Women's Golf: The Bullish Opportunities
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Hey Golfers —
In 2018, the United States had 24.2 million on-course golfers, compared to 26.6 million last year, according to the National Golf Foundation, an increase of 2.4 million golfers or 10%.
The growth of golf has been well documented. But where is it coming from?
Two primary cohorts are pushing the growth.
Juniors
Females
Since 2018 — one million net new junior golfers have taken up the game of golf. This has reduced the average age of on-course golfers from 44.6 years old to 43.5 years old.
The above stat is one of the reasons why I believe golf can sustain and continue to grow off the Covid bump. If the primary cohort of growth during Covid were aged 25 to 40, I would be more cautious.
Since 2018, there have been 1.3 million net new female golfers. Females now make up 26% of the total on-course golfers, up from 23% in 2018.
The female cohort is the fastest-growing cohort in golf.
And in 2020 — there was a net gain of 450,000 female golfers. The biggest gain since 2007. Female on-course participation reached 7 million golfers — the highest since 2006.
How about a double stat for juniors and females?
Female juniors now represent 34% of all junior golfers, up from 15% in 2000.
From 2020 to 2022 — there were 465,000 net new male golfers. In the same period, there were 820,000 net new female golfers. The female cohort grew 15%, while the male cohort grew 2%.
The underlying health of golf is not artificial. It is extremely positive.
So what about the rest of the world?
The R&A released its global participation report last August — it is one of the most detailed golf reports you can read. As a reminder — the R&A governs the world of golf with the exception of the United States and Mexico.
The R&A report had very similar results that have been stated earlier. The R&A breaks its on-course golfers into two buckets.
Registered golfers
Independent golfers
Most of the data the R&A report details is regarding registered golfers. Which is a significantly lower number since not everyone playing green grass golf is registered.
Here is an example:
Total on-course golfers in R&A markets were 39.6 million in 2022.
8 million registered golfers
31.6 million registered golfers
Females made up 23% of registered golfers in R&A markets. And South Korea had the highest percentage of registered female golfers at 45%. And six countries had a higher female participation rate than the United States that had at least a registration rate of 200,000 golfers.
Off-course golf is a different story. Over 40% of off-course golfers are female. Of the 18.5 million golfers that participated in off-course golf only in 2023 — 7.8 million are females.
A good majority of the off-course golf takes place at Topgolf venues.
I think the female off-course numbers are relevant — here is why.
Around half of Topgolf’s participants do not play golf. But Topgolf states that 10% of on-course golfers attribute Topgolf as their entry point to green grass golf.
In theory, Topgolf could bring around 800,000 new females to on-course golf per year. Now, that is not new, as some golfers will stop playing the game.
Online search trends back up most of this data.
2020 saw the highest number of Google searches for women’s golf clubs in Google's history, and 2021 was the second highest.
The chart below shows that each year has cycles of traffic. Here are the top five years’ peaks.
2020 — 98
2021 — 95
2008 — 92
2005 — 86
2024 — 78
Three of the highest five years have been since 2020.
Females are spending loads of money on golf. From 2014 to 2021 — spending by female golfers on golf goods grew by 66%.
More people are watching women’s professional golf on T.V., too.
The Chevron Championship had 936,000 viewers for the final round. While it was relatively flat compared to the prior year, it was nearly triple compared to two years ago when the final round was on Golf Channel. It was the most-watched Chevron Championship in a decade.
Last year’s U.S. Women’s Open had weekend viewership of 1.34 million views, up 76% from the prior year.
The LPGA Tour had its best month ever in July in terms of T.V. ratings. Four events averaged over 600,000 viewers across all windows.
Companies are taking notice as well.
Callaway launched an equipment product line, Reva.
TravisMathew rolled out its women’s apparel products.
Walmart and the LPGA Tour partnered to release an affordable club set.
There are often comments that golf is experiencing a bubble. Of course, the golf industry is cyclical and will eventually have a downtown. And we very well could see a dip in participation numbers and rounds in the future.
But the underlying health supports a strong foundation for future growth. In my opinion, the two most important cohorts in golf are juniors and females, and those cohorts are doing extremely well.
Golf is becoming a more diverse sport. When a business or industry offers a diverse product line or cohorts, it lends itself to meaningful growth and withstands a future downturn.
Have a great Monday. We will talk to you next week!
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Great coverage!!