By Steve Eubanks, Contributor, Golf Business
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A lot of owners believe their golf courses can and should host big-time events, maybe PGA Tour or Korn Ferry tournaments, or something on the scale of a U.S. Amateur or U.S. Junior. In the go-go 1990s and early 2000s when new courses opened at a clip that made little economic sense, the most eye-rolling statement an owner could make was, “We think we can host a U.S. Open here.” Predictably, a fair number of those courses are community gardens or dog parks today. But there are still plenty of great courses capable of hosting regional and statewide events. The question is: How do you host a state am or a state open in a way that maximizes exposure and drives attention to your brand?
The answer is as simple as the device in your pocket.
Technology has advanced at such an incredible pace that anything from a local YMCA fundraiser to a statewide PGA sectional event can be streamed to the entire world through social media. That is exactly what the owners at Turtleback Mountain Golf & Resort are doing this week with the New Mexico State Open, an event no one east of Abilene would have known about if it weren’t for an extraordinary decision to livestream the tournament on Facebook.
“When we first got the event, it was a top 30 PGA sectional in the United States,” said Turtleback Mountain marketing director James Prendamano, Jr. “Then we got record-breaking sponsor support that pushed the purse to $100,000 and it became a top 5 sectional in the U.S.”
How did that happen? Why did sponsor support pour in at that level? And why have there already been more than 40 stories written or aired about an event that would have normally attracted friends, family, and a few diehards from the state golf association?
“It’s because we’re launching the first-ever livestream of a PGA sectional open in history,” Prendamano said. “The event will be livestreamed on Facebook, LinkedIn, X, YouTube, the Turtleback Mountain website, and on sponsor Facebook pages. So, from a media perspective, we’re doing things that have never been done before.”
The added purse attracted players that will generate some buzz. Notah Begay, a past champion, will be the most famous of the 158 players in the field. A PGA Tour winner and NBC telecast veteran, Begay will be mic’d up for a couple of holes. Matt Every, a two-time winner of the Arnold Palmer Invitational, is also playing, as is former NCAA Champion and U.S. Walker Cup team member Todd Dempsey, who is a past champion of the Utah, Arizona and California State Opens.
“We’re really turning this tournament around,” Prendamano said.
But how? Golf is not like a high school football game or a rec-league softball tournament where you can mount one high camera and capture all the action. Even the major networks run miles of cable, have roving and stationary cameras, and bring in dozens of production trailers to produce golf. How do you livestream a state open in a way that captures the action and looks good?
“We have a camera on the first tee, first green, eighteenth tee and eighteenth green,” Prendamano said. “And we’ve got local NBC anchors co-hosting the livestream. We’ll be able to incorporate commercials, segments, and interviews throughout, and we’ll have a live scoreboard. If someone makes a putt to go from second to first, you will see an animation that moves that person up on the board, so you’ll be able to follow the action.”
Cameras and production in the modern tech era are not as expensive as you think. And the staff at Turtleback Mountain got some assistance along the way. In addition to local sponsors, Bridgestone Golf stepped in to support, and students from the PGM Program at New Mexico State are coming in to help.
“Just being our first year of hosting, I think we’ve done a phenomenal job so far,” Prendamano said. “And we feel like we’ve laid out a blueprint that other sectional events can follow to catapult their tournaments to the next level.”
Turtleback Mountain Golf & Resort is south of Albuquerque on I-25 and within hiking distance of Elephant Butte Lake State Park. At about 4,500 feet, the cool air allows the course to keep bent greens and bluegrass and rye fairways alive. But the superintendent, Thomas Hams, has also worked hard to showcase the course for the livestream. “An organic package of molasses and fish guts turned the greens around so we could deep-tine aerify and then top-dress then often enough to get them firm and fast enough for these guys,” Hams said.
So far, the course and the event have received rave reviews. According to general manager and PGA professional J.C. Wright, “All the participants have reached out to me and are excited about playing. But that all flows back to buy-in from ownership and the efforts of our team. I came here from Arizona, and we think players are going to have the same feel here that you would get at a PGA Tour event.”
What do the owners of Turtleback Mountain hope to gain from this? For starters, it is expected that 3 million people will engage with content from the New Mexico Open, either from the livestream, in person, or from post-event coverage. That is an enormous footprint for a sectional open. But as Predamano said, “This tournament isn’t just about golf. It’s about uplifting a community of just over 12,000 people that gets over 2 million visitors a year. It’s about uplifting not just Sierra County, but the entire state of New Mexico. It’s about spreading the word about what we have here.
“When Turtleback got the contract for the open, the governor signed a resolution proclaiming Turtleback Mountain Golf & Resort Day because everyone understands that this event is about showcasing New Mexico and letting everyone know that they can come down and enjoy the beauty of the amenities.
“At the end of the event, I hope to hear people say, ‘Oh my goodness, I want to be a part of this or something like this. This is truly special,’” Predamano said. “I want to hear ‘Wow.’ And if you love golf, we want you to engage. Maybe you’ll come to New Mexico; maybe you’ll add Turtleback to your golf outing list. But most importantly, how does this event make you feel? Do people look at this and feel like this is a welcoming and happy place, an environment they’d be comfortable visiting and possibly living? That’s the atmosphere and feeling we’re trying to create.”
That’s the lesson any operator can take from Turtleback Mountain. If you want people to see you for what you really are, livestream an event, or have a live camera on the first tee all the time so people can see everyone having fun. The technology is available, and it’s cheaper than ever.
As Wright said, “If you’re a small-town golf course owner, what you’re going to take away (from our event) is that arming yourself with the right resources and bringing in the community will create something bigger and better than you think possible. So, think big, use technology, engage with the community, and you’ll be amazed what you can do.”