The remarkable golf range at Greenwich Peninsular has now been open for just over a year. The 60 bay facility, complete with a superb food and beverage outlet, a recently installed American Golf superstore and a very busy N1Golf Academy, is breaking lots of records.
It is a very, very busy golf range on target to hit 1.5million balls this month: it is quite normal for people to have to queue for a bay, and the number of balls that are being hit in recent months has exceeded expectations, making it one of the busiest super ranges in the world. This is achieved with no throwaway pricing structure, and the return for the investors is healthy.
Often facilities can age quickly once they have opened, but the complex at Greenwich Peninsular has actually improved since it first opened. It now benefits from an enlarged American Golf retail outlet, which is doing strong trade with wealthy commuters all keen to have the latest equipment. One of the key points to the success of the retail offering is that they are quite willing to post purchases on for the customers, so that they do not have to handle bulky merchandise on the train home, or even just back to the office. There is also an exceptional custom fit studio, with all the latest brands available for trial prior to a purchase.
There is a new customer care ethic that has been washing through all American Golf stores over the last few years. This ethic is quite simple: to look after the customers’ best interests. American Golf want to help golfers get the most out of the game and be specialist advisors to them for their equipment needs. With so much of golfing hardware no longer available at traditional golf clubs, it is all too easy to buy things online. But golf is a highly technical game and the advances in recent years have been mainly in the area of supplying more suitable products, which better match the player’s game and physique. American Golf are masters at this and they spend an enormous amount of time, money and effort to ensure that their staff are fully knowledgeable on everything that a customer could possibly want to know. They are nice too. Golfers often just want to chat about their game or the latest golf event and they will find an ever more willing ear at all of the American Golf outlets. Director of Marketing & Communications Daniel Gathercole spoke to Golf Features:
“Our main aim is to provide the best possible service to our customers. This may sound a little corny, but it is really the best way for us to grow our business. We want to be involved in all the golf purchases made by any player and by understanding their game fully and also listening to them, we can build an excellent relationship with them and grow the business. This is in marked contrast to many other golf retailers, and to be fair our company has previously been in this category but American Golf today is not interested in this short term, slightly seedy type of selling. We are striving to improve our staff knowledge and customer care at every one of our 108 outlets.
“This process is obviously taking some time, but it is a much more fulfilling job to be genuinely interested in improving someone’s golf game, rather than just trying to sell them any piece of equipment. The results are really starting to bear fruit now and we are noticing a strong improvement in the number of people coming to our stores to look around, to chat and to buy.”
With so many major businesses headquartered just a few hundred yards away from the centre, it is obvious the corporate entertaining is a very big part of the business. Phil Richins heads up this part of the business, and he spoke to Golf Features:
“We have put some great packages together, which allow people to rent 2, 4, 6, 8 or 10 bays at a time. Our largest events have seen as many as 180 guests. They then have access to unlimited golf balls for one or two hours and - most importantly - we add a couple of our N1Golf professionals so that they get expertise, entertainment and obviously tuition, but also the guarantee that they are safe in conducting their fun golfing event. We serve food and drink straight into the bay and the tab is picked up by the client at the end. By city standards, we are able to offer remarkably good value for money packages that provide lots of different people with an interesting experience of golf, even if they have never played before. This side of the business is growing fast and it’s great fun to run as well.”
Knight Dragon is a huge property company and have the job of developing the whole of the Greenwich Peninsular. The very last part of land to be developed will indeed be the golf range, but that is many years away from now, and in the meantime all sorts of flats, and houses, apartments and townhouses of many descriptions are being built to serve this fast expanding part of central London. It is a huge project, but the Greenwich Peninsular, with its magnificent views and the O2, has much to attract people working in London. The commuting options are many and include river taxis and a great tube connection.
Declan Malone, who is the founder of N1Golf, was involved with the project from the very start. N1Golf are joint venture with Knight Dragon and also supply the academy with a number of PGA coaches for the venue. He spoke to Golf Features:
“This is the most exciting project that I have ever been involved with and we all feel very proud to be associated with such a successful golf venture in the heart of the best capital city in the world. Everybody using the range is just thrilled with the views and also the excellent service that is available to them. I would say this is one of the biggest growths seen in golf for a long time, we have a terrific throughput and like London attract a very diverse customer base, the number of balls that we are hitting on the golf range is simply phenomenal. Best of all there are thousands of new golfers trying golf for the first time here at Greenwich which is a pleasure to see and fundamentally what N1Golf stands for.“
Golf Features will be back to cover further developments at this remarkable golf range.