The Most Powerful People in Golf

Who are the movers and shakers that wield the most clout in the golf industry? Golf Inc. counts down the individuals who influence the business of golf

One of the most eagerly anticipated announcements each year is Golf Inc.’s list of the Most Powerful People in Golf.

For the past eight years, Golf Inc. editors annually have ranked the 35 individuals judged to have the most ability to influence the development of courses and communities, the operation of courses, the equipment used by golfers and the rules and administration of the game.

“This is truly a worldwide list, reflecting the changing nature of the golf industry as more and more countries embrace the game,” said Katina Cavagnaro, publisher of Golf Inc.

While they may not be names that every golf fan would immediately recognize, those in the industry certainly are aware of their contributions to the game.

Here is the list of Nos. 1-10, along with the previously announced 11-35.

 

1. Jack Nicklaus
CEO
Nicklaus Design

The Golden Bear’s selection as No. 1 may be becoming redundant, but the fact is that he keeps adding to his legend, at the design table and in the business world. Despite a worldwide course development slowdown, Nicklaus’s design firm has over 40 courses in development around the globe. Undeterred by an equally major decline in resort and community development, Nicklaus moved ahead with several Jack Nicklaus-branded communities and resorts, most notably in the Caribbean and the Cabo San Lucas area of Mexico. He remains perhaps golf’s most respected spokesperson on a wide range of issues.

2. Dana Garmany/Hud Hinton
Chairman/CEO
Troon Golf

Garmany this fall that he is stepping away from daily control of Troon Golf and turning the CEO reins over to current president Hinton at the end of 2009. Garmany will continue as chairman of the board of the company he founded at flagship property Troon North in Scottsdale, Ariz., in 1990. Hinton has served as Troon’s president and COO since joining the company in 1999 after a 25-year career in the hospitality industry. The two have built Troon into the world’s largest golf course facility management company with over 200 managed properties worldwide, encompassing 26 different countries.

 

3. Tiger Woods
World’s No. 1 Player, Course Designer
ETW Corporation

After returning this year from knee surgery that followed his stirring U.S. Open win in 2008, Woods likely reclaimed the PGA Tour’s Player of the Year title with six victories (as well as the FedEx Cup crown), although he had a rare major-less year. Off the course, construction continued on his Tiger Woods Dubai course, with additional course designs announced in North Carolina and Baja California, Mexico. His Tiger Woods Foundation continued to grow, and when the Tour lost The International in Colorado, Tiger and his Foundation stepped in to replace it with the AT&T National hosted by the Foundation at Congressional Country Club in the nation’s capital.

 

4. Eric Affeldt
President and CEO
ClubCorp

Despite an economic climate that has many U.S. private clubs reeling, ClubCorp managed to actually increase its sales of golf memberships, member rounds and dining revenues through the first nine months of this year vs. 2008 figures. While continuing to pare overhead, Affeldt and his executive team have introduced a number of “member appreciation” incentives to maintain membership and dues levels.

 

5. Peter Hill
CEO
Billy Casper Golf

Hill has led the Vienna, Va.-based Billy Casper Golf management company to a position as the second largest operator of U.S. courses, with more than 110 courses in 25 states. The company, growing steadily over the past decade, made a major jump this year, adding 18 course management deals in the first three quarters of the year including seven Chicago Park District facilities. The properties have done well, particularly in a down economy, showing a 2 percent same-store rounds increase over 2008.

 

6. Tim Finchem
CEO
PGA Tour

Finchem has largely kept the Tour insulated from the major sponsor defections that have plagued the LPGA, although the loss of Buick’s two tournament sponsorships hurt, and Finchem warned in September that more sponsors may drop out. The tweaks to the FedEx Cup contributed to a much more competitive Tour Championship, although the format remains complex.

 

7. Dr. David Chu
Chairman
Mission Hills Group

Dr. Chu has spearheaded golf’s growth in China. In addition to Mission Hills, the world’s largest golf facility with 12 courses and three golf academies, Chu has what may eventually become an even larger facility under construction near Haiku on China’s Hainan Island. As host of the inaugural Asian Amateur Championship, he successfully lobbied for its winner to receive a Masters invitation for the first time ever and has been a leader in the Olympic golf movement.

 

8. Joe Steranka
CEO
PGA of America

As head of the PGA and its 28,000 member professionals, Steranka has spent time expanding and revamping the organization’s professional education programs, in addition to actively promoting the Get Golf Ready player development program and supporting the push for golf in the 2016 Olympics. The PGA is also stressing the need for members to contribute data for the PGA PerformanceTrak records of facility performance.

9. Steve Lesnik/Steve Skinner
Chairman of the Board/CEO
KemperSports

After adding to their reputation as a development consultant and manager for upscale municipal and daily fee properties in the last few years (Chambers Bay, Butterfield Trail, Ridge Creek at Dinuba, Bandon Dunes’ Old Macdonald, etc.), Chicago area-based KemperSports had a relatively quiet 2009. The company did lose seven Chicago Park District courses to arch rival Billy Casper, but KemperSports remains a force, and will likely be more active in 2010.

 

10. Greg Norman
CEO
Great White Shark Enterprises

Norman’s competitive juices, primarily stirred by his far-ranging business activities in recent years, got an on-course jolt with his stunning run at the 2008 British Open title at the age of 54. While he remains active globally with golf course design and his involvement in community development, winemaking and turf production, he sold his majority interest in MacGregor Golf to Golfsmith, licenses his apparel line and holds a stake in the merged GPS Industries-ProLink Systems company, now the largest cart-mounted GPS provider. He also captained the 2009 President’s Cup International Team.

 

11. Jim Hinckley
CEO
Century Golf Partners/Arnold Palmer Golf Management

Dallas-based Century has slowly but surely added properties to its owned and managed portfolio of courses, reaching 40 owned courses and another 15 managed properties by the end of September. The company has become a go-to option for owners who have run into problems with prior operators – Century has picked up management deals at several CNL Lifestyle Company-owned properties.

 

12. Gary Player
CEO
Gary Player Design/Black Knight International

Even in his 70s, Player continues his peripatetic globe-trotting, designing golf courses in every corner of the world. His current projects include courses in India, China, Bulgaria, Abu Dhabi, the Canary Islands, Italy, South Korea and even Georgia – the one in the U.S. – among others. Always conservation-oriented, Player has become almost evangelistic about golf’s need to follow environmentally sensitive and sustainable guidelines in course design and maintenance practices.

 

13. Billy Payne
Chairman
Augusta National Golf Club

Payne has kept Augusta National and The Masters in the company of golf’s ruling bodies such as the PGA, USGA and R&A, which is actually rather amazing considering that it is, after all, merely one club and one tournament, albeit a major one. Payne has utilized The Masters’ clout to promote golf in the Olympics, and has made the tournament more inclusive, particularly for Asian players. And he has done it so far without any of the controversy that cropped up during the tenures of previous Augusta chairmen.

 

14. Nick Faldo
Chairman
Faldo Golf

While Faldo’s regular stints as lead analyst for CBS Sports’ and The Golf Channel’s golf telecasts make it seem as if he spends his entire life traveling from one on-course announcing booth to another, he is actively involved in his own thriving global course design business, lends his name to Marriott’s Faldo Institute training centers, and is a prominent figure on the international golf scene.

 

15. Peter Dawson
Secretary
Royal & Ancient Golf Club of St. Andrews

As head of the R&A, Dawson has played a leading role in championing the inclusion of golf in the 2016 Olympics. With golf’s popularity on the rise in many former Soviet bloc countries in Europe, and Russia itself as well as Asia and the Middle East, it can only increase the industry clout of the R&A, whose rules of the game govern most areas outside the U.S.

 

16. Joe Munsch
CEO
Eagle Golf

Of all the large management companies, Dallas-based Eagle and its 75 properties might best represent the overall state of the American golf industry – some well-situated courses doing well, others struggling with competition and declining revenues. Munsch has hired several new executives, including former ClubCorp marketing chief Frank Gore and finance and acquisitions specialist Tom Moran, and plans to unveil a “Radical Golf” concept to lure new players, juniors and families to the game at Eagle properties.

 

17. Wally Uihlein
CEO
Acushnet Co.

While equipment sales are struggling predictably as golfers pinch their disposable income, Titleist’s stranglehold on the ball market has kept Acushnet atop the heap. Golfers may be resigned to hitting the ball with the same old clubs for another year, but they remain convinced that Titleist balls allow them to get the most out of those old sticks. FootJoy remains a footwear powerhouse, Pinnacle has its fans too and the Titleist brand as a whole remains strong.

 

18. Mark King
CEO
TaylorMade-adidas Golf

TaylorMade remains the top driver brand in golf under King’s leadership of the company’s equipment and apparel divisions, after converting the doubters a few years ago about the appeal of adjustable driver heads. Now the company has introduced interchangeable wedge faces, in part to adjust to new USGA groove rules. And, in a stunning development, TaylorMade signed Greg Norman to play their clubs and balls in March while he was still a major owner in MacGregor.

 

19. George O’Grady
Executive Director
European PGA Tour

O’Grady’s campaign to dramatically stretch the boundaries of the European Tour hit a small speed bump with the September announcement that Dubai developer giant Leisurecorp was reducing its first year support of the Race to Dubai (formerly the European Tour’s trademark Order of Merit ranking) and the Dubai World Championship by 25 percent. Grady’s plans for the Tour still include expansion in the Middle East, as well as Asia, in an attempt to keep more of the region’s top players – and lucrative sponsorship and television revenues – in the European Tour fold.

 

20. Bob Husband
CEO
Heritage Golf Group

Heritage, whose portfolio of clubs was built primarily on ownership of private and high end daily fee properties, earlier this year moved more aggressively in pursuing third-party management opportunities. In September, Heritage took over management of The Legacy in Bradenton, Fla., when its former operator returned the club to lender Textron Financial.

 

21. Arnold Palmer
Chairman
Arnold Palmer Design

“The King” still keeps an occasional hand in and an eye on his Palmer Course Design business, as well as other relationships which rely on the Palmer name to move product, especially with the baby boomer generation. Palmer, who turned 80 years old in September, agreed to provide a tribute to former President Dwight Eisenhower when Eisenhower is inducted into the World Golf Hall of Fame in November.

 

22. Steve Mona
CEOWorld Golf Foundation

Mona and the Foundation have had a busy year, with the majority of the task focused on growing the game, supporting golf’s inclusion in the Olympics and expanding the reach of The First Tee outside U.S. borders. Last November, Mona, Golf 20/20 and their supporting industry partners launched Get Golf Ready, an ambitious program to introduce new or lapsed players to golf through a program of five lessons, on course play and instruction. Over 1,000 facilities signed up to participate by July, exceeding the group’s goal for the year in seven months.

 

23. Paul Major
CEO
American Golf Corp.

Major, who has long been running the day-to-day operations of the company, took over the CEO spot from Tom Ferguson, who had been overseeing American Golf’s gradual disposition of owned and managed assets for owner Goldman Sachs. With AGC’s portfolio of courses down to approximately 77 properties, Major is spearheading consolidation of the portfolio into key cluster markets.

 

24. Bill Kubly
CEO
Landscapes Unlimited

Kubly, who anticipated the course-building decline curve years ago and diversified Landscapes to handle construction and maintenance of other recreational facilities as well, has also moved to capture some of the emerging golf construction business in Asia and the Middle East. Landscapes also remains active in course ownership and operation, with approximately 15 courses on the books, and has formed a management division.

 

25. Mark Woodward
CEO
Golf Course Superintendents Association of America

Moving into his second year at the head of the GCSAA after heading the city of San Diego’s golf operations and the 2008 U.S. Open preparations at Torrey Pines, Woodward is working diligently to promote the GCSAA and its offshoot, the Environmental Institute for Golf, as shepherds of the environment. While also promoting increased professional education and advancement for superintendents, Woodward is overseeing research on sustainable strategies as a best practices manual and a governmental and public relations vehicle.

 

26. David Fay
Executive Director
United States Golf Association

The USGA remains the arbiter of the game’s rules and regulations in the world’s largest golf market, although there is growing grassroots objection to what some perceive as a hidebound traditionalism that ignores changing demographics and sociographics. Opponents point to survey results that indicate the game’s difficulty is one of three main barriers to participation and question why the USGA feels it necessary to regulate club grooves.

 

27. Joe Beditz
CEO
National Golf Foundation

Although entities like the PGA’s PerformanceTrak, the NGCOA and Golf Datatech and Pellucid Corp. have eaten into the NGF’s former virtual monopoly on golf participation, revenue and development statistics, the Jupiter, Fla.-based NGF still has the broadest industry-wide reach. Beditz has led the organization into a variety of revenue-generating research and consulting services, while maintaining NGF’s original charter as an information-gatherer.

 

28. George Fellows
CEO
Callaway Golf

Despite pressures from the economy that have sent club prices plummeting, Fellows has guided Callaway through a variety of operational and fiscal challenges. Having absorbed the Top-Flite acquisition of several years ago and some serious belt-tightening including staff layoffs, Callaway remains a force in the industry with a strong presence in irons, woods, its continued putter popularity and apparel.

 

29. Joe Louis Barrow
CEOThe First Tee

Barrow continues to head The First Tee, although it is one of several organizations under the umbrella of the World Golf Foundation. The First Tee has begun branching out with chapters outside the U.S., spreading the organization’s combined message of golf and living skills and good citizenship dozens of different corners of the globe.

 

30. Cindy Davis
President
Nike Golf

As long as Davis and the engineers at Nike can keep Tiger Woods happy and wearing the swoosh into trophy presentations on the 18^th green, the company will have a viable presence in the golf retail market. Nike’s brand awareness – and the fact that Tiger uses the clubs and balls – will continue to make golfers at least consider buying. 

 

31. Herb Kohler
Chairman
Kohler Co.

In addition to the plumbing fixtures empire that made him one of America’s 100 richest men, Kohler has thrived in the world of high-end golf destinations and resorts. His Whistling Straits and Blackwolf Run golf courses and his American Club have hosted several major championships already. Kohler also built and owns The Dukes Course in St. Andrews, Scotland.

 

32. David Pillsbury
President
PGA Tour Golf Course Properties

Since joining PGA Tour Properties, Pillsbury has both guided new Tournament Players Club developments and crafted exit strategies for the operation of a number of existing TPC facilities. While planning an ambitious TPC development in the Bahamas, Pillsbury also signed a licensing agreement with Heritage Golf Group.

 

33. Henry DeLozier
Principal
Global Golf Advisors

Along with company president and principal Stephen Johnston, DeLozier has parlayed his long-time industry presence and contacts into a number of successful negotiations and consultancy relationships involving golf course acquisitions, finance, operations and sales.

 

34. Andreas Doring
Director of Operations
IMG Golf Course Management

As part of International Management Group’s successful Golf Course Services operation, Doring has been spearheading new business development for the company’s course management consultancy in Europe and Africa. Based in the firm’s international headquarters in London, Doring has helped IMG continue to expand its roster of golf industry services beyond representation of celebrity clients in the world of sports and entertainment.

 

35. Max Garske
CEO
PGA of Australia

Garske remains the pre-eminent industry leader in Australia, and has worked diligently to not only expand the game in Australia, but to further the country’s golfing ties to other countries in the AustralAsia region.