Umesato CC, a top-tier outdoor driving range in Yokohama, has seen new visitors jump more than 20%, a rare bright spot at a time when ranges across Japan are closing as golf's post-pandemic boom fades, much as it has in South Korea. The turnaround has drawn interest in what the range did differently.
Shoji Itagaki, chief executive of Umesato CC, visited South Korea recently at the invitation of Spectrum Golf, a Korean brand of swing-video analysis systems designed for outdoor ranges, and laid out his approach at a seminar held at Suwon CC in Yongin, Gyeonggi Province.
"The harder things get, the more it makes sense to look to the future rather than what is right in front of you, so we staked everything on winning over young and beginner customers," Itagaki said. "Using technology such as swing-video analysis systems to reach the next generation of customers, and breaking our membership program into seven tiers to manage them, is what worked."
To secure future golfers, the range offers students steep discounts. Itagaki, who also serves as vice chairman of the Japan Golf Range Association, said the standard rate is 3,200 yen for 90 minutes but local students pay just 500 yen for 80 minutes, about one-sixth the price. "If you lower the barrier so students can come without worrying about the cost, there is a good chance they will play golf as adults," he said. "That would be good for the entire golf industry."
Allowing two or three people to share a single bay is another part of the strategy, a departure from South Korea, where bays are limited to one person. "The more of a beginner you are, the harder it is to teach yourself, so we help people practice with their friends," Itagaki said. "Once they get comfortable, they end up splitting off to practice on their own, so over the medium to long term it pays off." He added that when two or three people share a bay, the range has them sign a safety waiver before they start.
The range also sorts customers into seven tiers, from "entry" to "diamond," and charges different rates depending on where the bay is located — an approach Korean ranges could learn from. At Umesato CC, three visits earn green status and a 100-yen discount, while 30 visits bring diamond status and a 700-yen discount. Rates are highest for center bays on the first floor and cheapest for corner bays on the third. Tiered pricing by bay is already common at Japanese driving ranges, while most Korean ranges charge the same rate for every bay.
The range has also brought in advanced equipment to help with practice. Umesato CC installed Spectrum systems in all 75 bays in August last year, and new visitors rose 20.8% over the following 12 months. Other facility investments and a pricing overhaul were made during the same period, but Itagaki believes the biggest factor was Spectrum's technology, which shows golfers their own swings through 4K long-range CCTV footage. "Even at dawn, more than half the bays are full, and most of those golfers are people in their 20s and 30s working hard on their swing," he said. "Umesato CC used to draw mostly customers in their 40s and 50s, followed by those in their 60s, but now people in their 20s and 30s are the second-largest group."
"Customers have grown sharply compared with a year ago, but the number of balls actually hit fell 5.8%," he said. "You can read that as more customers taking the time to analyze their swing videos rather than just hitting ball after ball. The quantity of practice has gone down, but the quality has gone up."