The Pellucid Perspective - February 2020 - 14

MARKET FOCUS

San Francisco holds its own, strong
golfer base is underleveraged
San Francisco-Oakland, CA Core
Business Statistical Area (CBSA)

n this monthly section we profile one of the Top 25 US Golf
Markets based on a Pellucid composite score of the golfer
base, the supply level and rounds demand. Within that Top
25 universe, we then rank them based on relative health using
a Pellucid weighted scoring system of 7 variables ranging from
Population Growth to Avg. Facility Utilization. In this issue,
we'll profile the 10th-ranked market, the San Francisco-Oakland Metro CBSA. As most know, the Bay City came within
2 quarters of being the Super Bowl Champions this year and
it was an amazing run but, no doubt, disappointing that they
weren't able to "grab the ring."
By rounds demand (one of our 3 selection criteria for initial
inclusion in the Top 25 list), San Francisco punches below its
composite ranking weight coming in 24th among US markets
with facility-reported annual demand of just over 3M rounds
(that's facility-reported, through-the-turnstiles tally counts both
local and (limited) tourist play; they're somewhat supply-constrained as an additional mitigating factor). Looking at the golf
consumer base, we see that San Francisco is home to a healthy
local golfer base of just under 400K golfers (this is local, resident
population only, doesn't count any of the golf tourist crowd).
That golfer base is served by a meager supply base of 86 18-hole
equivalent (EHE) facilities producing an average ratio of just
over 4,000 local resident golfers per EHE, a very healthy level at
nearly 3x the national average.
The supply mix vs. the national distribution across Pellucid's five access/value/usage segments shows a meaningful bias
to the Private segment at 40% of holes (a 142 index vs. the
national contribution). The split between Private/Public is
40%/60% which is significantly more skewed to Private than
the national average of 28%/72%. The balance between Valueadded golf supply (Private & Public Premium) vs. Value golf
(Public Value, Price and Learning & Practice) is 61%/39%
skewing significantly to Value-added vs. the national average
of 47%/53%. Remember also that we establish the Premium/
Value/Price segments by individual market so that's factoring
in differences in cost of living/cost of golf as we cross markets (unlike NGF where New York City has the same price
segmentation as Kansas City, go figure). Within Public-Regulation golf, the distribution between Premium/Value/Price
is 40%/35%/25% which meaningfully "tilts" the direction of
Public-Premium vs. the national picture of 31%/47%/23% (at
the expense of Public-Value).
Using our new methodology for calculating Supply/Demand
equilibrium and how the picture has changed from '00-'17
based on rounds demand change vs. supply change, you can see

14 The Pellucid Perspective

Private

PublicPremium

PublicValue

PublicPrice

Learning
& Practice

San Francisco-

Tot US
Oakland, CBSA
Golfer Base
- Est. # of Golfers (Ks)
363.2 25,500
86 16,749
- # of 18 Hole Equivalent Facilities
4,224 1,535
- Golfers per 18-Hole Equiv.

Supply Mix
- Private
- Pub-Prem
- Pub-Val
- Pub-Price
- Learn & Prac
Supply/Demand Balance
- '00-'17 Cume Supply Growth/Decline
- '00-'17 Cume Rds Demand Growth/
Decline+
- '00-'17 Cume Mkt Supply Dilution

(-)/Absorption (+) Level*+
Av. Facility Throughput & Efficiency
- Avg. Ann Rds Velocity (Ks, per EHE)
- %Utilization Rate

40%
21%
19%
13%
7%

28%
19%
29%
14%
9%

14%
-9%

11%
-7%

-18%

-17%

33.0
40%

26.5
42%

Future
Facility

Index
vs. US

275
142
112
64
95
81

124
96

* Period % Chng in Rds vs. Period % Chng in Supply

Above average level vs. US (Index >105)
Average level vs. US (Index 95-104)
Below average level vs. US (Index <95)

February 2020

The Pellucid Perspective - February 2020

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