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Balancing act
Wearing both a superintendent’s and an owner’s hat requires a special breed with special skills.
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It’s pretty much a given that a golf course superintendent wears many hats. There’s one chapeau, though, that’s considered not so much a bad fit as it is just plain out of place. Let’s call it the top hat, which signifies “the boss” or, more specifically, the owner.
Accomplished superintendents across the country have made the jump from the course to the desk set, assuming high-level positions in facility management — directors of this or that, general managers even. It’s becoming more commonplace all the time, mostly because the hats prove to fit just fine.
But that top hat is a tricky one, vulnerable to the slightest winds of customer whims and not very protective in a sudden downpour of budget-bending issues. Rare is the golf course management professional who even tries one on.
“You’re wearing such a different hat as an owner,” says Jeff Prieskorn, a superintendent whose life hasn’t been the same since he bought a rundown nine-hole military layout on the Texas side of the Red River just west of Texarkana a little more than eight years ago.
“You’re thinking primarily about the customer and secondarily about the golf course,” the six-year GCSAA member explains. “To me, that’s a great balance. A superintendent always needs to have that perspective, I think. The key for an owner is to get the customers to become regulars, and golf course management has to accommodate that.”
Prieskorn is among those included here in a small but diverse and highly complementary sampling compiled by GCM — case studies of superintendent/owners and variations thereof.
Pete Spratlin
Superintendent, Ironhorse Golf Club, Leawood, Kan.
Pete Spratlin has been a superintendent for almost 20 years, but it’s the last six that probably are the most defining in his career.
“Pretty much up to my eyeballs 24 hours a day,” is how the 16-year GCSAA member describes things since 2000, when he formed his own golf course management company while continuing to be the Class A superintendent at Ironhorse Golf Club, a high-end city-owned venue in the southern suburbs of metropolitan Kansas City.
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In many ways, Spratlin came by his superintendent/owner tag quite naturally. He has had a long-standing relationship with management companies, working with Environmental Golf (now ValleyCrest) early in his career and then with Evergreen Alliance when its portfolio included Ironhorse.
He also came into the profession armed with an agronomy degree and a minor in business finance from Auburn University, and along the way has had the opportunity to speak to future superintendents at Kansas State University and area community colleges on the importance of adding business skills to turfgrass management.
“I always point out to the turf students to take all the business courses they can,” Spratlin says. “It’ll pay off almost immediately. You need to be able to walk into a general manager’s office or the owner’s office and know what they’re talking about. Actually, as far as I’m concerned, every superintendent is a mid-size business owner when it comes down to it.”
Taking the big step
A half-dozen years go, the city of Leawood ended its deal with Evergreen and gave its blessing to an overture by Spratlin in which he would create his own management firm with Ironhorse as his first client. Actually, he balked a little at what he was getting himself into until he secured a couple of partners in the venture, both PGA professionals.
“I was hesitant until the two partners came on board,” Spratlin says. “With them, I didn’t have to worry so much about the golf shop business.”
While the pros handled the pro shop, as well as food and beverage, customer relations and property administration, Spratlin busied himself with running the maintenance of the course by day and the company’s human resources (payroll, insurance, 401(k) management, etc.) at home on the computer by night.
“Superintendents everywhere excel at putting out fires ... I just threw some gas on mine,” he says. “But it worked out. I’ve had a great staff that allowed me more office time. I think I became pretty effective.”
Spratlin notes that his job also helped him achieve a wide view of the golf course industry in his area through numerous course visits.
“One of the fun things during the time was the amount of consulting we were able to do — evaluating golf courses that were being foreclosed and developing situations like that,” he says. “Moving around and seeing different situations helps a superintendent see issues at other properties. That was a big bonus that I really enjoyed.”
Ironhorse was the company’s only property until early in 2006 when two longtime Kansas City-area courses, Swope Memorial and Minor Park, signed on. Spratlin quickly added two veteran superintendents to his supporting cast — Tony Bertels, Class A and a 15-year member of GCSAA, at Swope Memorial and Paul Fiscus, CGCS, a 13-year GCSAA member, at Minor Park.
The added administrative duties also caused Spratlin to lean even more on his staff at Ironhorse, especially two key standbys — first assistant Eric Trimble and equipment manager Jeff McAlister.
Back to the future
Late last year, however, the city of Leawood — faced with a $5 million, 18-month renovation of Ironhorse GC — made Spratlin an offer he couldn’t refuse, although it meant leaving the management company he created. The other partners continue to run the clubhouse business, but the course management, including the renovation, is now under the city umbrella and under Spratlin’s direction.
“I’m narrowing my focus now and I’m anxious to return to golf course management,” he says, adding that the focus has zeroed in on the renovation that began this month. The work will address flood- and erosion-control issues, the rebuilding of all of the 12-year-old facility’s greens and several other projects around the property that will be done in-house.
The size and length of the undertaking hardly fazes Spratlin after the experiences of the past several years. “I’ve worked for single owners, I’ve worked for municipalities, I’ve worked for country clubs, I’ve worked for myself,” he says. “Across the board I can say that working for myself is very similar to working for a single owner that you enjoy working for and enjoy making money for. I feel like I’ve got that now with the city of Leawood.”
Jeff Prieskorn
Superintendent/Owner, Oak Grove Golf Club, New Boston, Texas
When Prieskorn wound up with the winning bid for Oak Grove Golf Club in 1998, one of his first thoughts as a golf course owner was also one of the most sobering: He didn’t have the slightest idea what to do with the neglected, weed-infested layout on the grounds of the Red River Army Depot.
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One of his first hires was a PGA professional, Coy Sevier Jr., who turned out to be as much of a wannabe superintendent as the new boss, so the two of them set out to tackle the world of golf course management.
“Coy knew a lot of folks in the industry, superintendents, so we just starting calling on folks he knew,” Prieskorn recalls. “They’d come by for a day or so, tell us what we need to be thinking about and who else we need to talk to. I’ll never forget the advice from one guy from down in Tyler ... He said, ‘Don’t get too aggressive with those weeds because that’s about all you got.’ That was our first slap in the face.”
Lessons learned well
The first few years of learning on the job were indeed tough, but the neophyte turf managers continued to tap into area superintendents’ expertise and also learned to lean on the advice of turf-care product sales representatives. It also didn’t hurt that one of the country’s largest distributors, BWI Companies, was headquartered nearby.
“You know they’re trying to sell you their products,” Prieskorn says of the sales reps. “But some of them were ex-superintendents and they’d spend time with us, tour the course and show us what problems we had and what we needed to do. They wanted a long-term relationship, and we appreciated their interest. They’ve been very helpful.”
Prieskorn eventually settled into the superintendent/owner mode as he and Sevier learned well. The weeds turned to turf as they groomed Oak Grove into a year-round semi-private venue, added a second nine holes in 2000 and renovated the original nine three holes at a time in 2001, ’02 and ’03. In recent years the course has averaged a tad better than 30,000 rounds annually.
“It’s not where we want it; I think we can get to 40,000 rounds,” says Prieskorn, who recently turned over the maintenance to Sevier in order to get a firmer grasp on the duties of ownership. “We’ve got to continue to get more customers to become regulars.”
David O’Rourke
Superintendent/Owner, Points North Golf Club, Stowe, Vt.
Calling David O’Rourke a superintendent/owner in the context here may seem like a stretch, but then, O’Rourke is used to being stretched.
To wit:
- For more than 25 years he’s been a manufacturer’s sales rep.
- He conducts golf tours to Ireland and Scotland and might be the best bet extant for a ticket to the Ryder Cup.
- He runs a little maple syrup operation on his property nestled in the north-central reaches of Vermont’s Green Mountains.
- He’s a part-time bartender at a local pub.
- And, within the last few years, he has built his own unique golfing facility and is in business to do the same for anyone so inclined.
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It’s that most recent venture that earns O’Rourke a place in this article, and it’s not that much of a stretch. Of all the hats he wears, as noted above, he is most of all an avid golfer and more so than most. The top hat comes in all sizes and, for that matter, so do golf courses. Therein is O’Rourke’s legitimacy.
Many arrows, one target
Here’s the lowdown on O’Rourke’s layout. It’s spread around 30 acres on a mountainside, 20 of his and 10 of a neighbor’s, with a lot of nooks and crannies and elevation changes that top out at about 1,300 feet. The specifics include 12 tee areas all aimed at one target, a 9,000-square-foot, two-tiered, well-bunkered bentgrass green with an irrigation pond menacingly close. Some of the “holes” are par 4s complete with fairway turf, while most are par 3s.
To play Points North is a tough tee time. O’Rourke says he maintains a limited membership by invitation only, although one gets the idea that anyone sharing a cold one or two with the owner on his veranda is free to step on a close-by tee and swing away. That particular shot is about 155 yards.
“It’s real golf in a limited acreage setting,” O’Rourke says simply of his concept of private property design and construction, which is also the M.O. of his new business, Home Course Advantage, of which his mountainside creation is the prime showpiece.
“We’ve had some people looking at the idea,” he says. “What happens, typically, is that people become very interested in it, then they get scared about the maintenance.”
Air of accountability
O’Rourke knows that fear well. A dozen tee boxes, a few fairways and a large bentgrass green don’t take care of themselves. Fortunately, he had a friend in Mike Keohan, the Class A superintendent at the Country Club of Vermont in Waterbury just down the road from O’Rourke’s place.
“Mike told me, ‘You know, you’ve got your own golf course ... you designed it, you built it, you might as well be an actual superintendent and join our associations,’ ” O’Rourke remembers.
Thus, Keohan, a member of GCSAA for 15 years, became O’Rourke’s main mentor and sponsored him for Vermont GCSA and GCSAA memberships along with a lot of valuable advice.
“I’ve met a bunch of great guys. It’s a unique fraternity,” says O’Rourke who is beginning his second year on GCSAA’s rolls. “The on-the-job training has been a fantastic experience.”
Today O’Rourke is as proficient a superintendent as he needs to be, adept with an abbreviated Toro irrigation system and a spartan equipment lineup that includes a fairway mower, walk-behind greensmower and topdressing necessities.
Living an idea
Meanwhile, he continues to hawk his real-but-limited golf concept from a business standpoint. The requirements, he adds, are few, but substantial — a few acres, a lot of dollars and it helps to be avid as heck.
“Typically, someone with that kind of money has the land and they’ll find somebody to maintain it,” O’Rourke says, noting that a superintendent, an assistant or a staff member from a nearby course might be open to a part-time maintenance gig. Another option, in this day and age, is going the synthetic turf route.
For now, O’Rourke enjoys being his own superintendent and all that comes with the territory.
“The amount of maintenance and work it takes to keep it looking good, playable and to the standards I want it to be maintained at are very challenging,” he says.
And what of the cost of providing Points North GC for 20 or so friends and acquaintances? “Let’s just say blood, sweat and equity,” says O’Rourke, top hat and all.
Lewis Burke
Owner, Shady Brook Golf Club, Paris, Ky.
Superintendent, Hidden Cove Golf Course, Olive Hill, Ky.
Asked about his more than two decades of juggling the dual role of superintendent and owner, Lewis Burke, who’s nothing if not old-school succinct, says, “It’s a long day; trust me on that.”
Burke’s story is loaded with twists and turns, so it’s fitting that the introductory heading above notes that he is the owner of one course and the Class A superintendent at another, separated by more than 60 miles as the crow flies in northeast Kentucky.
To take Burke’s cue and be brief, blunt and to the point, the 16-year GCSAA member built Shady Brook GC in the early 1980s on his in-laws’ farmland, spent much of the last half of the following two-dozen years trying to sell the nine-hole track and in the meantime is in the second of two stints as the superintendent at Hidden Cove, a four-year-old high-profile state-owned layout he helped build and grow in.
The rest of the story
Trouble is, there’s so much between the lines that that’s barely the half of it. The long version starts some years earlier with a young superintendent souring on the profession and getting into sales outside the golf industry. But later he would marry and, with enough wherewithal and the opportunity, decide to build his own golf course on his father-in-law’s land. For nearly 10 years, Burke adeptly handled his dual role of superintendent/owner as Shady Brook evolved into a successful niche course catering to retirees, women and others attracted to a golfer-friendly layout and customer-conscious management.
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“It was not as much wanting to be an owner as it was about control of your situation,” Burke says of his decision to get back into golf by building the course and running the operation. “What’s important is control and money management — being able to make absolute decisions where the money goes, what needs to be done.”
But Burke suffered a severe setback when he lost “the two people I was closest to” — first his wife and then his father-in-law six years later.
Despite the business’s success, he was never the same.
“It was a situation where I didn’t want to be there anymore, even though the course was really doing well,” he says.
Burke sought a buyer for Shady Brook and eventually, in 1999, made a lease/purchase agreement with a fellow superintendent eager to try on the top hat.
New directions
Meanwhile, Burke swerved sharply, caddying on the Buy.Com Tour (now Nationwide) for a time. Then came the opportunity at Hidden Cove, where he became the state’s “resident inspector,” working closely with the project designer, Brian Ault, and then directing the grow-in.
But before he could get settled in with his new job, the first lease/purchase deal at Shady Brook unexpectedly collapsed, and Burke was forced to leave his duties at Hidden Cove to return to the life of a superintendent/owner at Shady Brook.
“Golf courses are tough to sell,” Burke says philosophically. “You’ve got to find somebody who wants to be in the business, and if they want to be in the business, they generally don’t have the money.”
A few years ago he forged another deal with an area businessman who shares Burke’s notion of what works at Shady Brook. His good fortune extended back down the road to Olive Hill when the superintendent who replaced him at Hidden Cove left and Burke was re-hired.
Important impression
If all continues to go well, Burke will be hanging up his top hat and settling for the myriad selection more traditional for a superintendent. Even so, he figures to use the skills learned as an owner to his advantage.
“Ownership is different ... you’ve got to think about a lot besides growing the grass,” Burke says. “It helps to be able to think from the golfing community’s perspective. I think too many superintendents don’t figure out that their real job is for the golfers. You lean toward the golfer when you’re the owner because you want people playing golf. At Hidden Cove, I do feel like I’m doing a superintendent’s job from a golfer’s perspective. And we do get along real well.”
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