Daylight “saving grace” for golf in Queensland?

By Mike Orloff

In Australia, Queenslanders would know it better than anyone. With public opinion geographically divided, the state has fought a bitter feud over time, literally.

The myths and controversies surrounding daylight saving time (DST) are plentiful, and the opinions are vastly diverse. While most people believe that daylight saving time was designed to benefit farmers or school children, those theories contain little to no truth.

And with anti-DST lobbyists now debunking the long withstanding notion that biennial clock-tampering would result in energy savings, one is left to wonder: what are the actual benefits of that extra afternoon hour of daylight?

Ask the golf industry and no one seems to really know!

Michael Downing, a Tufts professor and the author of “Spring Forward: The Annual Madness of Daylight Saving Time, has said that thanks to the extended hours of sunlight during an extra month of DST – resulting in more time on the links – golf courses in the US are believed to make an additional US$400 million in annual revenue.

And that was the industry estimate 30 years ago.

The numbers were part of lobbyists’ attempt to urge lawmakers in 1986 to extend daylight saving from six to seven months, which ended up becoming the norm. So, did the golf industry alone support the false myths about farmers and school kids to grow their game?

Not quite. The larger business community also helped push the initiative.

The rational is that by shifting an hour of sunlight from the ungodly early morning hours to the evening, people are able to better utilise the time at the end of the workday rather than at dawn – whether it’s going to the park, cooking up a barbecue, or perfecting your golf game.

When I worked in California, our courses had a very good afternoon trade of golfers, range users and restaurant clients. People got off work at 4-5pm and came over for a quick hit. We even had company “leagues” that played each week over a 12-week period. This added up to some very good revenue each summer.

Queensland is unfortunately missing out on all these opportunities at our golf courses when the additional revenue would be in great need.

For South East Queensland especially as a tourist destination, the simple advent of daylight savings each year could add up to great revenue across all the tourism sectors. It would be good to get the quantitative research done for this to see once and for all how much benefit it would be for our golfing industry.

Click here to read full article in GIC summer 2016 e-magazine

In this 2016 summer issue we have a look at the ever-growing presence of MSL Solutions and their move into the global golf market, as well as their evolution into the Australian market. We also hope to start a discussion about Daylight Saving and the potential impact on the golf industry in SE Qld. We hope you enjoy the read…