December 15, 2017

My background and training cause me to abhor what we used to call “Management by Emergency” I prefer a properly staffed, well thought out and systematic plan as we strive to provide you the best golfing experience possible.  

With that said this year has not been without challenges. A well thought out conservative budget can only stretch so far. Unplanned expenses in the clubhouse included a new roof, repairs to the west wall in the dining room, and major plumbing issues in the old pipes from the upstairs locker room to the basement. Our conservative projections on revenue to be raised from outside play was not met mainly because of the rainy weather. While completing year 2 of the 5-year bunker renovation plan we decided to make additional improvements to the 7th green and surrounding area which was not in the original budget. I could go on, but you get the drift. 

The good news is you are going to love the improvements to Number 7, we exceeded our revenue projections with an unheard-of increase in memberships, and we did receive an insurance settlement which helped mitigate the cost of the new roof.  We will finish 2017 with a small negative cash flow which will slightly reduce our cash position starting 2018.
  
While the weather in upstate New York is not conducive to golf I can assure you that your Board, Committees, and Staff are busy laying the ground work for the upcoming year. I am optimistic we can continue to grow and provide you the best manicured course and an excellent golf experience as we strive to live up to our goal to be the “Capitol District’s Best Golf Club Value”

I believe that members are our greatest asset for many reasons. Members are also a source for generating the new members we require to continue to grow. If you are happy with the condition of the course, with the member tournaments, with the BSCC leagues, with the pace of play, and with the number of reciprocal courses to name a few, then tell your friends and invite them to become a member of BSCC. 

This will be the last Fox Newsletter for 2017. My goal is to welcome you back for the 2018 season with the April 15th Fox followed by our Kick Off Party on April 27th. Mark your calendar!! In closing I wish you and yours a happy holiday season and a safe and prosperous winter. 
  
THINK SPRING!!
Paul

 

Well the golf season in the North East is officially over.   We had a great year at Ballston Spa.  This year the weather was a little rainy early in the season but came around and we had a great golf season.  The improvements scheduled to be done to the golf course were completed and a couple of unscheduled improvements were also done, and the course looks great.  We continue to improve our golf course which shows with our increased membership, and we continue to get great reviews from guests and public play golfers.

Todd and his crew did a great job organizing our member and nonmember tournament events throughout the year.  We have put together our 2018 Golf Committee and after the first of the year will be meeting to set up the 2018-member events and finalize the member calendar.  

We have some Mondays open for outside tournaments which we will try to fill.  If you know of some group or person that might want to have a special event, ask them to contact Todd. If you play in an event at another golf course, try to get a contact person so we can contact them.  We will be advertising several different ways, but our members/owners are our best form of advertisement.  

There was a rumor going around that Jimmy Bryant bought snow golf shoes and put skies on his pull cart. I haven’t seen it but if you are driving by the golf course and see him out there give him a toot. 

I want to wish everyone a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. 

See you in the spring.

After getting the course finally all winterized a few weeks ago, we turned our attention to some of our winter projects.  Next year’s green surround that has been selected for rebuilding is the 3rd green surround.  This is part of the bunker renovation project that was started 2 years ago.  We took the opportunity to get ahead start with the few weeks of mild weather we had to work with.  Any work we can accomplish now will make things go quicker in the spring.  We started with the approach bunker.  We removed the sod around the bunker and reused some of the good sod to smooth out the left side of the hole.  Most of the sod was not reusable and was hauled to the dump.  Next, we removed the sand that was in the bunker.  The sand was pretty dirty but could be used for something at a later date.  We hauled it up to the area behind the 5th green where we keep the aerification plugs.  Next, we removed the topsoil around the bunker and stockpiled it off to the side next to #10.  Topsoil is very valuable and should be saved and reused on any project like this.  Once the topsoil is removed, the shaping of the bunker can begin.  Unfortunately, Mother Nature had different plans for us. This past weekend’s temperatures have frozen the ground where we are trying to work.  We need the ground to be soft enough to work with so I guess we might be done until things warm up and dry out in the spring.  I was hoping to get more accomplished but I guess I can’t really complain.  This is upstate New York in December.  Oh well, we will continue in the spring.  This is a large green surround with 3 bunkers so this one hole will consume all of one year’s revenue and time. #3 will be the only green surround we do in 2018.

Christmas came early to Ballston Spa Country Club this year.  We took delivery of a new greens mower and a new fairway mower last week.  Our lease was up on our two mowers, so we resigned up for four more years for new mowers.  The mowers are pretty much the same as the ones they are replacing.  I am very happy that we are able to obtain new mowers like this.  Good equipment is ESSENTIAL for the course to look and play good day in and day out.  It doesn’t matter if you have good turf everywhere on the golf course.  If you can’t mow the grass well or often enough then the course will suffer. 

The next mower we are looking to replace is our rough mower.  Our current rough mower is 15 years old with over 7000 hours on it.  It has been in the shop several times this year and currently has some significant issues with it.  A new mower to replace ours would cost around $60,000.  That price is a little much for the club right now.  I’m hoping we can find a good used mower for half that.  I’m sure you would agree that we need a good reliable rough mower out on the course every day keeping up with the rough.  Hopefully we can find a good used mower before we start next season.  I think that’s about all the updates that I have.  

I hope everyone has a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year. 

Hope to see you all in the spring.

Goals for 2018

We are looking forward to the 2018 Season and as we start our planning period, one of our goals in the Golf Operation is to do our best to ensure the Membership and their guests have a great experience.  Just a few ideas as to how the golf industry has changed over past 10 to 20 years is quite interesting.  We do our best to keep up on the most recent trends and changes in the Industry.   We at Ballston Spa Country Club are in the “Entertainment Business”.  We are one of a few that really recognize the business that we are in and it shows in our Membership growth.  

We hear all of the time of various Golf Facilities around our area that are struggling to keep members and to increase play.  These facilities have failed to recognize that there needs to be a “Fun Factor” in golf.  Unfortunately, every sport that is played, is measured by some sort of number to determine whether we have had success or not at the sport we are participating in.  As amateur players, it is ok to go onto the golf course and hit shots and feel good about the good shots that are hit.  There is no need to have score at the end of your round to determine whether or not you had a good time.  

Let me give you and example of how we look at things as players.  If A player starts out and scores a par on the 1st 14 holes that they play, then finishes up by scoring a bogey on the last 4 holes they play.  That player will be disappointed because they didn’t par the last 4 to finish up their round.  But, what if that same player started out by scoring a bogey on the 1st 4 holes in their round and scores a par on the last 14 holes they play in their round.  Mentally, they will feel so much better about their round for the day.  So, my point is, they had the same “SCORE” on both rounds but their attitude is completely different.  This is where the fun factor needs to come in to play and not measuring everything by a “Number”.  

Another way to increase the fun factor in golf is to be open minded to change.  We are now going into our 4th year with Golf Genius and our 2nd year with our App.  10 years ago, I would have never thought when a new member joins our facility that we would be asking them to download 3 Apps on their smart phone to add to their golf experience.  We ask them to download the Golf Genius, Ballston Spa Country Club, and the GHIN App to their devices.  This is another example to adapting to the change in the golf industry over the years.  We feel this adds to the fun factor for all and helps them be more engaged in the facility that they pay to be a member of.  This goes along with the other Member experiences that we are providing to all.  By providing these services and having them available to all has been a proven test that we are adding to the “Fun Factor” at Ballston Spa Country Club.  As all facilities seem to be competing for membership increases, what factors are determined in a players thought process as to where they decide to join for the season?  We feel that we are doing the right things to keep that member at a young age and have them become engaged in the club and add to the “Fun Factor”.  

So in closing, we hope that we have given all a different way to look at your golf membership.  Factors that are involved in a person’s decision to where to play golf does not always have to be measured in Dollars per Round.  We are here to make people smile and that is our goal moving forward for 2018.  We are all at Ballston Spa Country Club playing a game and that is supposed to bring enjoyment or what is the point of doing it.  The game of golf is growing at Ballston Spa Country Club and around the industry for the facilities that are willing to adapt to change.  We are one of those facilities.  
 
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to all.
 

Tee to Green

All Tournament Results Reported Here Include Only Current Members for the Sake of Space

February/March 1998

President George Gould asks Members to run for the board, noting there were 8 candidates the previous year

Tournament schedule is posted: 22 tournaments are listed, plus Women's Tuesday League, Senior Men's Tuesday AM League, Men's Tuesday Night League, Senile Seniors Tuesday Morning League, Women's Thursday Night League and Friday evening Buck & Doe. League.

Donald Monaco, Stan Ziobrowski, Jimmy Bryant and Art Cardinali have spent several weeks renovating the Men's Locker Room and George Gould and Ray Clothier worked on an exhaust system to help circulate the air conditioning.

April 1998

Women's Association Executive Board is Max Tucker, Dot Dever, Mary Joan Miller and Marge Roberge. Outgoing members of the Executive Board are Sue Kahler and Pat Rachiele.

Tucker reports that outside tournament revenue is expected to rise by 80% over 1997, due to an aggressive marketing push and a booming economy. Also green fees were raised to $50 for tournament players and it was decided that any Member playing in an outside tournament will be credited $30 so they will get a break on the green fee portion of the tournament fee.

As usual, seniors will be performing preventive maintenance on the golf cart fleet. Stan Ziobrowski asks for volunteers and reports no carts have been replaced for the past two years, plus ten new carts will be purchased this year.

May 1998

Stephen Smith, Norm Korniak, Sharon Naftzger, Wynn Wachtel and Steve Ludwin announce their candidacy for the Board of Directors.

The Baias publish information on the Mothers Day Brunch. There will be 3 serving stations, a 30 item salad bar, a 13 item hot buffet and a dessert table fit for a queen. Cost is $12/person.

The Club purchased the rights to the tee signs and is asking for businesses to sign on.

Guest Day is announced. Bring a guest and for $30 you get a cart for 2, green fee for your guest and a $10 restaurant credit.

Smith, Korniak and Ludwin join the Board of Directors.

The other day, I was reading about the time Walter Hagen and his trick-shot buddy Joe Kirkwood found themselves in a New York City hotel room with time on their hands.

They decided to amuse themselves by hitting shots through the open window of their fourth-story room into the adjacent Central Park. Tiring of this, they walked a few blocks away from their hotel, and with one club and one ball each, competed to see who could get their ball back into the hotel room with the fewest strokes. Into the toilet, to be precise.

These were the actions of desperate men obsessed with The Game, but miles from an appropriate venue. We see examples of this all the time: people out playing golf on New Year's Day in the frozen Northeast, people carving courses out of the sand dunes of Arabia, presidents flying to Florida for the weekend. No other sport seems to inspire the degree of dementia that golf brings out in its devotees.

In my misguided youth (as opposed to my current phase, misguided geezerhood), I played a version of Hagen's indoor golf in the wintry months, when the only courses open were south of the Mason-Dixon Line. I would sit and stare at my golf clubs, like a serial arsonist with a box of kitchen matches, stranded on the peak of Mount Everest. Once I reached a certain point of frustration, I would make a phone call.

Within the hour, an equally unbalanced friend would show up at my apartment, putter and wedge in hand, and the games would begin.

We would conceive golf holes around the apartment on an alternating basis, with each hole getting more imaginative than the last (off the elevated kitchen chair tee, over the linoleum waste area, onto the living room carpet fairway, a sharp bank off the partially open hall closet door dogleg, left into the bathroom green and a smart chip into the bathtub hole).

We always had the same finishing hole. Our dreaded 18th made Pebble Beach's look like a gimme.

We would place one of those floppy aluminum putting holes on the edge of the apartment balcony. One had to roll or bounce the ball past the ingenious sliding-glass-door-track hazard to reach the concrete balcony green. After that, most shots would bounce and roll their way off the edge to the grass around the parking lot ravine, six stories below.

Howling with laughter at this predicament, clubs in hand, we would descend, chip the ball around to the front door, into the elevating device (always interesting if there were non-golfing riders accompanying us), and up to the sixth floor, where we would try again. Playing the 18th hole in anything less than triple figures, or under an hour, was considered brilliant.

As winter approaches, each of us find ways of feeding the monstrous hunger for The Game. We become irrational in our hopes for an early start to the next season, and our spouses once again suggest some sort of twelve step counseling program (Hello, my name is Tucker. I'm a golfer).

Like Walter and Joe we will continue to play the games of desperate men. I personally will make no excuse for my actions. And, should your frustration reach its nadir, I challenge each and every one of you to a toilet chipping contest.