Brunello Optimizes the Golfer Experience with Tagmarshal

The Links at Brunello, outside Halifax, Nova Scotia dedicated to providing its members and guests with an exceptional golfing experience, has teamed up with golf course intelligence platform, Tagmarshal, to further enhance its service delivery.

Brunello joins courses such as Pinegrove CC, Wooden Sticks, Summit and Clovelly as Canadian courses optimizing their on-course experience with Tagmarshal. Tagmarshal partners with GGGolf in Canada, ensuring Canadian courses have the opportunity to optimize their player experience and drive additional revenue.

“GGGolf is excited to bring Tagmarshal to Canadian golf courses, assisting them in optimizing their on-course and golfer experience.” Gilles Gauthier, President, GGGolf.

Voted to be among the top 25 golf courses in Canada in 2018 by Golf Digest, the Links at Brunello is dedicated to providing its community members and customers with the finest experience in golf that exceeds the expectations of all guests with a customer service that is second to none.

The partnership with Tagmarshal aims to further entrench Brunello as one of the industry-leading golf experience providers. 

“With short seasons driving high volumes of play, we are excited to be partnering with Links at Brunello and others to ensure efficient on-course operations and the best golf experiences with optimal pace and flow of play. We’re also thrilled to be adding value to Brunello during winter, ensuring safety and line of sight of cross country skiers on the property with our tracking solution.”  – Bodo Sieber, CEO of Tagmarshal. 

During the winter months at Brunello members and guests can enjoy ice skating on the pond located on Hole 5, tobogganing, cross country skiing and snowshoeing with access to miles of hiking trails and golf cart paths.

What’s making this winter season particularly exciting is Tagmarshal’s golf cart GPS tracking tags in use to monitor skiers location. This ensures the safety and security of the skiers, ensuring that Brunello consistently provides a quality, forward-thinking product and experience that is in line with the clubs mission.

PGA Magazine: How Pebble Beach Prepares Guests for Pace of play

One of the most sought-after tee times for most golfers is Pebble Beach Golf Links, where a difficult golf course, windy conditions and players looking to savor a bucket-list destination can conspire to create pace of play problems. To help set expectations and prepare players for a speedier pace, the resort directs visitors to a special page on its website prior to their visits, located at https://www.pebblebeach.com/pace-of-play-guidelines/

Here are some of the highlights:

• Pebble Beach used data from Tagmarshal to set pace of play targets for different times of day, from a four-hour pace for the first group off to 4:55 for tee times at noon and later.
• If a foursome falls more than two shots behind the group in front of them, a player assistant will give the group a pace of play reminder. A forecaddie will be sent to assist the group if it is still out of position after two holes. After three holes, the group will be asked to move ahead or given the chance to restart their round after the last group of the day. 
• The pace of play page also has a primer on how to play ready golf; how to use the new Rules on stroke and distance on balls lost out of bounds; and for keeping the flagstick in while putting, as well as maximum scores by handicap for players to pick up their ball.

If you missed the live Tagmarshal Expert Session webinar, it’s not too late. Watch the webinar on demand video below, in your own time, and find out how data, informed by technology, is critical to successfully running a world-class operation.

PGA Magazine: Keeping Competitors on the Move

Jim Morris, PGA Head Professional

National Golf Links of America, Southampton, New York

As the old adage says, there’s golf – and there’s tournament golf. Improving the pace of play during the nervy rounds of tournament golf for the 350-plus members at Long Island’s National Golf Links of America has been a major accomplishment for PGA Head Professional Jim Morris.

While the famed club values a culture of healthy pace of play during daily rounds on its lauded C.B. Macdonald/Seth Raynor layout, Morris saw that competitive events often bogged down at the club.

“We have a lot of competitive events at the club, and members with a high golfer IQ, and their expectations are high,” Morris says. 

“For these players, one bad pin position can ruin an experience. Pace of play falls into the same category – if it takes too long to play, it ruins the experience and has a real effect on players.”

Morris and his staff brought in Tagmarshal to help identify trouble areas on the course in an effort to smooth out tournament play. By putting a GPS tracker on one player’s bag in each group, the golf staff can monitor the flow of the entire event and be ready to assist wherever needed.

Tagmarshal’s data also helped Morris create novel solutions to ongoing problem areas. For example, holes 13 and 14 require players to walk around – and play over – both sides of a large pond. In addition to the time it took to actually play the two challenging holes, players also lost time in walking around the water twice.

The data showed the detrimental effect this slowdown had on the rest of the field, giving Morris the idea to provide mandatory golf car shuttles to get around the water between shots. Two long walks have been transformed into 30-second shuttle rides, and pace of play is maintained.

“There were other areas that could cause problems, too, but Tagmarshal really let us see the patterns that lead up to issues during tournament play,” Morris says. 

“We’ve now alleviated the problem, and the response from the membership has been ecstatic. It’s added to their appreciation of our events that they don’t have to take all day to play anymore.”

As a result, National Golf Links has increased the size of the field and number of flights for each of its member tournaments, and all were oversubscribed this season.

“We have more members playing in our events, and they’re having a great experience,” Morris says.

PGA Magazine: Turning Time into an Ally

Andrew Headrick, PGA Head Professional

The Country Club at Castle Pines, Castle Rock, Colorado

With a well-regarded Jack Nicklaus Signature course winding through picturesque terrain just minutes outside Denver, The Country Club at Castle Pines doesn’t seem like it would need to worry much about competition from other activities for the attention of its nearly 400 members.

But according to PGA Head Professional Andrew Hedrick, the upscale private club is fighting a foe other clubs will find familiar: time.

“Golf is fighting an uphill battle on time, especially in a world where you can walk into Topgolf and have a golf experience in an hour, or have a simulator in your home,” Hedrick says. 

“Pace of play is a prominent part of the discussion here, and you have to appreciate that members’ time is important. You don’t want pace of play to be a reason people don’t remain members.”

Adding to the challenge at The Country Club that Castle Pines is the setting. The club sits at 7,000 feet, with seven miles of golf car path winding through 500 feet of elevation change and residential areas – and only two holes that run parallel to each other. Policing pace of play on such a rugged and sprawling site is daunting for staff members.

“Before 2017, we were operating blind – we could put two staff members out in golf cars and ride around, but you could go halfway around the course before you got to the trouble spot,” Hedrick says. 

“We had members asking if we could just pay more retirees to help manage pace of play as hourly employees, but I don’t think a high-end club should rely on that solution in having sensitive discussions with members during their rounds.”

Hedrick and his staff looked at a variety of solutions, including those offered by golf car manufacturers, before bringing Tagmarshal in for a demo. The club immediately saw the benefit of being able to track groups from the computer in the golf shop, sending a golf professional to the source of the slowdown instead of hoping a ranger happened upon it.

“Telling someone they’re holding up play can be a tough conversation, especially at a private club. You need to have tact, and you need to know the personalities – I can count on our PGA Professionals to do that,” Hedrick says.

“Plus, we understand that the group might be playing part of a seasonlong match play event, or there might be a member hosting three guests on business. You don’t want to embarrass a member in that situation, because this is our business.”

The Country Club at Castle Pines has now been using Tagmarshal for nearly three seasons, and the staff is using the data collected over that time to improve the member experience and further the bond between the golf staff and the golf committee.

Hedrick includes pace of play data in his annual report to the board, and the golf committee uses the data to communicate with members who are habitual slow players.

The club hosts approximately 23,000 rounds during its short season, and its most avid golfers have cheered improvements in pace. The average round has dropped from 4:20 to 4:04, but more important is the feeling rounds flow more smoothly around known bottlenecks, like the famed par-5 fifth hole, a 650-yard beast with a split fairway.

“Our members expect an optimized experience, which is what we get from technology in so many other parts of our lives,” Hedrick says. 

“The members love that we’ve invested in a solution that helps them move consistently around the golf course, and they ask about their times. We also have data on which players could speed up, and we can have that conversation from a position of being helpful instead of embarrassing them.”

National Golf Links of America Improved tournament pace of play by providing shuttle service to avoid a long walk around the water.

“An affluent club like ours expects an upscale experience, and it expects to play in a certain amount of time. You have so many other things that take time, but our members want to make the most of their time here. So if they know they can come out, warm up, play 18 and stay for a drink – and still be home within five hours – they’re going to do that more often.”

PGA Magazine: Saying Cheers to Faster Rounds

Matt Summers, PGA Head Professional, Mountain Branch Golf Club, Joppa, Maryland

As a semi-private club open to the public, Mountain Branch Golf Club in Joppa, Maryland, faces the same pace of play problems that other daily fee courses often battle.

 “There was always this perception that you’re a public course, so golfers are going to be out there for five hours or more. ‘How long is this round going to be?’ ” says PGA Head Professional Matt Summers. 

“We’re always looking for ways to improve our image and level of service, and ownership was on board with finding new ways to do that.” 

Summers was also looking for a way to shift payroll away from part-time course rangers so Mountain Branch could spend more money on its PGA Professional staff. In talking with other golf professionals, he decided to look into Tagmarshal’s services three years ago.

By adding Tagmarshal GPS units in Mountain Branch’s golf car fleet – under the seats, hidden from customers – Summers and his staff were immediately able to monitor pace of play from the golf shop, or from anywhere on the property if they were using a smartphone, tablet or device connected to the Internet.

As a result, Mountain Branch was able to do away with marshals completely on Mondays through Thursdays and often goes without marshals on weekends. When the golf staff sees a pace of play problem using the Tagmarshal app, they can go directly to the group causing the slowdown.

“It’s the toughest job on property, telling someone they’re playing slow on a busy day,” says Summers, who is in his 13th season at Mountain Branch.

“But now that it is usually a PGA Professional coming out to talk with the golfers, they respond with a lot more respect. And if they dispute that they’re behind, we can show them the Tagmarshal data as backup. That makes it an easier discussion, and they’re more likely to pick it up.”

Summers also adds a deft customer service touch in these situations.

“When we go out to talk to a group about speeding up, we’ll watch their progress on Tagmarshal,” Summers says. “If they catch up to the pace, we’ll send the beverage cart out and buy them a round as a way to thank them for getting back on track.”

This combination of technology and customer service has helped create an environment at Mountain Branch where pace of play is valued by the facility’s 300-plus members and many regular daily fee players. Average round times have improved by more than 15 minutes during peak season, from 4:08 to 3:53 and the golf staff has more flexibility and information to rely upon in setting the tee sheet at the facility, which hosts more than 23,000 rounds annually.

“We don’t know what kind of golfer is going to walk through the door on a given day, so we’ll use the data to know whether or not we should throw an open tee time in if we have a lot of public play on a given day – we can always fill it in later if things are smooth, and we know if we can squeeze a group in if we have people walk in wanting to play,” Summers says. “And because Tagmarshal keeps data on individual golfers, I can see if those golfers are fast, which helps with the decision about getting them out.”

National Golf Links of America Improved tournament pace of play by providing shuttle service to avoid a long walk around the water.

Summers is also looking forward to using the Tagmarshal data in new ways going forward. For 2020, his goal is to optimize the number of teams Mountain Branch can host in its weekday golf leagues, which are a steady source of green fees and food & beverage revenue.

“We have heavy league play in summertime, and we’re going to tag each group and gather the data on whether we can go from 24 to 26 or 28 teams in a league,” he says.

Pace of play is still an area the golf staff at Mountain Branch needs to monitor. But by having more information, the golf staff is able to make precise decisions to keep things moving.

“When you get that call from a group saying there’s a slowdown, we can look in real-time and see the pace – maybe that group is actually playing faster than the normal pace. That helps us decide whether there’s something that needs attention, or if it just seems that way to one group. Either way, we can deal with reality instead of perception,” Summers says. 

“Most important, when players come off 18 we see more happy faces. That keeps the staff in a good mood, too, which is why this is one of my favorite things we’ve done while I’ve been at Mountain Branch.”