Research note / Golf operations

Course Condition Shows Up in Revenue

What economic studies, golfer surveys and city golf reports say about upkeep and the money a course takes in.

Service Robot Co. Research · October 2026

Engraved illustration of a striped fairway curving toward a green and flagstick — Editorial illustration. It does not depict a documented deployment.

Summary

Most golf courses run on thin margins, so maintenance is often the first budget to come under pressure. The studies and public records we reviewed point the same way: better-kept courses take in more, and courses that let conditions slide tend to lose rounds and members.

Track course condition next to rounds, renewals and reviews, and judge any change to the maintenance budget by what it does to all of them.

01 / Analysis

Two studies tie condition to revenue

Economist Stephen Shmanske collected ratings from more than 900 golfers at 46 US public courses and compared them with each course's revenue. Courses in better condition took in more. He also found that the last dollar those courses spent on condition earned back about a dollar of revenue, which means a course that cut upkeep below that level would lose more in revenue than it saved.

A team of agricultural economists surveyed Georgia courses and modeled revenue and gross margin against maintenance spending. Extra spending on the playing surface showed up in revenue. How much it paid back depended on the course's age, location, size and rounds played, and it differed between private, semi-private and public courses. Both studies are 15 to 25 years old, and they remain the most direct evidence we found.

02 / Analysis

Golfers and members say the same thing

In a 2013 Golf Digest survey of 2,434 golfers, course conditions shaped how much golfers enjoyed a round away from home more than pace of play or cost did. More than 1,200 golfers on Spokane's city courses ranked condition as their top reason for choosing one course over another. In a survey of Los Angeles city golfers reported by Golf Course Industry, 70% said they would pay 5 to 15% more for better conditions.

Private club members point the same way. In a 2024 study of 3,750 members summarized by the Club Management Association of America, 46% named the condition of the club as something that could make them resign, just ahead of dues increases at 44%. That figure covers the clubhouse as well as the course. With attrition running at 3 to 4% a year and many clubs holding waitlists, conditions at a full club protect renewals more than they bring in new money.

03 / Analysis

What happened at real courses

Ely Park in Binghamton, New York, changed operators in 2021. By 2024 it hosted 32,000 rounds, 51% more than before, and memberships had nearly doubled. The mayor credited better maintenance, though the city also paid for cart paths, drainage and new carts during the pandemic golf boom. In Hamilton, Ohio, the city's two courses went from a loss of more than $60,000 to a profit of $56,762 in 2014, their first profit since 1998. The manager credited course conditions and his superintendents, alongside a new booking system and more outings.

The reverse cases are just as clear. Lago Vista, Texas, watched rounds and revenue fall as its course declined, and the city's fiscal 2024 report named poor course conditions as the primary reason for the revenue decline. Portland's 2019 golf audit found rounds down 6% over five years after the city cut maintenance spending, staff and mowers, along with fee increases. Aurora Country Club in Illinois cut its maintenance budget by 15% in 2009 and lost about 40 members during the recession.

None of these is a controlled experiment, because something else always changed at the same time. One counterexample is Nashville, which cut golf staff from 110.8 to 96.5 full-time positions and still set records during the pandemic boom, though golfers there said conditions could be better.

04 / Analysis

A fair test at your own course

Pick a way to score condition that you can repeat every week, such as a walk of the same holes with a fixed scorecard for fairway height, rough height, clippings and bare areas. Log it next to rounds, renewals and review comments for the same weeks.

When the maintenance plan changes, compare the periods before and after, and write down what else changed: weather, prices, tournaments and staffing. A few seasons of this record will say more about your course than any national average.

What to record

Weekly condition score on the same holes
Mowing frequency and height of cut, by area
Rounds, renewals and resignations, by month
Review ratings and comments that mention conditions
Weather, price changes and events in the same period

05 / Analysis

Limit of this note

This note summarizes published studies and public reports. The economic studies are old, and each course example had other changes at the same time. It does not claim that a given change in upkeep produces a fixed change in revenue.

Sources and method

This paper synthesizes the sources below and proposes a site-level evaluation method. It does not present original field measurements or a controlled trial.