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We live in an era where customer loyalty feels increasingly ephemeral – people switch allegiances with a swipe, viral trends reshape preferences overnight, and corporate longevity continues to decline.[i] The power dynamic between brand and consumer has fundamentally shifted, making loyalty harder to earn and easier to lose than ever before.
Against a backdrop of weakening consumer bonds, the golf industry faces a particularly striking paradox: in a moment of unprecedented success – record engagement, surging revenues and evolving demographics – NGF research suggests most Core golfers feel like “just another customer,” claiming only shallow, transaction-based relationships with golf businesses, who they believe fail to recognize them and reward their loyalty. It’s a notable disconnect that feels especially acute given the industry’s self-image as a relationship-driven business.
The path to this paradox seems gradual but clear. As golf evolved from a club-centered pastime to a diverse, $100 billion industry,[ii] the emphasis naturally shifted toward commercialization with measurable outputs — better equipment, faster greens, lower scores — things that could be marketed, compared and sold. These tangible innovations have successfully expanded business opportunities, and in many respects improved the golfer experience, but they’ve also inadvertently overshadowed the more relational (and perhaps equally vital) dimensions of business and customer success.
Evidence of golf’s relationship deficits are pervasive in our research:
- Last season, only half of Core golfers could recall a single meaningful interaction at a course or club that left them feeling valued or special
- A third of golfers said the staff where they play most often don’t know their name
- Only one in five could remember a meaningful interaction with a golf consumer brand
- Perhaps most telling: In a 2022 NGF survey, 50% of executives admitted golf lags behind other industries in customer engagement and retention innovation (only 11% believed golf was ahead)
The inconvenient truth is that our industry has devoted considerable resources to perfecting the technical experience while often under-investing in the human one.
At NGF, we recognize our own role in this dynamic. For decades, our industry research has diligently tracked rounds played, participation rates, equipment sales, and facility performance – all valuable metrics, but ones that focus on transactions rather than relationships. We’ve gotten remarkably good at measuring how often people play and what they buy, but given less priority to understanding their true relationship with the game – like whether they’re feeling head-over-heels committed or stuck in the ‘friend zone.’ We think by capturing more emotional measures alongside traditional indicators, we can bring focus to this vulnerability and, in some small way, help to push the industry to a more sustainable future, where we’re better positioned to withstand the next recession or disruption.
As customer expectations further evolve, relationship-building will likely emerge as the most undervalued innovation frontier in business. In fact, we hope it becomes the next great competitive battleground in golf. There’s no doubt that human connection can be a powerful business advantage, especially in industries where technical superiority and product differentiation are so heavily emphasized, and where many customers — especially those without memberships or regular purchasing patterns — can drift away too easily without a sense of loss.
We’re excited to continue this conversation in future research, highlighting the pioneering approaches of those who believe golf’s next great competitive advantage lies not in what we sell, but in the loyalty we inspire.
David Lorentz has served as Chief Research Officer at the National Golf Foundation since 2019, after joining the organization as an analyst in 2012. Lorentz leads a team dedicated to empowering golf business leaders through data-driven insights. Known for his rational thinking, economic mindedness, and human-focused approach, he brings valuable perspective and foresight to understanding the evolving business and consumer. Industry leaders rely on Lorentz's original research and insights to inform strategic decisions across both commercial and industry levels. He holds an M.S. in Applied Economics and Statistics from Clemson University and a B.A. in Economics from Xavier University. Lorentz is also a very proud native of Cincinnati, Ohio.
