|
Button Hole Short Course & Teaching Center isn’t your average driving range or golf learning center. With operational costs around $550,000 a year, Providence, R.I.’s Button Hole is only doing about $250,000 business per annum. But this place is anything but a failure. In fact, it’s a smashing success for the city’s 25,000 urban youth and a vision of the future of golf instruction.
Operating as a 501(c)(3) nonprofit entity directed by the Golf Foundation of Rhode Island, Button Hole is the brainchild of successful entrepreneur and golfer Ed Mauro. A lifelong Providence resident, former state amateur champion and retired owner of a lucrative pipe valve business, Mauro serves as the chairman of the foundation board.
“With his golf and business connections, Mr. Mauro was able to put together the gargantuan fund-raising effort this took,” says Button Hole Executive Director John Wolf. “It was three and a half million dollars over two and a half years of charitable contributions, not investors. It was convincing people to give it away. And it still goes on every year.”
That’s how Button Hole makes up that $300,000 budget deficit to keep the 26-acre facility operating. And keeping it open is important on a local, as well as industry, level. In its first year after opening in June 2001, Button Hole had more than 900 local youth participate in the center’s structured instructional programs, the majority of those picking up a club for the first time. This past summer, that number had jumped to nearly 1,500 children enjoying beginning lessons and an introduction to the game.
And if golf as an industry is battling to keep participant numbers up, then a facility like Button Hole is the front line.
“We’re well positioned to do our mission, which is to make golf more accessible and less costly, specifically to young people,” says Wolf.
In the Beginning
In 1997, after successfully working to return the U.S. Amateur Championship to Newport Country Club and helping to restore the local Point Judith course to its former grandeur, Mauro took on another project: a nine-hole par-3 course designed to be accessible and affordable to Providence’s urban youth.
“I just wanted to give kids a chance to play the game,” Mauro told Golf World magazine after construction began on the facility. “That’s what my father gave me, and I believe it shaped who I am.”
After plans for the course and lighted range were drawn up, Mauro called on his golf and business contacts to get the fund-raising fires going. Stanley Goldstein, then CEO of CVS, joined the project as co-chair, and the drugstore giant signed on as a major sponsor.
Other organizations also rose to the challenge. USGA came up with a $50,000 grant to help get Button Hole off the ground. Area golf courses donated equipment, and local governments supported plans for the facility. Even PGA stars Billy Andrade and Brad Faxon came aboard as honorary chairmen of the project and have been tireless advocates of Button Hole since.
“When Brad and Billy come out, we have a public relations event,” explains Wolf. “They’ve been awesome. I don’t think we could have done this without their support. They come out every year, and they’ve never turned us down when we needed them.”
Finding a suitable site wasn’t as easy. Mauro was choosy, rejecting several potential locations before the state offered to lease land for the project along the border of Providence, the town of Johnston and the Woonasquatucket River. The site, long called Button Hole by locals, was a former dump that had become a haven for prostitution and drug trade—not a perfect venue, but close to downtown Providence and the project’s target audience.
“We’ve been highlighted as a success story for reclamation,” says Wolf. “We had to bury a bunch of fill that was the topsoil on the site because it was contaminated with lead and arsenic. We had to fill in to flatten out our driving range and then it has been capped. It’s contaminated under the topsoil, but it’s safe.”
Just off busy Route 6, patrons enter the facility on Button Hole Drive and wind around the perimeter of the par-3 course to reach an 80-spot paved parking lot at the side of the 3,800-square-foot clubhouse. The range consists of a 24-station matted tee line that looks out to a 300-yard-long by 100-yard-wide natural grass landing area with six raised target greens. At the far end of the range, an access road allows customers to hit off 20 grass tees.
In addition to the range and par-3 course, Button Hole has two putting greens and a 45,000-square-foot bunker and tiered chipping area. At 16,000 square feet, the larger of the two practice greens is the biggest such green in Rhode Island, according to Wolf. On Saturdays, the green will often host as many as 40 “Little Leaguers,” kids 5 to 8 years old, who participate in short game clinics.
“We’ve actually got the space to have three different groups out here at a time in different areas,” says Wolf.
Teach the Children Well
USGA has mandated a 10-year $50 million initiative to make golf more accessible to more people in more places. Button Hole may well become a prototype for how the industry can reach new players.
“There’s a big push to get 100,000 kids [playing] by 2005,” Wolf says, referring to programs such as The First Tee. “By the nature of that, you’re going to have to build more facilities, but I still think a place like this, with our mission, is special. We’ve had calls as far away as California and North Carolina from people who are interested [in building a similar facility], but so far I think we’re the only place like this.”
Operating under the supervision of the foundation board, Button Hole has only five full-time employees other than Wolf: a director of golf, an assistant professional, a greens superintendent, an administrative assistant and an office manager. But Button Hole also has 22 part-time employees, many of them kids from the neighborhood who have been through the facility’s instructional programs. Thanks to a USGA Boatwright Internship, Button Hole also is able to fund fellowships each summer for quality interns, and USGA provides additional money to hire golf instructors, too. Shane Drury, Button Hole’s director of golf, has a part-time and volunteer staff numbering more than 40.
“We’ve got some assistant pros who are 22 through 27 years old, good people with a lot of energy who can deal with the flexibility we need,” says Wolf.
For example, Button Hole has an innovative partner program with Wheels & Heels, an adult wheelchair athletic group, which plays three of the most accessible par-3 holes every other Thursday night. Normally accustomed to basketball and track and field events, Wheels & Heels participants have proven quick studies on the links with Button Hole’s proven instruction, which stresses safety first, followed by golf basics, and adheres to a basic rule of no more than five students per instructor.
“It was kind of like a test for us because we had to figure out whether people would swing from the side of their wheelchair or in front of it, whether they would need longer clubs, whether we would have to bend the clubs to adapt them,” says Wolf. “But they’ve picked it up like fish in water.”
Playing from wheelchairs or with the aid of crutches or braces, Wheels & Heels players hit from tee to green and are matched with kids enrolled in Button Hole’s programs who finish off the hole. The kids also push the wheelchairs over the three holes. The players, by all reports, have a blast.
Special Olympics athletes and students from the Rhode Island School for the Deaf are also regular visitors, but Button Hole’s target demographic is financially disadvantaged youth whom the facility reaches through the YMCA, Boys & Girls Clubs, recreation departments, schools and the Providence Housing Authority.
“In Providence, you’re talking about a demographic that’s roughly 40 percent Hispanic, 20 percent African-American, 20 percent Southeast Asian, and a lot of these folks don’t have a cultural context with golf,” says Wolf. “Whether it’s because of economic or racial or whatever the reason is, they’re not familiar with the game.”
Wolf says Tiger Woods has increased awareness of golf among youth, but in the Providence area, “on a Saturday or Sunday, you won’t find them watching the PGA Tour.”
So Wolf’s challenge is to not only sell the game to these kids but also sell the social agencies that serve their interests. “I’m trying to convince the social service agencies in the city that, instead of bringing your kids to the basketball court right next to you or that soccer field, I want you to arrange transportation and bring the kids down here,” he says. “I’m creating more work for them in an area where most of the families have no connection [with golf].”
Perhaps one of the most gratifying developments in the brief history of Button Hole has been an influx of new donors—families who have experienced the benefits of the facility firsthand.
“We’ve established ourselves after three years as a pretty good place to bring kids to give them their first shot,” says Wolf. “And people are buying into it. We’re finding people at the lower income levels; they’re donating $25 to $50 a year. People believe in what we’re doing.”
And what Button Hole is doing is not only introducing golf to new participants but also helping build self-esteem and offering structured activities for children who need positive alternatives.
Social service agencies that bring kids to Button Hole are charged $30 per child, and financial assistance is available through grants and donations to reduce that fee. That modest fee represents just 5 percent of the facility’s costs. Enrolled kids receive four lessons, unlimited range balls, supervision by the staff, a 47-page student manual and a fashionable Button Hole golf shirt.
Students graduate from the program by passing a short, written test and get a certificate signed by Andrade and Faxon. These “Button Hole Kids” then can hit unlimited range balls or play the course for a dollar until age 18.
A Range of Ideas
Button Hole’s facilities also attract more traditional golf enthusiasts, a clientele Wolf hopes will grow. Such growth can further defer costs for the facility’s charitable mission.
A city course about a half-mile away doesn’t have a range, so Button Hole gets some spillover customers from it. Many of the facility’s charitable donors also are country club members and avid players, so they’re encouraged to use Button Hole’s facilities. Wolf says many of the older courses in the region weren’t designed with ranges in mind, so the center can sell itself to the country club set looking for a better place to practice. In fact, for $300 a year, members can hit all the balls they want. So far, more than 30 people have signed up for that deal.
Wolf says one of his best tools to draw in traditional golf range users is Button Hole’s newsletter. The mailing list is 7,000 strong with donors, customers, prospects and basically “anyone who has dropped their business card here,” says Wolf. The newsletter is a standard fund-raising tool for nonprofits, and it’s a great fit for Button Hole, offering an opportunity to reiterate the facility’s mission and answer the most common questions about pricing, club rentals and directions. Along with the web site, it’s one of the center’s best ways to provide information.
“When you send a newsletter out to 7,000 people, it is costly but it’s a great way to get through to people what you’re doing and what impact you’re having,” says Wolf.
Seniors are another potential growth area for Button Hole, and for a very practical reason: the short course is perfectly designed for their game. “There are a lot of seniors we think might like this course,” says Wolf. “Our course is nice for them because the longest hole is 150 yards. It’s challenging but it wouldn’t preclude a guy who can’t hit it past 200 yards.”
Wolf also likes to distribute lots of coupons in the community to get new business in the door. And nights when Andrade or Faxon host demonstrations and clinics are also popular draws. Wolf plans to bring in more “top-name teachers” from around the state for adult lessons, renting them space and helping them attract students.
One of Button Hole’s best revenue producers is renting out the center to other nonprofit organizations for fund-raisers. The San Miguel School, a local school for at-risk boys, netted $13,000 with a recent nine-hole flight and hole-in-one event. Button Hole takes 10 percent, a value for the renting nonprofit, yet still a moneymaker for the center, and a force to create synergy in the community.
Button Hole also hosts corporate outings and has had some companies bring in as many as 300 people to play the course and use the range. Wolf would like to schedule 10 such events a year if he can find enough interested corporations.
“You have to be careful, though,” he says. “Some courses have alienated their clientele by just booking completely with outings so they aren’t available to the public.”
With Button Hole’s mission always at the forefront, it’s unlikely that would ever happen. In fact, it’s that mission statement that makes Button Hole different from many golf centers. Specifically, the small pro shop is limited by design. Customers can buy hats and shirts with the Button Hole logo, and balls and ball markers, but there’s no high-end merchandise.
“We don’t net more than $5,000 [in pro shop sales] a year, and the reason we do that is we’re serving kids who come from next to nothing,” says Wolf. “Part of our kids who walk in, their families are on welfare and we don’t want to be sporting the top of the line drivers that cost $200. We might be able to sell some, but it would be sending the wrong message.”
Likewise, there’s no restaurant at Button Hole. Snacks are sold over the counter, and drinks are available from vending machines, which were moved indoors shortly after opening because they were targets for thieves and vandals.
Wolf is thinking about adding ball dispensers on both tee lines, but the rough nature of the neighborhood is still a consideration. On nights before big events, security guards patrol the range and course.
Just Getting Started
After a successful start, Wolf and the foundation are looking at adding on to the facility. Specifically, they would like to add an indoor putting green, a golf library geared toward instruction, heated, covered teaching stations, and possibly some sort of mobile food service. They’re studying their options on all those fronts these days, and won’t move forward until they have a consensus. “When you’re a nonprofit, you take great care spending the money you’ve worked so hard to garner from your patrons,” Wolf says.
Wolf thinks selling more snacks and going to over-the-counter sales of canned or bottled drinks could provide a better profit margin. “We get 20-30,000 visits a year, and if we could find a few more ways for them to spend their dollars here, it would help us meet our fund-raising need,” Wolf adds.
Rhode Islanders have been generous, donating more than 4,000 golf clubs. Balls are regularly donated, too, which is a good thing for Button Hole. Because of the neighborhood, the facility has to pick balls frequently to hang onto its inventory.
As for the clubs, many sets are just taking up valuable space, and Wolf is talking with an industrial artist about crafting an outdoor sculpture with some of them to capture the flavor of the facility.
Melding those clubs together somehow seems appropriate at a place that brings all kinds of golfers together.
“We have people of all different nationalities and ethnic backgrounds coming out here,” says Wolf. “We have people in wheelchairs playing alongside people who are fully able. We’ve got a course where a grandfather, a father and a 6-year-old can go out and play together and take their time. We encourage that. I think this is the cutting edge of what golf is becoming.”
|
