “Scramble” is the most popular tournament format for groups because it takes the pressure off individual player scores by creating 2-, 3- or 4-person teams of varying abilities (based on their actual or estimated handicaps). Each plays their own ball, and the team then plays from where the best ball lands, and so on throughout the round. Thus, every player has a chance to contribute, and the format ensures faster play.


A “twilight,” or late afternoon, tee-off will lower the greens fees, and a 9-hole tournament, of course, costs less than 18 holes. Scheduling off-season and Monday through Thursday will result in lower fees, too.


An 18-hole course can handle 144 players for a rather long day of golf—typically about 4.5 hours plus added activities. Seventy-two players (18 foursomes) is a more manageable group that will finish in a few hours.


Tee-offs are usually timed for about 8 a.m. with lunch to follow the round. They can also begin around 1 p.m., followed by an informal after-golf cocktail hour and a casual awards dinner, or alternately, a freshen-up interval and a more formal evening.


FOOD AND BEVERAGE

Depending on your budget, you may precede an early morning tournament with continental breakfast, followed by snacks and drinks on the course and an awards ceremony lunch. For late morning or noontime tee-offs, a box lunch is usually given to players to eat on the course.


Although receptions and awards dinners are held in the golf clubhouse or in banquet rooms, some of the most enjoyable are al fresco barbecues, picnics and buffets. In the mild climate of the California Wine Country, Silverado Resort has a secluded redwood grove where burgers and hot dogs are grilled during the day, and intimate after-golf parties are set up under the trees or in hospitality tents. “We have many repeat groups,” reports Edson, “because they enjoy the privacy we can provide and the feeling of being in a sort of magical oasis away from the world outside.”


Be creative with your receptions and meals by asking a winery owner or winemaker to put on a wine tasting, or a brewmaster to come in with a selection of microbeers and ales.


REVVING UP THE EXCITEMENT

Your golf outing will be remembered and talked about for years to come when you surprise your players with treats and amenities throughout the day. Ask the club coordinator what they can offer on a complimentary basis, and add more according to your budget.


Between the 9th and 10th holes, set up a snacks-and-drinks station, presenting fresh fruit smoothies, beer and chips, or lemonade and cookies. On cold days, bring in hot chocolate, coffee or hot buttered rum.


Expecting the temperature to rise during the round? On the back nine, offer frozen, damp, rolled-up towels to refresh the face. Cold, citrus-scented “Oshi-bori” towels are piled on trays on Poipu Bay Golf Course on Kauai. And, just when golfers feel the heat of the desert sun at Troon North in Scottsdale, a staffer cruises around with icy Evian water, asking, “May I spray your face?”


A white-jacketed waiter at the Four Seasons Resort Punta Mita near Puerto Vallarta offers fresh mango smoothies after the 9th hole, while sexy beverage-cart girls serve piña coladas on the fairways of Bali Hai Golf Club on the Las Vegas Strip.
You can arrange to delight your players with chair massage on the practice range, as they do at Coeur d’Alene Golf & Spa Resort in Idaho and at the Golf Club at Quail Lodge Resort in Carmel Valley, Calif.


At a Rotary Club outing on the links in Sonoma County’s Windsor Golf Club, guacamole and tequila shots were served on the front nine, followed by a keg of beer awaiting players at the turn, and going even further with oysters on the half shell and white wine on the 15th hole––choose your poison!


To up the excitement factor, give every player a shot at prizes. Ask the golf club to set up mini-contests on the course, such as Longest Drive, Closest to the Pin, Casino holes and other challenges. At some tournaments—particularly fund-raisers—a pro is waiting on one hole, offering to make a drive or a putt for each player––for a price.


For a sizable group, and a cost of a few hundred dollars on up to two thousand, you can arrange with a hole-in-one insurance company to place a new car at one or more of the 3-par holes as the prize for anyone who makes a hole in one. Among the prizes offered at past Half Moon Bay Golf Links tournaments have been Land Rovers, Dell computers, Bose music systems and sets of golf clubs. The club tournament director can direct you to such companies as American Hole ’n One.


OFF-COURSE ENTERTAINMENT

Don’t overlook the driving range and the practice putting green as venues for golf-related activities. The pros at The Golf Club at Eagle Mountain in Arizona often conduct a pre-tournament instructional clinic, which gets everyone excited about the game, relaxes them and offers a chance to warm up.


The staff at the Half Moon Bay Golf Links near San Francisco are creative geniuses when it comes to add-on events. They set up a huge projection screen in the club parking lot, take the roofs off the golf carts and show “drive-in movies,” complete with souvenir blankets and car-hop waiters on roller skates giving out cotton candy, popcorn and adult beverages.

Luminescent balls are brought out for Glow-in-the-Dark Golf and slot machines and poker tables for Monte Carlo Night awards dinners. Tournament Director Brett Armstrong says, “We have hosted over 1,200 tournaments for private groups, charities and corporations. On our two oceanside courses we can handle groups of 16 to 300 players.” The adjacent Ritz-Carlton, Half Moon Bay comes in handy, too, with clifftop patios and banquet rooms, as does the also-adjacent Beach House at Half Moon Bay.


On balmy evenings, Ko Olina Golf Club uses their driving range as an after-golf site for live musical performances on an outdoor stage, and for dining under the stars or in tents. “We specialize in custom planning to fit every need and budget of our groups,” says Ko Olina’s sales and marketing manager, Carey Pinklesimer. “It may be limousines or shuttle buses, margaritas or mai tais on the golf course, or arranging for sponsors. It might be a Jimmy Buffett-style ‘parrot head’ party or a luau—just ask! We have GPS on our golf carts, so we can have the client company send fun messages to the players throughout the day.”


Golf breaks are becoming popular options for between-meeting relaxers, from a mini-golf obstacle course that a club will set up on their practice greens, to putting contests. The Desert Springs, A JW Marriott Resort & Spa in Palm Desert, offers a sure distraction from the stress of a conference or a company meeting by giving everyone a putter for an hour or so of easy competition negotiating sand bunkers, water hazards and rolling “fairways” on their 18-hole putting course.


A 10,000-square-foot expanse of velvet-green lawn will soon be the site of after-golf parties at the Grand Golf Club North San Diego County. Surrounded by the Tom Fazio-designed and recently refurbished golf course, The Grand del Mar luxury resort hotel will open this fall in all its Mediterranean splendor. Expansive tenting of the outdoor pavilion and a gazebo will accommodate larger groups, while awards receptions and dinners can be held in the 2,500-square-foot Veranda Room, an intimate venue with dual stone fireplaces and a wide terrace overlooking the golf course.


NONGOLFERS NEED LOVE, TOO

Many resorts accommodate spouses and nongolfers with Golf Widow spa packages as well as sightseeing and shopping expeditions—with everyone meeting up at the end of the day. For a corporate incentive trip to the Four Seasons Resort Punta Mita, organized by Doug Mikel of Motivation Excellence, Inc., the resort set up a cocktail party on their signature island hole, the Tail of the Whale, a black volcanic atoll just offshore. Mikel says, “Everyone, even the nongolfers, took a shot at teeing off to reach the green, then we were all chauffeured across the sandbar in an amphibious golf cart for cocktails and hors d’oeuvres. After that, we caravanned in carts over the course to a lawn area near the clubhouse, where live music was playing and we partied and danced. This was very nice for spouses and others to get a chance to enjoy the beautiful golf course.”


GET SOME HELP

Hiring a golf-event or golf-tour company may be the way to save time and money, and to streamline the planning stages. With in-depth knowledge of the 200-plus golf courses in the Scottsdale/Phoenix area, Scott Samele at Scottsdale Swing specializes in smaller corporate groups who want customized packages. “With a marketing background from Silicon Valley, I know that companies expect personalized attention to details,” he says. “We put together turnkey golf outings at some of the lesser-known but hidden-gem golf courses that are particularly player friendly and non-intimidating, such as Sun Ridge Canyon and The Golf Club at Eagle Mountain. According to budget, abilities of the players and overall goals, we arrange transportation, lodging, meals, golf, of course, and even extracurricular touring and social events.”


Working through a tour company with established relationships may cost no more than if you deal directly with a club or a resort, and often the tour company can get a better deal. Jerry Rockwell of JDR Tours says, “We have long-established contracts with courses around the western states, and we do the negotiating for our clients. At Mt. Woodson Golf Club in San Diego, at Entrada at Snow Canyon Country Club in St. George, Utah, and at the spectacular courses in Whistler, B.C., we’ll do better, cost-wise, by 20 percent or more, for a meeting planner who is not familiar with those clubs.”


A former pro golfer on what is now known as the Nationwide Tour, Rockwell loves to put together unique golf trips. For one cadre of golf-hungry plumbing contractors, he set up 54 holes in a day of golf at Whistler, followed by several more 36-hole days. Needless to say, evenings were quiet.


The Pinnacle Experience is another company that produces incentive and client entertainment golf trips and events, both abroad and around the country. Their client roster has included JP Morgan, Deutsche Bank, Sysco Systems, Land Rover and Jaguar. Going beyond the basic golf-tournament format, Pinnacle focuses on the total experience of the event in each of their programs.


Finally, relax! As a player, schedule yourself in the first foursome to tee off, in order to be available to check on arrangements for the after-golf events—and so you will be on hand to greet your happy golfers as they head for the 19th hole! 

 

WHACKY QUACKY GOLF TERMS 

  • Albatross: a score of 3 under par on a hole, also known as a double eagle.
  • Birdie: a score of one less than par for any hole.
  • Chicken Wing: an awkward wing-like appearance when the player pokes his/her elbow out when hitting the ball.
  • Dogleg: a hole with a fairway that bends significantly to the right or left. 
  • Dog Track: a poorly maintained golf course; also known as a goat path or a cow pasture.
  • Duck Hook or Quacker: a golf shot that turns sharply to the left.
  • Eagle: a score of 2 under par on any hole.
  • Elephant Burial Ground: refers to the mounds on the greens of some holes; this is where your golf game goes to die.
  • Frog Hair: also called the fringe or the apron; a border of grass between the putting green and the rough or fairway.
  • Gator Grip or Claw Grip: an unusual putter grip, when the fingers of the bottom hand are on top.
  • Let the Big Dog Eat: as in the movie Tin Cup, when a player uses the driver, the biggest club in the bag.
  • Military Golf: the tendency to play wildly from one side of the fairway to the other, i.e.,"left-right-left-right.”
  • Quail High: a mis-hit shot that flies lower to the ground than expected; also known as a worm-burner.
  • Rabbit: a beginning player.
  • Tiger Tee: the back tee, requiring the longest drive.

 

BASIC GOLF TERMS 

  • Bag Drop: a signed area where golfers unload their bags before parking.
  • Caddie: a person who accompanies one to four golfers, to carry clubs, find lost balls, read greens and give advice. Players usually pay a fee for this service, plus a tip.
  • Director of Golf: a trained professional who heads up the staff of golf pros and teachers at a golf club; the go-to person for advice, information and, often, for tournament planning. 
  • Driving Range: separate from the course, an area where players warm up by hitting balls off a teeing area into a wide-open field.
  • Executive or Par 3 Course: playable in about 2 hours, a short course of par 3s and short par 4s.
  • Forecaddie: a person located on the fairway who spots a player’s ball when it lands.
  • Foursome: golf is usually played in groups of two, three or four, hence a “foursome,” “threesome” or “twosome.”
  • Gallery: spectators who stand or sit around the fairways and greens to watch the play.
  • Green or Putting Surface: the short-mown area that surrounds the hole; also known as the dance floor.
  • Greens Fee: the cost to play a round of golf.
  • Handicap or Index: the calculation a player uses to keep track of his/her scores in relationship to the difficulty of each course played, thereby measuring general ability. A tournament planner may use handicaps to set up foursomes.
  • Leader Board: where players’ names and tournament scores are posted. In the case of a small group, all names may be listed; at a large tournament, only the best scores are shown.
  • Mulligan: an extra shot that golfers are allowed to take, without counting the first stroke. Often in a friendly tournament, a mulligan is allowed for every 9 holes; at fund-raisers, players may purchase extra mulligans.
  • 19th Hole: the bar in the clubhouse where golfers gather after golf. This is where meeting planners are often found during and especially after the outing! A player who scores a hole-in-one is obligated to buy drinks for everyone who happens to be in the bar when he/she arrives. (A new trend at some luxury courses is an actual 19th hole, sometimes called the betting hole.)
  • Par: the number of strokes a golfer is expected to take to reach the hole (each hole is designated as a 3, 4 or 5 par). The average golfer is often over par on most holes.
  • Pro Shop: the retail outlet and office headquarters for the golf course staff. This may not apply to your group; individual golfers check in here to confirm tee times and pay greens fees.Pro-Am: a tournament (usually a fund-raiser) in which professional golfers are partnered with amateurs.
  • Round of Golf: 18 holes of golf.
  • Public, Private and Semi-private Clubs: private golf clubs are open only to members and their guests; semi-private clubs have members and are also open to the public; public access or daily fee courses are open to the public. 
  • Starter: a staff member at or near the first tee who starts each foursome at the correct tee time. The starter also may instruct players in local
  • rules and course conditions.
  • Tee Time: the exact time, to the minute, when a twosome, threesome or foursome is scheduled to tee off from the first hole, usually at 7 to 12-minute intervals.
  • The Tee or Tee Box: on each hole, the area between two markers or “boxes” where the player places his/her ball on a tee and hits away. There are usually three to five or more sets of tees on each hole. Better players play from the “back tees,” lesser players from the “forward” tees. 
  • The Turn: between the “front nine” and the “back nine,” players often stop for restroom breaks and/or to grab a snack at the clubhouse.

 

GOLF TOURNAMENT FORMATS 

  • Shotgun Start: foursomes tee off simultaneously at every hole on the golf course. This is the most time-efficient method of moving players around the course. A shotgun often costs more than individual tee times because it requires that a course be entirely empty of players for your tournament.
  • Scramble: in teams of players of varying abilities (based on their actual or estimated handicaps), each plays their own ball, then all play from where the best ball lands, and so on for every shot throughout the round. This format keeps the groups moving and avoids any awkwardness on the part of players of lesser ability.
  • Best Ball: everyone plays their own ball for the entire round; the lowest score for each hole is then totaled as the team score.
  • Shamble or Bramble: when the foursome tees off, the best of the tee shots is selected and all players move their balls to that spot. Team members then play their own ball until holing out.
  • Alternate Shot: for 2-person teams. Each player takes turns hitting shots, playing with the same ball.
  • Ryder Cup Format: 6-hole Scramble, 6-hole Best Ball, 6-hole Alternate Shot.

 

TIPS FOR PLANNERS 

  • Dress Code: in spite of what PGA and LPGA players might wear on TV, many upscale courses require shirts with collars for all players, and disallow jeans, cutoffs and short-shorts.
  • What’s in a Name: make each participant feel appreciated by affixing a personalized tag to their golf bag, and ask the club to make easily readable signs showing players’ names on the golf carts. A leader board is another way to showcase the names of participants.
  • Latecomers: nothing throws a monkey wrench into a precisely timed golf tournament like a late-arriving or missing player. Take care to carry with you a list of cell phone numbers for the participants, and ask the club coordinator in advance what to do when a player does not show up.

 

GOLF RESOURCES 

Quail Lodge Resort and Golf Club, Carmel Valley Quail Lodge Resort and Golf Club, Carmel Valley