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Archive for October, 2009
Sunday, October 4th, 2009
Selling online greens fees is a growing business that the frugal golfer should use to save big!
Increased competition for the golfing dollar has forced many golf courses to explore new ways to maximize revenues. One major way is for courses to sell more of their teetimes that aren’t getting sold. Many resourceful internet businesses have sprung up in the last few years to show these courses how.
More and more online greens fees are being sold at auction. eBay of course sells just about anything and numerous greens fees are constantly being offered by individuals and businesses. Find a course that you like & with a little patience (and sometimes luck), you can find some real bargains. Other auction sites (e.g. golfus.com & ezlinks.com ) specialize in online greens fees. Try doing an internet search on “golf tee time auctions” + your state in you have difficulty finding courses in your area.
Many companies (e.g. clickateetime.com sell online teetimes for specific dates and times for reduced rates. Some of these companies will also offer certificates for discount teetimes (for multiple dates) for a substantial reduction from full price.
A relatively new method for selling greens fees online involves naming your own price. After registering your credit card, you make an offer to purchase a specific teetime. Should your offer be accepted, you are then obligated to buy that teetime & your credit card is charged. So be careful when you make that offer! Some of these online companies using name your price (e.g. ezlinks ) offer the same courses & teetimes under teetime special (see last paragraph above), so one strategy for name your price is to offer a price a few dollars below what’s listed in the specials section.
There are also a multitude of national and/or regional membership sites (e.g lastminutegolfer.com ) that are free & can provide you numerous ways to save with golf discounts & coupons. This is an area that is growing quickly and there are too many great sites to mention. As always internet searches can identify some real gems out there.
Online greens fees are just another way the frugal golfer finds to maximize the golf dollar!
Category: Frugal Greens Fees
Sunday, October 4th, 2009
Sell your used clubs is a strategy the frugal golfer finds is a no-brainer! And it’s getting easier to do it all the time. Sell your used clubs & you can stretch your golf dollar that much further! For example, are you buying a new driver? Then, sell your old driver or trade it in to help pay for it.
Before you sell your club, you need to know how much it is worth. An excellent source is PGA.com Value Guide. This guide has a database of current used club transactions and will tell you how much you can expect.
You have a number choices to sell your used clubs. The last few years has seen many online stores spring up specifically to buy clubs. A couple you might check out are Sell-A-Club.com and OldClubs. Basically, you will describe your club online to them, get a quote, & then if you accept the price, you ship the club to them at your own expense. All these sites have escrows or other systems to ensure you get your money. The biggest hassle you might run into is if you haven’t described your club according to the buyer’s grading system. The buyer would then have the right to ship your club back to you at your expense.
Many online golf forums have sections devoted to used golf equipment. Check out FGI Forums Flea Market & Swap Shop and GolfRewind.com Marketplace forum Buy/Sell Golf Equipment . There is a bit of a trust factor here in that you are dealing with individuals rather than a company, but it might be worth a try especially if you have a club the online stores won’t give you a good price for.
eBay is always a viable option to both buy and sell just about anything! You’ll probably find that selling on eBay is just as fun and exciting as buying, and eBay’s outstanding Trust and Safety Program will help to ensure a positive auction experience.
Trading in your used club when you buy your new one will reduce your costs too. Just as when you trade in a car for a new one, you probably won’t get as good a deal as if you sold it yourself. But you take most of the hassle out of it. Online stores that have excellent trade in programs are Callaway Golf Pre-Owned and Outlet , The Golf Warehouse and Golf Galaxy .
The most trouble free way to get at least something for your used clubs is to donate them to charity (thanks Herb Bailey!). Get a receipt and follow your IRS tax guidelines, & you can get a charitable donations deduction on your taxes.
Clean out your garage, make your wife (or husband) happy & get rid of those clubs you don’t use anymore. The frugal golfer knows there is money in selling your used clubs – money you can use to stretch your golf dollar!
Category: Frugal Clubs
Sunday, October 4th, 2009
“Use recycled golf balls” is probably the single best advice a frugal golfer can get.
From scratch golfers to duffers and for anyone in between, you can get quality recycled balls that will suit your game and are virtually indistinguishable from new balls in appearance and playability. AND, there is no reason to ever pay more than HALF the price of retail for these balls!
How often have you hit a brand new ball once or twice & then lost it? Retrieving & recycling lost golf balls is big business on the internet. These companies typically have up to 4 grades of golf balls. The top of the line are usually called AAAA, PEARL, PERFECT, 1st QUALITY, or GRADE 1. These balls will look and play perfect (although you will occasionally find logo balls among them). The next grade will have minor cosmetic imperfections, but will play perfect. The third grade will have noticeable scuff marks, but are still playable. The fourth grade are suitable only for practice.
I have been playing the top grade (I’m a bit picky) recycled golf balls for the last 4 years & I can honestly tell you that I have never been disappointed with the appearance or performance of a single recycled ball. Should you play with either of the top two grades, neither you or your playing partners will be able to tell that you didn’t start off with a new ball! Visit Knetgolf.com , Used Golf Ball Deals , and LostGolfBalls.com, 3 of the largest and best websites for recycled balls that I recommend based on my personal experience, and I guarantee you’ll find major savings!
So, how much can you save playing with recycled golf balls? Let’s take, as an example, the very popular (and very expensive) Titleist Pro V1. Although the MSRP for a dozen of these new balls is $58, you can find the same balls on the internet for about $45. Compare those prices with recycled Pro V1s. You will pay $24 for a dozen of highest grade Pro V1s, $18 for the second grade ball, $14 for the third grade, and $8 for the fourth grade (all prices approximate). With these kinds of savings, you can easily finance an extra round of golf!!!
When you combine the frugality of the recycled golf ball with selecting the right golf ball for you , savings can become even more impressive. The Titleist Pro V1 is the best selling golf ball for a good reason – professional & low handicap players love it for its outstanding performance characteristics. Many mid & high handicappers then reason it is the best ball for them, but in most cases it’s not! The design of the Pro V1 makes it best suited for golfers with a very high swing speed who control the ball well. If that description does not fit you (feel distance challenged? fighting a slice?), you will be much better off with a considerably cheaper ball. The top grade recycled golf ball that is the best performance ball for many of you, especially the high handicapper, will cost much less that $10 per dozen.
Think back to how you winced the last time you lost a $4 golf ball? How much less would that pain have been with a $.60 ball? Not only that, but if you hit that $.60 ball further & straighter, you probably don’t even lose it!
Category: Frugal Balls
Saturday, October 3rd, 2009
Hello fellow golfing addicts! My name is Lee Triplett & I live in the Baltimore, Maryland metropolitan area. My brief life’s history includes being a local boy, a University of Maryland alum (go Terps!), three years in the Army during the late 1960’s, a 35 year Federal Government career much of it as a human resources manager with USDA, a 25-year marriage to a wonderful & supportive woman, and a bright & successful daughter in her early 20’s. But, cutting to the chase….what do I know about golf?
First, what kind of golfer am I? I “learned” the game in my late teens by playing with my buddies a few times a year. I played mostly socially for the next 15 years or so, although with my competitive nature I was always looking to improve. A close call with the embarrassment of receiving a “duffer’s” trophy, coupled with a sensitive athletic ego, led me to actually give the game up for a decade! Fifteen years later when injury forced me to give up another passion (softball), my dear wife says “Well, you’ve got to do something! Why don’t you take up golf?” (She’s had mixed feelings about that suggestion ever since…..) So I took the game up again. And when I did, I quickly became energized to learn as much about the game as I could. In the early years, my scores ranged from the 120’s to the low hundreds, occasionally venturing into the high 90’s during my 30’s. When I took the game up again in my early 50’s, I quickly settled into the low hundreds to the high 90’s. I’m happy (relatively happy, that is) to say that I now typically shoot in the 80’s, sometimes in the 90’s, but have even tasted the high 70’s on a few occasions!
The most basic thing I know about golf is how I feel when I play it, watch it, read about it, and talk about it. Most of you can relate to just how exhilarating it can be to spend 4 to 5 hours breathing in the fresh air of some gorgeous surroundings. Share it with those whose company you enjoy! Compete with your buddies, the course, yourself. And if you can play your round well, so much the better!
But I digress – the first thing I did when I retired in early 2005 was to get myself a job at the local golf course. Turned out to be one of the best moves I’ve ever made. In addition to all the benefits to the avid golfer of getting such a job (see my page on Golf Course Jobs ), I now found myself around countless others who were as enthusiastic about the game as I was! Interacting with the professional staff, club members, and other employees in this environment has led me to a wealth of information about the game. And since I don’t have unlimited funds to pursue the game as much as I’d like, I often focused in on ways to maximize my golf dollar.
My years of trying to stretch my golf budget, combined with my golf job experiences, and my natural affinity to exhaustively explore the internet before I buy anything, has led to this website. The content you’ll find is tried & true, based in most cases on my own experiences, and I know you’ll find at least a few things that will help you maximize your golf dollar. But I’m not naive enough to think that I know it all. Many, many of you out there have been playing golf on a budget for a long time & I would be interested in any tips and thoughts that you can share with me! I will, of course, pass them right along to everyone else on a new webpage on this site — giving you full credit!!!
Thanks for visiting this site & I look forward to a long relationship!
Lee ***
Category: Administrative Stuff
Saturday, October 3rd, 2009
Nothing will maximize the frugal golfer’s dollar more than getting a golf course job! You may not get paid much more than a pittance, but the benefits you can get makes it an ideal job for the avid golfer.
So how good are the benefits? Well they differ depending on the individual golf course, but quite a few courses are very liberal in their benefits to employees. Benefits include:
Free Golf, including greens fees and carts, is the most significant. Some of the higher end courses may restrict your free golf to Mondays when they are closed to members or the general public, but most courses will allow you to play free the majority of the time, except for perhaps the busiest times on the weekends. Also, many courses are partnered with other local courses & will provide you with golf privileges at all their courses.
Driving Range Privileges. This is pretty universal – practice to your hearts content, whenever you want, for nothing!
Free/Discount Lessons. Most course Pros do not have a full lessons schedule & are happy to fit you in for a significantly reduced rate or sometimes even for free (so how great does free lessons sound to you?).
Discounts in the Pro Shop & Restaurant/Snack Bar. Expect employee discounts on equipment, apparel, & food/drink.
The Intangibles. I can tell you that being an avid golfer, it’s a lot of fun working around others who feel the same way about the game that I do!
But what do you have to do for all these benefits? Again, individual courses vary, but expect to put in a minimum of one or two shifts totaling 6 to 12 hours per week. Jobs include cart attendant, driving range attendant, starter, ranger, & pro shop attendant. Believe me, none of these jobs are very strenuous or stressful.
Golf course jobs are perfect for retirees (like me!), teachers, students (or anyone with their summers off), part time salesmen, or anyone with a flexible schedule.
I’d work at a golf course for nothing but the benefits, but you know what – they have to pay me at least minimum wage! I’ve found that the money I earn working at a golf course will fund me playing at one or two pretty nice outside courses per month.
There is simply no better way for the frugal golfer to maximize his golf dollar than to get a golf course job. Period!!!
Category: Employment
Saturday, October 3rd, 2009
The frugal golfer knows that buying at Amazon can mean big savings on golf equipment! And as always, every dollar you save on golf purchases is a dollar you can do something else with (like playing more golf!).
There’s a good reason that Amazon is the world’s largest online retailer (nearly $15 billion in annual sales in 2007). Actually, two reasons — first just about anything that can be found in a brick and mortar retail store can be found on Amazon, and second, most of the time it can be found cheaper(or, at the very least, just as cheap)!
I started shopping at Amazon years ago for books, dvd’s, games, electronics, and a myriad of other items. Going to the mall to shop has never been one of my favorite pasttimes, and I quickly embraced all the advantages of buying at Amazon — massive selection, great prices, quick delivery, and security of the transaction. All of this translated into a buying experience that was hard to match, with the result that it has been years since I have had to venture to the mall for a holiday or birthday present. More and more these days I’ve found that Amazon is a great place for golf equipment too!
Check it out for yourself! Go to the page at Amazon.com for golf gps sytems. You will find just about every golf gps system on the market. Go to one of them, click on the stars you see & access large numbers on user reviews for that product — perhaps nothing is more useful for evaluating different brands than these user ratings. Pick out a product you like & click on the link for “used & new”. Not only will you get pricing information (that includes shipping), but you will also get the track record of the various merchants provided by their customers. Click on the link next to the merchant’s star rating and access more detailed information. Many a time I have passed up the best deal in order to feel more secure with the merchant I was buying from.
The major disadvantage to shopping online, of course, is that you can’t touch the product or try it out before you buy it. So I don’t necessarily recommend that you rely totally on the internet to identify what you want to purchase. Hit your buddy’s new driver, try on that new glove at the store, and otherwise do your homework to zero in on the best product for you. But once you’ve identified what you want, the frugal golfer knows to check out if buying at Amazon will get it cheaper.
Category: Buying Equipment Frugally
Saturday, October 3rd, 2009
Cabretta leather golf gloves – nice, luxurious, and EXPENSIVE! But the frugal golfer doesn’t get caught up in the hype for premium golf gloves. Inexpensive gloves just might be better for your game!
Your only connection with the golf club is through the grip, so arguably how you grip the club can be a critical part of your game. Terms like “hand hugging fit”, “buttery soft feel”, & “great looks” are often used to describe the premium glove, but these elements have little to do with its essential function.
The essential function of a golf glove is to provide a light, but firm grasp of the club. (A light, firm grasp is crucial to a proper golf swing.) The legendary Sam Snead described the pressure to be used as firm enough to hold a small bird in your hands, but light enough not to crush it!
Central to using the proper pressure on the club is the nature of the golf club grips themselves – they cannot be too smooth or slippery (more about this on a future page on golf grips). Given the right grip, some better players & pros don’t even use a glove, preferring the “feel” of bare skin on the golf grip!
Leather gloves provide an excellent grip of the club — when dry. However, if you sweat a lot or it starts raining, leather gloves quickly become slippery. So you solve your problem either by switching to a dry glove or a rain glove. OR, you can use a multipurpose synthetic fabric golf glove. This kind of glove allows for a light, firm grip in all kinds of weather. It also costs a fraction of the premium gloves. I’ve personally found an additional undocumented (albeit somewhat unsanitary) benefit to this glove on the green by using the palm of the glove, moistened by spit, to clean my ball before putting.
When shopping for a real or synthetic leather glove, shop mainly for price. But, be prepared to also invest in a set of rain gloves. Much cheaper overall is the versatile synthetic fabric glove. An excellent site to find all of these gloves at truly great prices is at MasterGrip.com.
Functionality and price are the two key elements the frugal golfer considers when shopping for golf gloves.
Category: Frugal Accessories
Saturday, October 3rd, 2009
Discount golf passes can save the frugal golfer big time! AND, they are more available than you might think.
Think about it! Golf courses maximize their revenue whenever all of their teetimes are filled. Naturally, the elite courses don’t have any problem with this, selling out their teetimes days, weeks, & sometimes months in advance. But most public & semi-private courses find many of their teetimes go begging, some even on the weekends.
The smart courses find ways to fill more of their vacant teetimes. Although these courses tend to put some restrictions on discounts offered (after all they want to keep full price for the teetimes that normally sell out), the frugal golfer will find many opportunities to save on greens fees 7 days a week!
Check the sports pages in your local newspapers (Mondays can be a good time). Courses tend to place discount greens fees advertisements here to drum up business during slow times of the year. Subscribing to a course’s e-mail listing (check a course’s website) can also result in discounts.
Many courses will subscribe to one or more discount golf pass programs. The courses listed in these programs typically offer $10 to $30 discounted from their greens fees, 2 for 1 greens fees, limited free golf, or some combination. Individual courses will restrict their offers, but these restrictions vary greatly from Monday thru Thursdays, to hourly restrictions for teetimes, to weekday anytime PLUS weekends with an hourly restriction, to anytime. If you are very limited with the times you can play golf, the restrictions can be an annoyance. Otherwise, you should be able to find many suitable courses.
Discount golf pass programs generally cost between $20 & $70 per year, but this cost can be recouped with 1 to 3 rounds of golf. There are national golf pass programs covering thousands of courses (e. g. www.GolfCard.com ), as well as numerous regional and local programs. Just do an internet search on on “discount golf pass programs” + your state, and you should come up with a number of possibilities.
It’s likely that there are a number of national, regional, and/or local discount golf pass programs where you live. Since the programs do charge a fee, you probably will want to purchase only one or two. One way to help you choose among them is to approach some of the courses you play often or others you would like to play and find out what discount pass programs they subscribe to. If the local pro or counter person doesn’t know or doesn’t want to share that information with you (although it is in their interest to do so), ask to speak to the business manager.
A great benefit to using the discount golf pass programs is the incentive you have for checking out a large variety of golf courses. Over the last several years, my main golf buddy and I have played literally dozens of courses that we would not have tried were it not for one of our regional discount golf passes — TeeTime Golf Pass .
Discount golf passes are just another example of how the frugal golfer maximizes his fun as well as his golf dollar.
Category: Frugal Greens Fees
Saturday, October 3rd, 2009
Clone golf clubs can be the high quality equipment that you need, but at a fraction of the price of name brand clubs. However, you have to be careful!!!
So what are clone golf clubs? Clones are clubs that take the basic design of the brand name clubs (TaylorMade, Ping, Titleist, Callaway, etc.), make small modifications that in most cases do not affect performance, and then market them under a different brand name. Don’t confuse clones with illegal knockoff clubs which seek to fool you into thinking you’re buying the name brand or with counterfeit clubs.
The makers of legitimate golf club clones are scrupulous in observing the patents and property rights of the major brands (otherwise they’d be sued out of existence). Legitimate clones stress that they are clones by using language such as “compare to Callaway’s FT-5″ or “similar to Ping’s G-10″. The illegal knockoffs & counterfeits seek to confuse you with a similar sounding name or defraud you with clubs that look virtually identical to the real thing.
How good are clone golf clubs? Basically these clubs are made from very similar materials and design principles of the brand name golf clubs. Because of this, clones typically look, feel and perform very much like the name brand clubs. From a practical standpoint most except for perhaps the very experienced golfer will ever notice a significant difference. It’s interesting to note that the majority of brand name companies outsource the actual production of their club components to the same foundries & suppliers that provide clubs to the major clone companies!
The price of clone golf clubs is what makes them so attractive to novice & casual golfers. The major golf club companies spend enormous sums of money (in some cases up to 70% of cost) on promotion, advertisements, & endorsements. On the other hand, the producers of clone clubs typically forgo these costs and the middleman & sell directly on the internet.
Caution is always in order in buying anything on the internet. Sometimes it is virtually impossible to distinguish clubs of the legitimate quality clone companies from the illegal knockoffs, counterfeits, or low quality clones made with inferior materials. Your best bet is to deal with those clone companies that have a long, proven track record for quality, guarantees, & great customer service! I recommend that you check out Pinemeadow Golf , GigaGolf.com , and Golfideas.com — all established and reputable companies!
Getting quality golf equipment at reasonable prices is a major goal for the frugal golfer, and buying golf clubs from the recognized clone companies can improve your game while not busting your pocketbook!
Category: Frugal Clubs
Saturday, October 3rd, 2009
Like playing with a particular brand of ball? Trade golf balls with your buddies, and you won’t have to buy your own brand as often!
I play Titleist NXT Tour – my golf buddy plays with Nike One. We’ve agreed to swap whenever we come across the other’s ball. If you’re like me, you find plenty of balls (invariably any but my own). You get a box of new balls as a present or a sleeve as a tournament favor. I use to have a drawer full of these new balls that I wasn’t going to use because they weren’t my brand.
I keep my eye out for Top Flight XL3000s, Callaways, & Titleist Pro V1s for some of my other buddies. A couple of my playing partners aren’t particular about what they play, so I’ll trade them 2 or 3 of the other brands of balls for 1 Titleist NXT Tour!
Trading golf balls won’t eliminate having to buy more balls. However, the frugal golfer always looks for opportunities to maximize his golf dollar, and when you swap golf balls, you don’t have to pay a cent!
Category: Frugal Balls
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