July-August 2003 Cover Story:

Lights, Golf, Action

Extended Hours Allow Customers to Spend More (Time) at the Range

By Sherrie Burns

Stopping by the range after work to hit a few buckets of balls before dark is certainly nothing new. But on Long Island, N.Y., customers at The Links at Shirley can stop by after the late shift and still find the lights on. The golf center’s 50 combined acres, which support a driving range and an 18-hole par-3 executive course, are fully lighted and open until the wee hours of the morning.

“The last tee time is midnight, so golfers can be out here until 2 or 3 in the morning,” says owner Mel Mindich, who estimates that 40 percent of his par-3 business and 50 percent of his driving range business is done after sunset. Industry studies have shown that depending on demographics, up to 80 percent of a driving range’s revenue can be generated after 4 p.m.

Though the bottom-line benefit of lighting is evident, range owners should evaluate whether their market will support the investment.

“In the Sunbelt, lighting definitely impacts the bottom line because it extends the daylight hours in the spring, fall and winter months, and it’s cooler to play at night in the summer,” says Tom McClurg, president of McScot Golf, a golf range and course design and construction company based in Lake Mary, Fla. “But in some northern climates, the spring and late fall can be very cool, so if you don’t have some heated hitting areas, staying open late may not work. If you’re in a warmer area where 50 percent of your business is after 4 p.m., it makes sense to have lights.”

Lighting Options
The purpose of lighting is to illuminate the tee line and landing area so that customers can comfortably address the ball and follow its flight. “The key is playability,” says Mike Limpach, southeast regional sales manager for Musco Sports Lighting in Oskaloosa, Iowa. “The goal is to create a continuous light source on the back of the ball. They need that depth of field or it’s frustrating, and frustrated customers don’t return.”

The most traditional lighting design involves pole or roof-mounted lights positioned behind and above the tee line that shine downrange. “As with any sports lighting application, higher is better,” says David Little, developmental sales representative for Musco. “Poles work well, and roofs are fine if they’re high enough to do the job, but 15 to 20 feet high from a lighting point of view is pretty low. We like to get 50, 60, even 70 feet up so there’s a bit of an angle downrange.”
The number of tee stations dictates the number of poles needed. Depending on how many lights are mounted on each pole (typically four to five) and their intensity, the general rule of thumb is one light pole for every eight stations. While this design requires fewer poles, fixtures and electrical wiring, lights directed out toward the landing area produce a lot of spillage beyond the range’s property. As a result, this design works best in nonresidential and noncommercial areas where light glare and spillage are not issues.

Using pole lighting behind the tees as well as along the sides of the range minimizes light spillage because the lights behind the tees shine down, not out, and the sidelights are directed on the landing area. However, unless the lights can be mounted onto existing netting poles or other structures, this option can be more costly because of the increased number of poles needed. Wooden poles can cost $300 with steel poles running as high as $1,200, says McClurg. Plus, steel poles need to be set in a foundation, which can add another $500 to the cost, he says.

A more cost-effective design is to combine pole lights behind the tees with berm lights in the landing area, a design used at Knight’s Play Golf Center in Apex, N.C. “On our range, we have pole lights across the back of the range and ground lights on the range for well-lit targets,” says Kevin Jones, manager and head golf professional. “We get a lot of compliments from people who hit at night who like it because they can see where their ball is landing.”

High-powered fixtures set into mounds or bunkers down the sides and throughout the landing area, berm lights are strategically directed up and out across the range so that the ball is lit from all sides, allowing golfers to see ball flight and landing in its entirety.

“In the past 15 years, the biggest advent in lighting has been the use of ground lighting,” says McClurg. “Ground lighting systems, from an aesthetic and playability standpoint, are better than using conventional pole lights behind the tee, blasting downrange.”

Berm lighting virtually eliminates light spillover from the range, but tends to produce a glow around the facility, sometimes referred to as “night glow.” Berm lights also are easier to access and maintain, but they may not be an option depending on the design of the range. For instance, at The Links at Shirley, the landing area is part of the facility’s water retention system. “We could have standing water which could be a problem for the electrical system, so we use pole lighting down the sides instead,” says Mindich.

Cost Factors
Because the cost of installing a lighting system is significant, experts suggest finding a well-referenced company to help in the design and implementation of this major investment. According to McClurg, depending on geographics, pole materials and labor, the typical cost of a pole-mounted light fixture with wiring and installation can be $1,500 to $2,500 per pole. This is based on 1,500-watt metal halide lamps, with four to five fixtures per pole. “A 300-foot-wide tee area at a range might typically use four poles with five fixtures per pole,” he says. “Depending on the type of pole—wood, concrete or steel—the total cost could range from $30,000 to $50,000 for installation. [But] in an area where 50 percent or more of business is done after 4 p.m., a $30,000 investment can be recouped pretty quickly.”

Another cost consideration is maintenance. “If done right by a reliable contractor, sports lighting is generally static,” says Musco’s Little. “It’s not mechanical so things don’t move or break down. Except for some lamp maintenance, changing burned-out bulbs and cleaning the reflectors, it’s pretty much maintenance-free.” Roof and berm lights are easiest to access, and pole lights can be reached either by a utility truck, a crane with a man basket or with attached climbing steps and surface platforms. “A 1,500-watt bulb is generally rated for 3,000 hours, depending on how much it’s started and stopped,” says Little. “A 1,000-watt bulb can burn up to 12,000 hours but it produces less light. If a range only operated three to four lighted hours per night, it could be three or four years before a bulb would need to be changed.” McClurg adds that a lamp will begin to dim about halfway through its life cycle. “At 50 percent of its operating life, a lamp will begin to put out only 50 percent of its light. It starts to dim and depreciate, so it’s smart to anticipate relamping about every 1,500 hours,” he says.

Metal halide lights provide a good lumens-per-watt relationship, making them more cost-effective than other lamp types. “These lamps give good color rendition, closer to sunlight than other types,” says McClurg of McScot Golf. “Sodium vapor lights turn everything yellow, and mercury vapor lights turn everything blue. What you want is something closer to daylight, and for that, metal halide is pretty much the light source of preference.”

Operating costs will vary with power company rates, but McClurg estimates that at 10 cents per kilowatt-hour, each 1,500-watt fixture would cost about 161/2 cents per hour to run.

Mindich at The Links at Shirley turns on the lights during the prime season from near the end of May to the end of September. “One of our problems is high rates from our local power company, which has different rates at different times of the day,” he says. “One of the key rate changes is 8 p.m. so I don’t turn the lights on before then. In September, when it starts to get dark at around 7:40, I just wait until 8 to turn them on.”

The Bottom Line
Lighting a range lengthens the window of opportunity for people who can’t make it down before dark. Depending on the market, these customers could account for a sizable portion of the range’s business.

At Knight’s Play Golf Center, they’re half. In addition to lights on the 60-station driving range, the facility has a lit 27-hole par-3 course, both of which are open until midnight year-round, weather permitting. “We do more business from 4 p.m. to midnight than from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. during the warm season,” says Jones. “We could survive without the lights, but if we took away our 5 p.m. to midnight business, we’d probably lose 50 percent of our income. Golf is very profitable after dark.”

But only if the range’s lighting system is properly designed, installed and maintained.

“The primary issue is to light the facility so that it adds marketability,” says Musco’s Little. “Once you decide that adding lighting will enhance revenue and attract customers, then make sure to take the time to talk to suppliers, visit other facilities and check out references to help pick the right outfit to work with. If you’re spending $10,000 to hundreds of thousands of dollars on a lighting system, you only have one chance to do it right. It’s not a project you can toss and start again.”