Chapter 6 – “Building(s) For the Future” (1996)
It’s mid-1996 and the old buildings the Board talked about needing to be renovated or replaced last year are all a year older and the problem is not getting any smaller. Meeting these Capital Budget needs with monies generated through the usual short-term assessments or short-term loans was not a viable option. This time things were much different. We’re talking really big money, probably somewhere between two and three million dollars. Solving the problem would require long-term financing. Fortunately, the City was willing to get involved and agreed to borrow the money and rework the Club’s lease to accommodate the loan payments. Unfortunately, they wouldn’t be able to get the loan on a tax-free bond basis and the interest could be as high as 9½ %.
After months of meetings, proposals, discussions, debate and member surveys it was agreed to address the cart barn and clubhouse issues first. A major benefit of starting with these structures was that in addition to being old, they were undersized for meeting current needs.
The Club had a waiting list of members looking for a place to store their carts, so a new cart barn would immediately generate new revenues. The same was true of a new clubhouse and the revenues that could be generated by adding additional space for business and social functions. The Finance Committee chaired by John Nertney was developing a Long-Range plan and the remaining needs including the swimming pool and golf course maintenance facility would be addressed as part of their plan.
In the final analysis it was decided to build a new cart barn first because it could be completed much quicker and cheaper than replacing the clubhouse. It was also an eyesore that even non-golfers were tired of seeing as such a visible part of the Club’s infrastructure. It was actually a tin shed that had been built next to the swimming pool in 1963 at a cost of $4,500. The clubhouse was a much more complicated matter because there were definitely two diverse views on what was needed. There was the “kick the can down the road” crowd, presumably led by the older members, who favored Band-Aids and paint; however, the Board, the architect and the voices of reason were eventually able to sell the idea that a $2,100,000 city backed bank loan and a fifty dollar a month Senior Member Capital Dues increase would, in the long run, prove to be far less painful than “death by a thousand cuts”.
A Special Membership Meeting was held on September 29, 1996, to address a Board recommendation to spend the $2,100,000 on a complete renovation of the Clubhouse rather than $700,000 on “Band-Aids”. The meeting was attended by 249 Senior Voting Members. After almost three hours of heated debate on the one item Agenda, the project was approved by a vote of 143 to 106. At another Special Meeting on March 2, 1997, plans were “tweaked” again, when the bid process revealed the main ballroom could be entirely renovated and a slightly smaller version of the rest of the building could be totally rebuilt within the same funding.
- April 1997 Score Card announcement – “Congratulations Dave Langdon, Club Champion and John Rowe Jr., Senior Club Champion.”
A very successful “Bring Down the House” party was held at the pool on June 27, 1997, and although the official tear down start date for the old Clubhouse was July 14th, members were invited to “take out some of their frustrations on the old building” as part of the July 4th Family Fun Day.
The new cart barn was completed in mid-July when the tear down of the Clubhouse officially began. During the clubhouse construction period a 12×48 foot trailer was leased and positioned behind the new cart barn to function as the Pro Shop. A double wide 24×64 foot trailer was also leased and placed in the same general area to function as the restaurant, lounge and card room.
The official grand opening of the new clubhouse was April 7, 1998. On a personal note, I submitted my application for a golfing membership (with a check for $2,630) on March 19, 1998, and was one of five applicants approved at a Board meeting the same night. Incredibly, at the next Board meeting a total of thirty-eight applications were approved.
With a new clubhouse now in service, it was time to address the two other urgent needs on the Board’s “to do” list. One was providing a more “member friendly” swimming facility by replacing the forty-year-old complex designed for swimming and diving competitions with a new complex designed for member “sunning, floating and drinking” competitions. The other priority need was replacing the golf course maintenance facility, aka ”termite farm”, that had literally been in service since the horse and buggy days. Actually, it was the “mule and mower” days because although the facility had originally been built as the city fire station, it was later used to house the mules that powered the golf course mowing and plowing equipment. A replacement facility designed to house people and “gas powered” golf course maintenance equipment had been identified as a capital Budget need, at least as early as March 1973.
The membership’s decision to move forward with the pool and once again defer action on the maintenance facility was not surprising (Similar to the answer you might get when asking teenagers if they’d prefer a new video game or a trip to the dentist.)
The House Committee was charged with developing a plan to be presented for membership approval. On September 17, 1998, a detailed plan was approved by the Board for a totally “new facility consisting of a structure (3,360.7 sq. ft.), which houses a fitness center, conference room and toilet, men’s and women’s lockers and toilets, dining area, bar and kitchen, terrace (1685 sq. ft.), laundry/storage (400 sq ft.), pool, hot tub and professional landscaping.”
The following month, the membership approved a ten year, $11 a month Special Billing to fund financing of the estimated $689,085 project scheduled to begin in November 1998, to be completed within six months.
Unfortunately, the project was not completed on schedule. There were delays to address a member petition concerning the scope and cost of the project; there were delays to address concerns over the City’s expectations; there were delays created by the Construction Committee when they decided to bring in an additional architect; there were delays while the new architect and the old architect worked out their differences of opinion; and, there were delays when the chairman of the Construction Committee had to resign the position for personal reasons and Brian Hawke stepped in to replace him.
The project, as completed did not exactly mirror the original design approved by the membership. There was no fitness center, no conference room, no kitchen, no laundry and a vast majority of the walls you would assume necessary to enclose a 3,360.7 square foot building were never actually built. However, the pool pavilion/Tiki Bar complex delivered in November 2000, has been a wonderful addition to the Club. (Not to mention that because the final cost was less than the original estimate, you might say the money authorized to build walls around the pool complex could now be repurposed to build walls around a new maintenance facility.)
In February 2001 a meeting with the City Manager was held to open a dialogue on Club options regarding the new maintenance facility.
Because Board discussions on this subject had been going on for at least twenty-eight years and a portion of the money to fund the project was, in theory, already available from the “scaled back” pool complex, one might assume the new maintenance facility could be completed in a short period of time.
After all, they had a very talented Construction Committee led by John Buntin who was in the business and was an expert in “all things construction”. Well, as it turned out, maybe all things except where private country club construction project intersects with church and state opinions on golf course maintenance facility construction. John was more than ably supported in his efforts by a Committee that included Brian Hawke, Mike Stanley, Jack McGeachy, Ron Beck and Greens Superintendent Doug Hughes. It was only February, so a “grand opening” celebration by the end of 2001 should be doable. Right? Au contraire!
The first question to be answered was, where? The Committee was considering three different locations. Rebuilding at the current location could be problematic. The current facility was undersized and was wedged into the intersection of several different city streets on a piece of land roughly the same size as the building. The Temple Terrace Community Church was directly behind the facility and another part of the church, its Community Center, was on another side. Across one of the intersecting streets was a two-story classroom building that was part of Florida College. Across another side street was an ominous looking pumping station of the Temple Terrace Water Department. (A facility that displayed enough “danger” related warning signs to be mistaken for a nuclear reactor.)
Building at this location would require resolving a number of issues beginning with the need for a land survey to identify boundaries. The undersized lot would have to be enlarged by the City agreeing to abandon parts of two streets, an option that would not be well received by the church or the Temple Terrace Preservation Society, who felt the two short sections of street were an irreplaceable part of the City’s heritage. There would be easement and setback issues as well as environmental mitigation costs for cleaning up the wash down area used for golf course machinery.
The last but not least issue would be getting the church to agree to the plan. Although there was no question the church members would welcome a change to the less than godly view they had endured through their stained-glass windows since the day the church was built, there was also no question they would try to take advantage of the opportunity to the fullest.
The second site option was on golf course property located behind the new cart barn, basically the full length on the right side rough along the 1st hole. This location was quickly dropped from consideration, ostensibly over the reasonable objections of several homeowners directly across the street. Building at this location would have resulted in them having to not only hear but dodge heavy equipment when going outside to retrieve their morning newspaper or when entering and leaving their driveways. The decision to look elsewhere may have also been influenced by Golf Course Superintendent Doug Hughes. Having spent many years observing the typical club member skill level, Doug would have realized locating his workplace along the right-hand side of any fairway would leave him and his staff vulnerable to the “skill” level of the golfers on the tee; furthermore, being on Hole #1 would have given most golfers two opportunities to inflict damage. (As in mulligan, do-over, breakfast ball, etc.)
The Committee created a potential third option that would be a simple but ingenious three-way deal between the Club, the City and Florida College. The Committee would talk to Florida College and establish their interest in buying the property that housed the current maintenance facility that was right across the street from one of their classroom buildings. Assuming interest, the Club would then propose the City sell the property to the school and share a portion of the proceeds with the Club for use in building the new facility at the “perfect” location on a currently unused large tract of golf course land to the far left of the tee box on the 9th hole.
Step one was easy, Florida College was absolutely interested in the property; however, the rest of the plan hit a snag when the City suggested that although they might be amenable to the idea of selling the land, they saw absolutely no need to even consider sharing the proceeds with the Club
Not wanting to give up on the location, the Committee pursued moving forward without the financial assistance of the City; however, once again their plan was undermined by “church people”. This time it was the Temple Terrace Presbyterian Church located directly across from the area being considered. For some reason the church, and maybe a couple of other residents in the area were not too keen on the idea of replacing their scenic golf course view with a view of the sights, sounds and buildings that housed the people and equipment responsible for creating and maintaining their beautiful view.
It’s now July 2002 and the Construction Committee, surveys and site plan in hand, make a recommendation to the Board that rebuilding on the existing site is the only viable option. Their rough cost estimate is $447,000 plus demolition and removal of the existing building. A major hurdle continues to be dealing with the Community Church’s opposition to the abandonment of portions of Kingsway and Sunningdale Streets.
March 2003 – “We have submitted plans to the city that include vacating two streets. Signs have been posted. A public hearing will be held April 15 at 7:00. Members are encouraged to attend. There still may be potential problems with the underground tanks located on the existing property.”
June 2003 – The City Council approves the street closures.
Successfully navigating the street closure issue was a major hurdle, but there were many more hurdles to overcome, including,
- A buried gas tank under the current maintenance facility
- Environmental mitigation of the wash down area
- Removal of asbestos wrapped wiring
- Southwest Florida Water Management District drainage issues
- Utility company easements
- City approval of the Site Plan
- The contractor bid process
Finally, after taking six years off the calendar and probably more off the Construction Committee Chairman’s useful life, in December 2005, the “John Buntin Maintenance Facility Complex”, a 10,000 square foot facility, built at a cost of $800,000 was formally opened at a ribbon cutting ceremony.
“The Board of Directors gets “Tunnel Vision”
Playing a golf course designed as part of a “golfing community” normally requires crossing city streets on a frequent basis. In its current configuration, during a typical eighteen-hole round at Temple Terrace starting on the first tee and ending in the Pro Shop to record a score, the wheels of your golf cart touch paved city streets at least twelve times, (thirteen if you stop by the Clubhouse at the turn) plus one additional crossing of an unpaved street on the seventh hole. In theory, the actual number of street crossings is limited only by the proficiency of your game, the number of golf balls in your bag and your perseverance in retrieving them. Golfers playing without benefit of a motorized cart usually eliminate one of the streets by cutting across the 10th hole as they return to the Clubhouse after finishing their round.
All of these streets have only two lanes of typically low volume local traffic, so the risk of serious injury while navigating them is generally minimal; however, there was a time when two additional street crossings, of the much busier Bullard Parkway were required.
At the June 1995 Board Meeting (the same meeting that ended Ken DeMott’s tour as GM), “President Neubert led a general discussion pertaining to the upcoming Bullard Parkway Project”. Hillsborough County and the City of Temple Terrace were in discussions about widening Bullard Parkway from two lanes to four and five lanes along sections of the street that dissected the golf course. The Club was involved because the project would require using golf course land for widening the streets, creating water retention ponds and, if the golf club could influence the project, building tunnels.
The road work would not be completed until several years later and the Club’s involvement in the matter would require contracting with several paid professionals including a law firm specializing in imminent domain issues, a golf course architect, a golf course construction company and an engineer.
Throughout most of the project, the members primarily responsible for protecting the Club’s interests in dealings with the City and the County were Lee Winter, tasked with ensuring all the piles of real estate dirt ended up positioned to the best advantage of the Club, John Nertney, tasked with ensuring all the piles of money ended up on the “proper” side of the club’s Balance Sheet and Don Whittemore, tasked with ensuring all agreements between the parties were memorialized to the maximum advantage of the Club (and to keep Lee and John out of jail).
Early on, “verbal agreements were reached to the effect the Club would accept the placement of two retention ponds and would not otherwise oppose the project under the following conditions:
- The construction of a tunnel between the second and third holes,
- A “safe crossing” between the eighth and ninth holes, and,
- The club would be made whole for any costs incurred in restoring the course as a result of the widening.”
Apparently the thought of the City incurring costs associated with tunneling under Bullard Parkway did not sit very well with the City Manager because in November 1995 he wrote a letter to Club President Gary Neubert seeking approval of his alternate solution because he felt tunnels “would create more problems than resolutions for the City”.
He proposed that at the Bullard/Glen Arven intersection, “A new button-activated system be installed with a diagonally marked crossing from the southeast to the northwest corner of the intersection. When activated, the traffic lights will stop traffic in all directions and crossing would be permitted diagonally across the intersection”
For Bullard/Greenfield-Burlington, he proposed, “The crossing will be improved and designed to include a railroad-type crossing with flashing lights and cross arms that would be activated by a push-button from either side of the intersection. This would allow proper notification to on-coming traffic and provide a barrier to keep vehicles from violating the safety of the crossing”.
So, let’s review. We have golfers either riding in a golf cart or walking or even worse, walking and pulling a hand cart while attempting to cross Bullard Parkway (aka County Road 583, State Road 580, Busch “Beer” Boulevard and Temple Terrace Highway) in order to get from the green of a hole they have just completed to the tee-box of the next hole they wish to play.
In one instance they would be asked to diagonally traverse a four-way intersection totaling fourteen lanes with potentially six lanes of traffic coming straight through the intersection and up to eight lanes of traffic turning either left or right into their path. If this were a video game, it might appropriately be named “The Gauntlet”.
I’m confident railroad-type crossings with flashing lights, bells and cross-arms are very, very safe, ….. for trains, and there are two undeniable reasons. First, at a traditional railroad crossing, the party doing the inconveniencing, the train is much larger than the parties being inconvenienced, the cars. The train is in charge and there’s nothing the car can do but wait for the train; however, in the City Manager’s proposal, although the party being inconvenienced is still the car, the party doing the inconveniencing, i.e., the golfer, is much smaller than the car and therefore more vulnerable to creative “road rage”.
It’s also important to note that cross-arms at the typical railroad crossing are probably engaged, on average, about three times a day while during the busier periods of every day, golf carts would traverse each of the two crossings about every eight minutes. (Not to mention the additional crossings by golfers traveling to and from home, pedestrians crossing the street and even the kids from nearby schools tripping the switch, just because they can.)
The two crossing points are about three blocks apart and, after considering the frequency and long duration of the cycles for each crossing, it’s probable that during most golfing hours, the widening of Bullard Parkway would have actually reduced the amount of traffic able to navigate the golf course stretch on a timely basis.
Fortunately, the “Diagonal Crosswalk and Railroad Crossing” solutions were abandoned and “only” two and a half years later, the County returned for design approval of their two-tunnel solution. (One to be paid for by the County and one by the City)
Unfortunately, the proposed tunnels were designed with a 7% grade as required for wheelchairs by the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). The club noted that golf carts were easily able to navigate a 14% grade which would reduce the length of the tunnels by half and significantly reduce both their construction and maintenance costs. (The longer tunnels would also make it necessary for golfers to exit them halfway down the fairway, sneak a look back towards the tee to determine if the group ahead of them was still hitting or if it was safe to exit the tunnel and head back to hit their own tee shots.)
The negotiated resolution of this issue was definitely favorable to the club. The shorter tunnels with the steeper grade would be constructed and a lift (elevator) would be built in each tunnel to accommodate the ADA requirements for “wheelchair traffic”.
There were other issues to be resolved, including responsibility for tunnel maintenance, tunnel insurance liability, the visual integrity of the golf course, the Club’s “cost of cure”, etc.; but Lee, John and Don deftly handled all those challenges. (In February 1999 a “cost-of cure” check was received for $351,000 and in September 2001 the dirt displaced for the tunnels and retention ponds was sold for $6,800) The Bullard Parkway Project was “completed” in November 2001. (Well, almost!)
One year later a State Inspector showed up at General Manager Marie Fivecoat’s office looking for keys to the elevators because it was time for their annual inspection and renewal of their Certificates of Occupancy (C/O). Confident the lease agreement did not identify the club as being responsible for the elevators, only for the tunnel cleanliness, lights and sump pumps, she directed him to the City. A week later she received a letter from the City Manager, along with the keys to both elevators, indicating the Club was responsible for the elevators.
To better understand the situation, she researched everything she could find, including the three-party agreement, the minutes of City Council Meetings and all the club memos and letters on the subject.
She also researched the principal players involved in providing and installing the elevators, uncovering a story line resembling the plot of a cheap spy novel of contractors, subcontractors and LLCs with business addresses now leading to empty lots.
At the November 2002 Board Meeting she presented a very detailed four-page analysis of everything including the fact one of the elevators was currently working but had no emergency telephone service as required by the ADA, while the other elevator did not work, had a phone line, but no physical phone. The “opportunity” was turned over to Club Attorney Don Whittemore who resolved the matter with City Attorney Ted Taub and his able assistant, current State Representative Kathy Castor.
It’s now over twenty years later and with the exception of occasional flooding during very rainy days, the tunnels have functioned beautifully. Well, there was an incident in August 2003, when an automobile accident at the corner of Bullard and Glen Arven ended with one of the cars at the bottom of the tunnel; an accident that provided another opportunity to test the “who’s responsible” provisions of the three-way agreement.
However, the “functioning“ of the elevators has been quite a different story. As of this date, I have been unable to identify anyone who has personally experienced, witnessed or even heard rumors of a single instance of the “lifts” being used to transport a wheelchair. In fact, currently and for an overwhelming majority of the more than twenty years since their installation, the entry doors to both elevators have displayed what appear to be permanent metal signs announcing, “Out of Service”. (Apparently whoever ultimately ended up being responsible for the elevators found an acceptable “low cost” method of doing so.)
The Parade of General Managers Continues
During the period of time the “Tunnel” and “Building” projects were completed, 1996 to 2005, the Club experienced a number of changes in the management team.
“JR” Gayle had been hired in August of 1995 and had maintained a very effective and popular relationship with the membership. His obvious interest in the creative arts had a major influence on the design, décor and furnishing of the new clubhouse; however, in July of 1999 he decided to relocate and “return home” to north Florida where rumor had it he was offered an opportunity to manage another club in the early stages of an extensive building program..
- April 1998 – Future Club President Bob Boss and wife Cynthia accepted for Membership.
- May 1998 – Future Club President Bob Mora and wife Gwen accepted for membership.
- May 1999 – The tee box on #12 was extended by building a new blue tee utilizing dirt donated by former Club President Ray Bryant. (The dirt came from the construction of a swimming pool in the back yard of Ray’s house on #7.)
In November 1999, the slate of candidates for replacing JR was reduced to three and the Board ultimately utilized two of them. The GM position was filled by Head Pro Mike Lawler and Marie Fivecoat was hired as Assistant GM with primary responsibility for the Food & Beverage operation. Shortly thereafter, Jim Garrison was named as the new Head Golf Professional.
In year one of Mike Lawler’s two-year stint as General Manager the new pool complex was completed. In his second year, the Bullard Parkway tunnels were “almost” completed, and he was afforded an opportunity to “enjoy” the first frustrating twelve months of the protracted schedule for building the new maintenance facility.
The circumstances surrounding his resignation as GM were somewhat unusual to say the least. At the November 15, 2001, Board Meeting, the first item of business was “to discuss the Management Committee’s Report on the compensation of the General Manager and the Assistant General Manager. Following this discussion and with input from several members who attended the meeting, there was a motion by Mr. Buntin, seconded by Mr. Heid, that Board discussion on the compensation of the GM and the Assistant GM be tabled and a Special Meeting be held to discuss these issues, Following discussion, the motion carried with Mr. Ruzic abstaining.” “Mr. Ruzic resigned from the Board at this point in the meeting.”
On November 27th, two days before the Special Board Meeting, a member petition was posted in the Clubhouse, requesting that a Special Meeting of the entire voting membership be scheduled to modify Club By-Laws to require approval by the voting membership before granting a pay increase “to any employee, in excess of a cost of living raise in line with the Department of Labor Index” (typically 3% or less)
The Special Board Meeting was opened by noting Mr. Ruzic had rescinded his resignation. President Affronti spoke on the results of the Management Committee review of the evaluations and their conclusion that 7.5% increases were warranted.
“The Board then heard from members present at the meeting as to their issues related to the evaluations of the General Manager and the Assistant General Manager.” After more discussion, a motion was made by Mr. Ruzic and seconded by Mr. Affronti “that the Board approve the recommendations by the Management Committee as to compensation increases. Motioned Carried.”
At the next regular Board Meeting, held only days before the scheduled Special Membership Meeting to address the petition, the first report was given by General Manager Mike Lawler who ‘Thanked the Board for their support and wished the club good luck in the future. He had spent the last week and a half sharing all his current duties and knowledge with Marie and will continue to do so until he leaves on Saturday.”
Yes, he had resigned: and in an open letter to the membership he distributed after his sudden resignation, he thanked “each of you that has been supportive of my efforts” and noted “while Temple Terrace has many great members, it also has a very vocal minority that in recent weeks has brought into question, the direction of the Club and my future role in that direction”
The Special Meeting of the Membership to address the petition submitted by the “vocal minority” was held at 7:00 pm on Sunday, December 16, 2001, and ended only twenty minutes later.
A letter announcing the meeting and a follow-up reminder asked every member to attend and to encourage their friends to attend. The response was overwhelming as noted by the Chair’s observation that “this is an incredible turn out for a meeting. It’s much larger than we typically have for annual meetings.“
Club President Ralph Hughes opened the meeting by stating that in the past forty-six years he had grown his company from five employees to over seven hundred and was a firm believer the most valuable asset to his or any business was its employees. He suggested the Club was also a business and the petitioning members were actually speaking as “customers” of that business. He then noted that a successful business would never say, “We can’t give a raise unless our customers vote to approve it.”
He went on to say, “I believe if this proposal were to pass, we, (the Board) would only be able to hire those people who couldn’t get a job anywhere else.” He pointed out it also didn’t make sense to put a three percent (18 cents an hour) limit on the raise a manager might deem necessary to reward an outstanding employee making $6 an hour without a vote of the entire membership.
Mr. Hughes’ position on the matter was then echoed by Jerry Schine and Skip Davis, two former Club Presidents who were also charter members of the Club and after a somewhat capitulating response from one of the petition’s authors, a vote was taken and the “crowd” adjourned to the bar.
The “Fivecoat” of Many Colors
Naming Marie Fivecoat as the new General Manager was an easy Board decision; after all, she was an extremely hard worker, was pleasant around the members and had done a remarkable job of improving the bottom line in her primary area of responsibility, the Club’s Food & Beverage operation.
“JR” Gayle, had the perfect personality to function as the “host” in a country club dining room, but based on his handling of at least a couple issues raised at Board Meetings during his tenure, you could question his effectiveness in controlling the financial aspects of the Club’s F&B operation.
The first occurred in April 1997 when Senior Member, Ben Simpson, addressed the Board, “He stated he had on occasion been served drinks that had not been billed and stated that other such cases had occurred with other members and that it was a serious loss of revenue. After discussion, the consensus was that it was not a fault of any individual staff person or club member but was somewhat endemic to bar operations generally. But that club management should caution all serving staff and monitor the system to the extent feasible. No other action was proposed or taken on this matter.”
Endemic? Not the fault of any individual staff person? There are a lot of ways to lose money in the bar business. Some are easy to correct and many aren’t. The server not charging for drinks is an easy one. It’s either an intentional act or it’s not. If it’s intentional, the server is either using a tip enhancing ploy or treating a friend; either way it’s called “stealing” and is easily “correctable”. If it’s not intentional, it’s either a lack of training or failure to apply the training. The training is also simple; ring up the order “before” serving it so you don’t get busy and forget about it. Occasional exceptions to the rule are acceptable, repeated violations are “correctable”. In the situation described above it would have been appropriate for the General Manager to at least have asked for the name of the server, so someone who cared, in addition to Ben Simpson, a customer, could observe them in action.
The second issue occurred in November 1997, when as part of the Finance Committee report, “Judy announced a change in inventory procedure. It will now be done by physical inventory rather than as an adjustment computed as a percentage of sales as was done in the past.”
The single most important tool for effectively measuring the financial success (or failure) of a restaurant might be the development and tracking of Cost of Goods Sold (COGS) ratios on every aspect of the operation. Attempting to accomplish this without taking regular physical inventories is like trying to balance your check book without using your bank statement (“There must be money in the account, I still have blank checks”),
Using the “percentage of sales” method referenced above would eventually result in having plenty of dollars in the food and beverage inventory accounts, but no “groceries” on the shelves.
During the final two years “JR” managed the Club, the F&B operation averaged losing (at least) $43,000 a year. During the first two years under Marie’s management, the F&B operation, measured the exact same way, averaged a profit of $62,000 a year.
Yes, when it came to knowing and using the tools for managing F&B, Marie was a pro. The Board told her they wanted F&B to operate at a profit, and she went after it. Throughout her tenure, Senior Golf Memberships hovered around 400, give or take a few; but Social memberships grew by well over a hundred members.
Her philosophy was to maximize member support of F&B by offering “value pricing” and then make money on outside banquets and events. Items on the regular menu were priced at three times the entrée cost adjusted up for the side dishes, and items for outside banquets were priced at four times the entrée cost adjusted up.
When the Board suggested she consider offering Saturday night dinners to the members, her response was direct. “It’s your choice, would you rather I book forty-eight Saturday night banquets a year for a hundred and fifty or more people at non-members prices designed to make money or would you prefer I serve thirty- or forty-member priced meals every Saturday night?” Case closed.
To make sure her pricing was on target, she did a profit and loss calculation on every banquet and every event on the Club calendar; and she required her chef to provide a theoretical cost calculation on pricing every menu item and made sure he operated within those parameters.
On the golf side of the business, she was not as knowledgeable but had competent people reporting to her. She had complete trust in Greens Superintendent Doug Hughes and was heavily involved with Head Pro Jim Garrison. Most of the long, drawn-out process for building the new maintenance facility occurred under her watch and based on the extremely detailed written reports she gave the Board each month, she obviously believed in following all projects closely.
May 16, 2004, Annual Membership Meeting – At this point in Club history, the financial numbers were still looking solid, but it was becoming obvious the current strategy for quickly attracting new members would not be a viable option much longer. Historically, the club had been able to attract new members and generate big dollars quickly with “Initiation Fee Deals”; either by offering reduced fees or threatening to increase them. But with the “regular” Initiation Fee down to $1,000 and the Club already offering two for one “Buddy Deals”, this strategy was on its last legs.
The Operating Budget for the fiscal Year 2003-04 ended with a net profit of $13,000, four hundred and seven Senior Members and 207 Social Members. This financial success was significantly aided by the positive F&B numbers that in no small part resulted from the record number of Social Members and the fact outside banquet sales had averaged a twenty percent annual increase for the previous five years.
November 7, 2004 –A Special Membership Meeting was called for approval of capital expenditures in three different areas. Getting approval to spend $112,500 on new carpeting and furniture was fairly easy. (After all, the “voters” at the meeting were actually sitting in the chairs and walking on the carpet the Board felt needed replacing.)
However, while in the final analysis, Cart Path Project Chairman Jim Schaffer got approval to spend $275,000 for replacing crumbled asphalt cart paths with new cement ones, I’m fairly certain, the events at the meeting remain to this day indelibly etched in his head. After making a short presentation on the overall plan, the first question out of the box was from John Tenney and the next five pages of the meeting transcript detail a “discussion” primarily between these two gentlemen on whether the “cart trail” on #4 should be routed to the left side of the hole or to the right side.
Mr. Tenney’s question seemed to unleash a barrage of other questions on details of the plan, a few more on routing the paths, but most offering sage advice on “cost saving” ideas for using asphalt or soil cement versus regular cement or maybe varying the widths of the paths; should they be four feet wide, or five, or six, or eight, or even ten in some areas? What about curbing? Is there any doubt the project would have been much better off had Mr. Schaffer received this valuable “guidance” at an earlier date?
Attention then turned to the $800,000 request for funding the new maintenance facility……… “John Buntin, #2764” “I want to thank Mr. Schaffer for calming everyone down before I got up here, appreciate that very much, Jimmy.”
Getting approval to spend such a large sum of money on infrastructure that members would only see from a distance was not easy, but once he got the membership to understand why it was “up to” $800,000, John was able to handle the wide-ranging array of questions from all the “maintenance facility construction experts” in the audience.
The Fiscal Years ending March 2005 and 2006 were somewhat calm; both ending with just over 400 Senior Members, small dues increases and reasonable net operating results. The good news was, at the end of this period, the Club was at an all-time high of two hundred and seventy Social Members. But things were about to take a dramatic turn, for the club and for me personally. I was asked to run for the Board in May 2006. I had enjoyed being on the House Committee the previous year, my first venture into the business side of the Club, so why not give the Board a try? “How hard could it be?”
The year began fairly smoothly for the Club and for me. As Chairman of the House Committee, our first project was installing Suggestion Boxes in various parts of the Club. The rules were simple, answer a few general ratings questions on the provided form, make your comments, and as long as the form contained your name and member number, the Committee would address your question or concern.
Early on, a suggestion was submitted saying the American flag flying in front of the clubhouse was in need of replacement. After verifying it was in bad shape, I approached Marie, who immediately started laughing and said, “That’s funny, just last week I got a call from a doctor in Virginia Beach, Virginia. He said twenty-five years ago, he was a student at Florida Christian College (directly across the street from that flag) and one night he stole our flag to hang in his dorm room. Apparently this had weighed on him for twenty-five years and he wanted to make amends. A couple days ago, I received a check in the mail for $253. I have no idea how he came up with that number.” (Free at last?)
The Muffin Conundrum – It was around this same period of time we received three different suggestions pertaining to the muffins served with every salad on the menu. The first said, “I’m a new member and the chocolate chip muffin that came with my salad was fantastic, I hope you serve them every Tuesday when I eat lunch here”; the second said, “Chocolate chips are for cookies, not for muffins, nobody eats cookies with a salad”; and the third said, “You’re wasting money serving muffins with salads, no one eats them anyway”
At the next Board Meeting, I posed a theory that solving the “Muffin Conundrum”, i.e., keeping all three of those customer/owners happy, was analogous to the daily challenges confronting our Board of Directors and Management Team.
