Mini-golf course captures a new audience to increase revenue
By Gail Loskill
Faced with the same challenges of other municipal-golf programs, the city of Cedar Rapids, Iowa, took a creative approach. What resulted was a facility that provides recreational opportunities for individuals with disabilities and the entire community.
In the past, the city struggled to operate four 18-hole, municipally owned courses, in a community of 130,000, without a loss. The system operated as an enterprise, meaning it needed to break even each year. With one of the courses saddled with high maintenance costs due to flooding, the city reviewed every facet of the golf system, reduced staff members, and operated as lean as possible.
The Most Attractive Option
It still was not enough, so golf staff members brainstormed, and Dave Roe, Golf Operations Superintendent, wondered if placing a miniature-golf course next to one of the 18-hole courses would add a new market to draw revenue from and expose younger generations to traditional golf. “We were considering all options. Mini-golf seemed like it might be something that would work,” Roe says.
Staff members did research, reviewed how well other miniature-golf courses operated, determined the feasibility and market potential of opening a new course, estimated how the course would affect the overall profitability of the golf division, and developed a business plan for operations. The city had two privately owned miniature-golf courses in operation, one at each end of the community, approximately a 20-minute drive apart.