About Me

Hi,

Thank you for visiting my personal website and taking the time to visit this page to learn more about me and my journey to this point.

Firstly, I want to make clear I am not professing to be anything special or a so-called guru. I am simply a colleague in the exciting world of sports and leisure clubs.

I have worked in golf clubs since 2001, starting at a members club near Woking, Surrey, working as part of the UK’s largest golf course operator. Initially, I had aspirations of turning professional, but after a few years I realised I would never reach the level required. So in 2006 I ventured into the administrative side of golf club operations and more specifically Sales and Marketing. I took my first role as a Membership Sales Manager. Within my first 12 months I achieved a record month, achieving my 50th new member of the month on the final day, as well as substantial membership growth over the months. I then moved to another club but after a little disillusionment I ventured into the competitive world of recruitment.

When the UK economy crashed I realised it was not a good time to be trying recruitment fo the first time. However I survived 9 months as more experienced consultants were “disposed” of around me and our office shrunk from 14 consultants to just 5, before I decided the grass was not greener. However I had learned some invaluable skills in the art of selling which I took with me as I returned to Crown Golf.

This time I took up a position at a 27 hole facility with a mixed reputation but a thriving golf academy. In the 4 years I was there my career and reputation progressed, achieving yet another company record, this time for net growth. In a single month, October, head count grew by over 40 members in as the season drew to a close!

This led to me being asked to present at a company conference on membership sales as well as stepping up to assist at other clubs with training and troubleshooting. However, in 2013 an opportunity I couldn’t refuse afforded itself to me, to work on the Goodwood Estate selling membership for Golf At Goodwood.

This was a much more rounded role with a strong emphasis on member engagement and retention as well as sales. Just over two years there flew by, achieving significant growth in 2014 and 2015 in membership head count and, more importantly, revenue.

Then towards the end of 2015 my ambition was realised as I was offered my first GM position at a golf club, a private members’ club, just north of Portsmouth.

Little did I know the challenge in front of me. Like many clubs in the UK, the membership levels had dropped and as a result so had the club’s income. But unsurprisingly their costs had grown and the cash reserves had diminished. The initial goals were clear:

• commercialise the approach of the club
• drive core revenue lines (especially membership)
• manage costs by driving better deals from suppliers.

In the first year membership growth was significant as head count grew by nearly 100 members and the following year also saw a positive net gain.

When it comes to being a Secretary/Manager, I will admit to being inexperienced and I wouldn’t want to teach fellow GM’s and Secretaries to suck eggs. But I believe each and every GM has a set of unique skills that are stronger in certain aspects of club management, normally built up in a prior career or specific aspect of golf club operations, such as F&B, greenkeepng, sales, etc. Each and every one of us excel at certain aspects of Club Management, whilst we take longer to grasp others. I believe my strongest area to be the commercial operations of a club… more specifically focused on sales and makerkeitng… and even more specifically on the sales and marketing of membership.  

This is what led me to start this blog and focus it around my career, sharing my knowledge, skills, and learnings that I either have now, or will pick up along the exciting journey I have ahead of me in this wonderful industry.

Hopefully I can not only help the clubs that I am employed at, but others within the industry that could tap into my knowledge. I also hope that I can build my network and learn from other General Managers from inside and outside the golf club management industry.

So if you have read to this point then I thank you and sincerely hope to hear from you very soon. Please do get in contact if you have any questions and even if we don’t do anything else then at least we have both grown our network by one more person and ultimately our resource for personal development.

Yours faithfully,

Mark Wycherley