On the edge of professional Disc Golf

[Three Putt]

A bit late responding to this. Maine is 98% private pay to play (one public free course that when I visited almost all 9 baskets were vandalized or destroyed) and yes it is a wasteland for PDGA events. Their are tons of non sanctioned events, even through the winter at least 2 events a month. In the summer their is a 15 event series that regularly gets close to or over 100 players but again, not pdga. I'm not speaking for the Maine scene, but I think the attitude is something like, "we got a scene that works for us and is fun, what do we need the pdga and it's fees for (particularly when we are already supporting all of the courses)." Again that's not necessarily my attituted but just my guess at the attitude that keeps the maine scene kind of on it's own. Hell NEFA can't even really make inroads up here never mind the pdga.

Two issues with pay for play: A) you make your money attracting local day-to-day play. Big events are loss leaders; unless you are selling tons of plastic you lose your shirt. When you are trying to run a business, events that lose money are not all that attractive. B) If you are already open for day-to-day play you have insurance. You don't need the PDGA insurance blanket. Combine the two and putting together your own local-oriented series makes a lot more sense for a pay to play than some big event for the benefit of people who are not your day-to-day customers.

 

[Menacewarf]

Not sure all maine courses have insurance. I may be wrong but I do know that the landowner protection laws in Maine particularly in terms of user recreation are heavily tilted towards the landowner.

"If someone uses your land or passes through your premises for outdoor recreation or harvesting, you assume no responsibility and incur no liability for injuries to that person or that person's property. You are protected whether or not you give permission to use the land."

Is it still possible for me to get sued in spite of the landowner liability law?

"Yes, but it is very unlikely for two reasons: (1) a person who brings suit and loses must pay the landowner's reasonable legal fees and court costs, and (2) the law protects landowners so clearly that there is little opportunity for the injured person to win. In fact, there has not been a single reported successful case against a landowner where the Maine Landowner Liability law applied."

The rub is this part...

"Am I still covered by the landowner liability law if I charge a fee to use my land?

Maybe. In general, landowners running commercial recreation on their land are not protected. For example, commercial campgrounds or ski areas cannot expect to be protected by the law.

However, landowners do not automatically lose their protection if they charge fees. The landowner liability law applies to landowners who charge fees for entry as long as the land is not used mainly for commercial recreation or as long as the payment is not for exclusive use, such as club membership or rental for an event or campsite."

So pretty much in Maine as long as you live on your the land that a private course is on you have legal protection that has never been defeated in court and the person using assumes legal fees (presumably unless they win). I know that a prudent businessman would also have insurance but I would also not be surprised at all if many courses use this law as their protection.

 

[Three Putt]

Even with that, it does the same thing. It defeats the "sanction for the insurance" angle. I've had to sanction events in the past just to get the insurance. If I had not needed the insurance, I would not have sanctioned.

When I worked for a Parks Department I never sanctioned. The City already had the insurance, and I could skip the fees and payout requirements and do my thing.

 

[JC17393]

Disc golf courses operating as a business are in that same category as ski resorts and campgrounds. It's commercial recreation. Of course, not every course is an official business. Some courses, like menacewarf's, are simply someone's backyard that others are allowed access to (for "donation" or by "permission only", whatever the case may be). Those fall into that grey area covered by the law.

As far as the PDGA and Maine, I find it's much more the attitude of a lot of players that keeps the PDGA down around here rather than the courses and course owners. For the players, there's a bit of a geographic disadvantage just living here. We're isolated...one neighboring state in which the game is still relatively fledgling. So we generally have to go a long way (at least 2 hours driving) to get out of the state to play competitively, and the result is that few actually do it all that often. Those that do pretty much are the PDGA members in the state. The rest stay and play the local series because that's what's there.

Two issues with pay for play: A) you make your money attracting local day-to-day play. Big events are loss leaders; unless you are selling tons of plastic you lose your shirt. When you are trying to run a business, events that lose money are not all that attractive. B) If you are already open for day-to-day play you have insurance. You don't need the PDGA insurance blanket. Combine the two and putting together your own local-oriented series makes a lot more sense for a pay to play than some big event for the benefit of people who are not your day-to-day customers.

The local series here requires cash payout to all divisions. So right there, courses lose out on "selling" merch payout and player packs. That is actually an advantage that a PDGA event has for a course owner relative to the local series. Am payouts can help balance the ledgers for a course business just like it can for a club or individual running an event in a park. In a vacuum, you kinda scratch your head at businesses opting to not take advantage of opportunities to, at the very least, mitigate costs/losses, but they do.

And the reality is that most courses here choose the local series for their "big" tournament of the year because that that's what the players want. If they're only going to host the one tournament, of course they want to do what takes to get the most players on the course that day, if only to justify closing the course off from their day-to-day clientele. Sometimes the courses don't even close. Casual play is intermixed with the tournament groups because they simply can't afford to turn people away for the benefit of maybe 25-30 tournament players. Can't blame them, either.

I don't think there is no hope for the PDGA around here though. I run a B-tier that sells out each year and has for years. There is a base of players that will support PDGA events if they were run, we just need more folks to step up and run events. Once in a while, one or two jump up and try to get the ball rolling, but burnout catches up quickly and things fizzle. Someday, though.

 

[Menacewarf]

Your event though is the only pdga event in Maine of any merit as of now. The sabbattus event could have some potential too though. I agree....someday problably , just maybe not right away I guess.

Edit
Speaking of that. I think I'm going to have to report Dave for not submitting the beast unleashed. I tried to remind him but got nothing

 

[JTacoma03]

Two issues with pay for play: A) you make your money attracting local day-to-day play. Big events are loss leaders; unless you are selling tons of plastic you lose your shirt.

You're making lots of assumptions with that statement. I could very easily start a pay model which makes money when events come around...

...now if only there was a sport with similar rules to ours that costs money to play and makes even more money when a local club hosts big events that I could use as precedent for my argument...

...hmmmmmm.

 

[Cgkdisc]

One of the ways to spur PDGA membership in an area is to bid on and get to host Worlds. The Minnesota scene in the late 90s was similar to Maine with a self sufficient, long standing state series that ran so well that the PDGA was not seen as necessary except for players who played regional events outside MN. However, we bid on and hosted the Pro Worlds in 2001. All of a sudden we had local TDs running PDGA events left and right so players could earn points to qualify to play.

 

[JMeresmaa]

The article has collected over 10,000 readers and 2000+ shares/likes. Thank you for your contribution. I have got several contacts already that are potential. I´m glad there are people who are dynamic. That´s what we need now.

Couple points I want to make (not in particular order):

• The biggest sports in the World are free. So is Disc Golf and that gives it a good chance to be much bigger. My pay-to-play comment was ONLY towards Pro Disc Golf. If we would have more pay-to-play courses could we grow faster? Every pay-to-play course is a business of its own. And business drives the World. Everywhere. It´s obvious that most of the courses will remain free to play.

• I´ve got an impression that there are a lot of "old" disc golfers who does not want any change. That´s okay. I´m sure that even the Disc Golf keeps evolving, there is always room for casual rounds with no pressure. My point was not to change the whole sport. That would be stupid even to say aloud.

• Disc Golf is most of all a life style. For some, that means smoking and drinking at the course. When I´m talking (again) only professional Disc Golf, drugs in any form does not belong there.

• When I was looking into this article, I did a lot of research before I wrote anything. I went to most of the major Disc Golf websites, player profiles, etc. It was really hard to find professional touch anywhere. That made me write to article. Usually, it helps the progress when something is said aloud. There are not too many DG websites that are professionally made. There are only a few player websites online. If our pro player biggest online presence is selling new/used discs on facebook, we are far away from professionalism. And most of the event websites are horrible.

I will push this topic forward and keep making things in real world. However, I´m just one alone promoter. I´m happy that I have a team of guys working towards better events, like European Masters. One reason for the article was to gain more exposure to that event. We are currently negotiating with two TV-stations about live broadcast. http://www.mastersdiscgolf.com

I´m currently working with a large promotion concept that I´m hoping to get finished this Spring. If everything comes together, we have something really neat coming in 2015. Stay tuned.

Please, keep up the conversation. Thanks. :thmbup:

 

[Discslinger12]

While working with the PDGA on their strategic plan this year I came across a number of observations/phenomenon/facts I found interesting…

The PDGA doesn't have an accurate count on the number of people playing disc golf (if not them who should?) The most verifiable number was the unique visitors to the website (1.2 million) which what was used for the strategic planning work - most folks I spoke with in the industry believe it to be much higher (5-10x). For argument/comparison sake, let's say it's 7 million. Thankfully, this isn't the interesting part.

If 7 million is the number, I was intrigued by the fact that we are roughly 25% the number of ball golfers (28 million). A good reference point, until I dug in a little further. Using numbers based on educated guesses for disc golf and an industry report on golf….

Average Green Fees per Golfer: $1,066 Disc Golfer: $1.78
Average Equipment per Golfer: $201.39 Disc Golfer $10.71
Average $ in the tour per Golfer $73.04 Disc Golfer $.17

Another way to state this is $73.04 is spent on each golfer to get a return of $1267 in sales - about 6%. From an industry perspective, marketing budgets are generally 10-15%, 6% as a component of a marketing budget for the tour seems in line.

For disc golfers, $.17 is spent for a return of $12.49 in sales or 1.3%.

Observations:

- while my numbers may not be precise, this demonstrates the scale of how far the sport must grow before 'real' earnings can be had playing disc golf. Let's say Paul MacBeth should be making 4 times more than he does now - with the same economics we would need to have as many people disc golfing as there are golfers. Given the economics stated earlier however, with the same number of players the PDGA tour will only be .23% the size of the PGA tour, not 23%… POINT TWO THREE %.

- if the economics changed and the Disc Golf tour accounted for 6% of the average disc golfer spend as in golf, Paul would make more than 4x; One can infer however that the disc golf tour does not provide the same return as the golf tour (which many will find obvious)


Numbers Used:

Disc Golf/Ball Golf Comparison

Players Disc Golf 7,000,000 Ballf 28,000,000
Courses Disc Golf 4,500 Ballf 35,112
Greensfees Disc Golf $12,460,000 Ballf $29,852,000,000
Equipment Disc Golf $75,000,000 Ballf $5,639,000,000
Tour Disc Golf $1,200,000 Ballf $2,045,000,000

Avg Greensfee/golfer Disc $1.78 Ball $1,066.14
Avg Equipment/golfer Disc $10.71 Ball $201.39
Avg Tour $/golfer Disc $0.17 Ball $73.04
-

 

[Halcón]

I'd be astonished if 1 million people regularly played disc golf, in the U.S. 7 mil sounds WAY too high.

 

[DavidSauls]

I'd be astonished if 1 million people regularly played disc golf, in the U.S. 7 mil sounds WAY too high.

I agree, though it depends on your definition of "regularly". And the PDGA may not be looking at "regularly", but people who play at all.

Would 2 or 3 times a year count? I know people who play golf 2-3 times a year, and I'm sure the golf industry counts them.

 

[Discslinger12]

I stand by my experience, sources and references as to the market size…. but hey, what do I or the owners of the major disc golf businesses know…

 

[DavidSauls]

An awful lot of them must play very little. Or they're somewhere else other than here.

If 2% of the population plays, then Columbia, SC metropolitan area would have about 10,000 disc golfers in it. Yet the handful of courses aren't very crowded.

Then again, one course is on a elementary school yard. If you count every kid who played disc golf during P.E., there's a couple of hundred to start with.

Perhaps you're right. But I'd be astonished if it's over a million, in any meaningful sense of being disc golfers.

 

[Discslinger12]

Given there is no formal count, the market size is a subjective number. I had some extremely credible sources say the number of people who play is around 12 million…

I was the facilitator of the strategic planning process for the board, but did make a few suggestions one of which was conducting a 'big count' to have a better estimate of the disc golf player base…

 

[JMeresmaa]

If 2% of the US population would play Disc Golf regularly, this sport would be recognised almost everywhere. In Finland, we are on the edge of being a mainstream sport and still there are only 1% of the population playing. In Finland, around 90% of the people I talk knows Disc Golf.

I´ve been to US almost 20 times and during my stay I always ask many people if they know Disc Golf. 99% have never heard about it. My estimation is that there are around 500,000 disc golfers in US who play regular basis (once a week).

For those, who are jumping into this discussion now, here´s the link to the article that started this topic: http://mastersdiscgolf.com/news/2013/12/on-the-edge-of-professional-disc-golf/

 

[Jay Dub]

I've been watching and reading this very interesting thread. After seeing the 7 million players estimate I tried to find some other sport that could compare and the estimate for that sport.

According to wikipedia in 2008 there were 4.9 million Ultimate Disc players in the U.S.

And according to an article in 2011:

http://www.sfia.org/press/view.php?id=312

After analyzing team sports participation patterns at the 'core' level, four team sports have had double-digit percentage increases in participation since 2009. They are lacrosse (13+ times/year….up 33.1%), rugby (8+ times/year….. up 20.3%), ultimate frisbee (13+ times/year….up 19.2%)


IMO Ultimate is more popular than disc golf.

 

[Halcón]

I had some extremely credible sources say the number of people who play is around 12 million…

With all due respect, 12 million is absurd.

 

[Aim For The Chains]

If 2% of the US population would play Disc Golf regularly, this sport would be recognised almost everywhere. In Finland, we are on the edge of being a mainstream sport and still there are only 1% of the population playing. In Finland, around 90% of the people I talk knows Disc Golf.

I´ve been to US almost 20 times and during my stay I always ask many people if they know Disc Golf. 99% have never heard about it. My estimation is that there are around 500,000 disc golfers in US who play regular basis (once a week).

For those, who are jumping into this discussion now, here´s the link to the article that started this topic: http://mastersdiscgolf.com/news/2013/12/on-the-edge-of-professional-disc-golf/

10k throwers per state might even be generous but good post and very true. You can be on a disc golf course and can have other park patrons not even know what you are doing when you are doing it.

There are more bingo clubs and crochet'ers with laps full of yarn than disc golfers could ever dream about being as popular as for now. Image doesn't really matter at all-- I tried to agrue this before with some tools in this thread but Grand Theft Auto wouldn't be one of the biggest selling video games of all time if it was the little children their parents are looking to protect. The entire industry is not a healthy one which there lies the biggest issue.

 

[Aim For The Chains]

I really wonder how disc retailers make enough $ to employ people.

If dg gets more popular I wouldn't be surprised to see prices go up across the board for equipment and events etc as its not sustainable currently. Everything has to be done through partnerships and exclusive contracts which is never the best way to be competing for business but no company has the means to make any big moves outside of their own operations which is where the growth will stay..

 

[Tpro]

I've been watching and reading this very interesting thread. After seeing the 7 million players estimate I tried to find some other sport that could compare and the estimate for that sport.

According to wikipedia in 2008 there were 4.9 million Ultimate Disc players in the U.S.

And according to an article in 2011:

http://www.sfia.org/press/view.php?id=312

After analyzing team sports participation patterns at the 'core' level, four team sports have had double-digit percentage increases in participation since 2009. They are lacrosse (13+ times/year….up 33.1%), rugby (8+ times/year….. up 20.3%), ultimate frisbee (13+ times/year….up 19.2%)


IMO Ultimate is more popular than disc golf.

^^WAAAY more popular.