Business Categories: Sales & Marketing

Business Member Profile

Products and Services

The NGF pursues its mission, Helping Golf Businesses Succeed, organized as two separate companies:

1. National Golf Foundation (NGF): A 501-(c)6 not-for-profit trade association whose work in golf market research and industry databases is funded through the member contributions of nearly 4,000 wide-ranging golf-related businesses
2. National Golf Foundation Consulting (NGFC): a wholly-owned, for-profit subsidiary of NGF that applies its assets and capabilities on behalf of individual clients

NGF – The Golf Industry’s Trade Association

NGF’s member organization is the golf business’s most reliable and comprehensive resource for market knowledge. NGF conducts primary research and analyzes existing secondary data and then communicates the results and an unbiased point-of-view to members. NGF’s work is also disseminated via the media and monthly “Dashboard” e-newsletter. NGF’s reporting areas include golf participation, consumer spending, facility development, travel, retail and consumer confidence. NGF continually examines golf supply (counts and analysis of courses and facilities) and demand (number of golfers, segmentation, demographics and behavior) and provides timely information on trends that will impact golf businesses.

• The NGF has member companies representing every facet of the industry:
• Golf equipment and apparel companies
• Golf media
• Golf course developers and operators
• Golf retailers
• Turf equipment and supply companies
• Companies offering specialized services to the golf industry
• Thousands of private and public golf facilities
• National governing bodies as well as regional, state and local golf associations

There are three levels of membership:

• Facility ($199) - NGF’s published reports and a full archive of market research is available to members along with listing resources to connect members with other golf businesses. This membership level receives between four and six pieces of original and exclusive research each year. Member passwords are provided to www.NGF.org for 24/7 access to NGF’s wealth of member information.
• Business ($495) – Same as above.
• Business Elite ($5,000 annually) – Represents the highest level of access to NGF’s resources. Includes everything above, plus the full archive of unpublished data and NGF’s research staff at their disposal. The majority of golf’s most significant brands and course operators rely upon NGF Elite membership to support their research needs with our highest priority, “on-call” service. The quarterly high-level NGF State-of-the-Industry Update is distributed only to this membership class.

Additional Member Fulfillment

Golf Industry Databases – At the core of NGF’s knowledge of the supply side of the golf business are its definitive databases of U.S. golf facilities, retailers, practice ranges, companies and golf industry professionals. These databases are the most comprehensive, accurate and up-to-date in the industry and are systematically verified and maintained by a team of professionals at NGF’s Jupiter offices. Some of the areas tracked are openings/closures, transactions, courses under construction/ renovation and retail square footage. Changes to these databases and their content are analyzed periodically to reveal trends and also to identify areas worthy of further investigation.

Golf Demand Model/Tactician Software – NGF’s extensive supply and demand data is mapped onto 209,000 U.S. census block group geographies using a software platform called Tactician. The Golf Demand Model incorporates demographic and lifestyle models with exclusive NGF data sets that include golf behavior, spending, travel and other metrics. The Golf Demand Model is a proprietary tool that has been used to great effect to optimize retail location selection, assess market potential, sales territory analysis, customer targeting and support decision-making.

NGF Golf Business Symposium – The pre-eminent annual conference for golf’s business leaders. The Symposium is a pre-season (post-Masters, pre-U.S. Open) educational conclave designed to provide timely insights on the state-of-the-industry (the event is loosely modeled after the Davos World Economic Forum). To complement NGF’s exclusive content, outside speakers are carefully chosen for their ability to enrich golf’s business leaders on new trends that are likely to affect their businesses in the coming year. More than half of the attendees are the CEOs, Owners or Presidents of the most significant companies in golf. Non-Elite members pay $895 to attend. This is a single day event scheduled to allow attendees to get in, get educated, and get home in 24 hours.

Golfbizwiki.com – An online resource for sharing information, and best practices for the benefit of those who work in golf facility operations. Utilizing NGF’s unparalleled relationships in the industry, an advisory board provides oversight of the content supplied by the leading experts in every job function, including course architects, facility managers, food & beverage, search consulting, turf management, procurement and strategic planning. “The Wiki” should be very helpful to NGF in its efforts to support the community of golf facility professionals acquire helpful guidance and solutions to their problems.

Affliliate Partnerships – NGF has developed relationships with companies who offer expense-reduction and service benefits to our members. Current partners include FedExShipping /FedExOffice (formerly Kinko’s), IOA – Insurance Office of America/Travelers, and GOLFPAY - TransFirst credit card processing. Other partners are pursued to provide additional value to members.

National Golf Foundation Consulting - NGFC The consulting arm of NGF was created in 1989 and offers products and services to specific clients for their own strategic and competitive use. NGFC has four main business units:

• Facility Consulting
• Database and Direct Marketing Services
• GolfSat
• Proprietary and Syndicated Research

Facility Consulting – NGFC offers experienced and independent advisory services for owners, management companies, operators, developers, HOAs, builders and others. Municipal golf entities have relied upon NGFC’s services for decades. NGFC body of work and client list has established this business unit as the clear leader in its space. Clients have included the cities of Phoenix, New York, San Francisco and San Diego, states of Georgia and Oklahoma and even branches of the U.S. Military who operate many courses around the world. NGFC is also experienced in private club consulting, working with golf courses in ownership or status transition, dealing with politically sensitive scenarios, foreclosure and even expert witness situations. Services include but are not limited to: strategic planning, market analysis, feasibility studies, operational reviews, business plans and economic impact studies.

Database and Direct Marketing Services – NGFC offers best-in-class industry and consumer databases, list brokerage, management and list “hygiene” services, best customer profiling, geo-demographic targeting and sales prospects/leads. The NGF golf facility database is licensed by golf’s governing bodies such as the PGA of America, USGA, CMAA, GCSAA, media organizations such as Golf Channel, Golf Magazine and The Weather Channel and the leaders in navigation/GPS services such as TeleAtlas and NavTeq . NGFC is an expert in strategic list selection, email marketing and direct mail.

Customer Satisfaction Surveys- National Golf Foundation offers GolfSat , the industry's most widely adopted customer satisfaction survey for golf courses. Over the past 10 years the NGF's surveys have been used to gather customer feedback from over 565,000 golfers at over 840 courses. GolfSAT is a complete golf course customer survey system for public and resort courses and is only $395. GolfSAT is a web-based survey that is simple and fast - it takes customers less than five minutes to complete. Reports are automatically generated and easy to understand. Most importantly, GolfSAT provides you with unique performance benchmarks, so you can see just how your customer satisfaction stacks up against similarly priced courses. No other customer survey can offer you this. To learn more about GolfSat , visit http://www.NGFGOLFSAT.COM

Custom and Syndicated Research – NGFC provides both qualitative and quantitative market intelligence designed to clarify decision making, examine market size and share, mitigate risk and direct sales and marketing strategies. Typical assignments include brand equity analysis, market segmentation, tracking studies, on-line focus groups and personal interviews. Clients include Nike, TaylorMade -adidas, Callaway, Myrtle Beach Golf Holiday, Golf Channel, Sports Illustrated and Titleist.

NGFC serves the equipment manufacturers by administering wholesale shipment reporting for golf clubs, balls, clubs, shoes and gloves. Participating OEMs supply their confidential unit and dollar volume each month which is aggregated and delivered back to the subscribers so they can better understand the size, share and trends in each category. These reports are a perfect example of NGF’s unique role in the industry and is evidence of the trust that golf’s largest stakeholders place in the National Golf Foundation.

NGFC’s turf category share reports look at the golf course maintenance and golf car businesses and examine the installed base, share of new purchases and other trends. The “Barnshare” data is compiled based on annual surveys of GMs and Superintendents.

Key personnel

• Joe Beditz - President and CEO
• Greg Nathan - Sr Vice President
• Austin Elmer - Director of Member Research and Communications
• Richard Singer - Director of Consulting Services
• Marlene Stone - Golfbizwiki.com administrator & Member Services