Commercial Golf Simulator Design: Beyond the Residential Build

TL;DR

When planning a custom golf simulator installation, particularly for commercial or high-traffic environments like luxury amenity spaces or corporate offices, the considerations extend far beyond those of a residential setup. Durability and ease of maintenance are paramount; a high-end residential unit, while robust for personal use, may quickly degrade under heavy, varied user traffic. It’s crucial to select commercial-grade technology designed for sustained use, including launch monitors with intuitive software that allows for quick, autonomous play without complex settings adjustments. Furthermore, robust automation systems are essential for managing bay access, lighting, and even integrated marketing displays, ensuring seamless operation and preserving the luxurious aesthetic. Proactive measures, such as providing house clubs and dedicated cleaning stations, are vital to mitigate wear and tear from user-supplied equipment, safeguarding your investment and maintaining the facility’s pristine condition. Neglecting these commercial-specific elements can lead to premature equipment failure and significant operational headaches, undermining the value of your custom golf simulator investment.

Durability and Maintenance in High-Traffic Simulator Spaces

Stephen: No. That makes total sense because, even just in the planning, kinda going into this next question, it kinda leads almost directly into that, but it’s in a little bit different of a light. Yep. Next question that I have is how should developers plan access control, durability, and maintenance for a golf simulator amenity?

Tyler: Yeah. I’ll start with access control. And, again, how do you want the space to be used?

Selecting Technology for Seamless Commercial Operation

Cliff: Some people are building these as twenty four seven access. You get a, you sign up online. You get a little key card or maybe tap with your phone to get access. We’ve seen a lot of people do that in the commercial space and have success with it. A, a twenty four seven semi autonomous environment can be a great model. And, obviously, you have to plan for that. Right? You need, you need the system on phones. You need key cards tied into your key system for your hotel or your condo. You gotta think about the technology infrastructure to allow people to do that. Or are you gonna have it be, supervised by somebody that’s getting people set up, getting their drinks for them? So, again, you gotta know the model you want or at least have options when you’re planning for it so you can set it up in the right way.

Cliff: There’s even technology now that, can turn the computer on or off, give, lock people out when their time is done, like a bowling alley or whatever. All those things you gotta figure out how do you wanna do that.

Is it is it autonomous? Is it fully, fully run by an employee? So that’s kinda on the access side. Durability, again, you’re gonna get a lot more use in these environments. We need to use, yep, materials that are gonna be more durable, more resilient to bad shots, to abuse from customers. But you also have to plan to know that there are some wear and tear type items in these environments. Right? The hitting strip is wear and tear. The this the hitting mat and the putting turf over time will get, run down.

Cliff: That’s the last thing you wanna do is build this luxurious type, amenity, and I’ve gone into some of them with that have had heavy use, and they’re not taken care of over time. And now you’ve got this great amenity that just feels kinda rundown and worn. You do have to think about that maintenance protocol and plan for it and build it into your budgets. They’re not huge ticket items, but they are things you need to be able to replace over time because they do get worn out.

Tyler, feel free to jump in on

Tyler: I would I’ll I’ll piggyback on the maintenance stuff that Cliff mentioned., some other things that can also expedite the need for maintenance or potentially replacement of things like the screen and the heavy mat, the wear and tear consumable items is especially in something probably more in, the multifamily unit type situation, maybe the office situation where you might expect more people to be bringing their own clubs. It’s highly likely they’re not may not do the best job of, they went out to the course yesterday outside, and now they’re coming to play inside. They’ve got sand in their clubs, dirt. They’ve been using dirty balls. All of those things, will expedite the need for maintenance and, potentially getting a replacement screen or needing to have the screen cleaned. Those are some factors that are especially in those type of environments where you might be expecting more people to be bringing their own clubs, that’s a bigger challenge.

Automating the User Experience and Facility Management

Tyler: But that might be also something I recommend is in most cases, you typically we would, typically recommend having a set of clubs already there, so, lefty and ready sets. Those are already cleaned, and then providing balls as well too. That way, at least, you can reduce some of that potential issue of getting the screen dirtier, folks not necessarily cleaning the clubs. Or we have also done, respectively, some of, club and shoe cleaning stations, outside of simulator base., as part of the process of playing, everybody is heavily encouraged to take a moment, clean their clubs, clean the balls if they wanna use their existing ones, and do that before playing, again, just to keep the overall facility in a great shape.

Stephen: Yeah. I know it’s it’s funny that you guys even mentioned that because I know I’ve even, friends of mine with different types of simulators and whatnot have, have spent a lot of money on the nicest version of almost like a residential version of something, but it’s really not meant to be used so heavily. And I’ve gone there and experienced exactly what you’re what you’re talking about of where it’s this really, really nice space that feels like it used to be really nice, but it’s now run down.

Stephen: Yeah. And if you don’t know what those differences are between the top of the line residential and you’re just buying whatever the nicest thing is versus the experience of understanding which things work best in terms of this commercial space, I think you can get led astray, which is really, really nice. Yeah. It seems like to work with somebody like you guys in that scenario.

Cliff: Just like you wouldn’t put a residential oven in a commercial kitchen. Right? They’re very different products. Like, we’re we’re gonna think about things differently, bring different products to play to bear. Yeah. For sure. That makes total sense.

Stephen: Going forward to, again, a logistical question that I know we’ve answered in certain ways, and I think might be a very broad question.

It’s okay if you guys wanna kinda hone in on a specific part of this. But what technology works best for golf simulator amenities in hotels, resorts, and apartment communities?

Cliff: I, I guess I’ll start and Tyler jump in, but it’s I think you need to think about the usage and customers that aren’t gonna be typically used to working with this type of technology. You wanna go with something that’s gonna be a little bit easier to use, a little more foolproof. There’s different types of technology. For exact for example, Trackman is a little bit better in commercial settings because you kinda just click one button, open everything up. It’s all self contained within the Trackman software. Some of the other technology, you have to open a couple programs and click a couple buttons, and that’s just people aren’t accustomed to that.

Cliff: One, you wanna select your technology in a way that’s going to make it easy for people to use, especially if you’re going in a in a more un unmanned or, autonomous type environment. And so, yeah, I think that’s that’s one. And then two, how are you gonna run it? Right? There’s, for example, Trackman has some commercial software built into the platform for scheduling, billing, POS, all that stuff. That is a nice feature. Or if you’re going with other technology for the launch monitor, there’s third party applications that run some of that for you., what if you’re gonna run leagues? Do you have to some have somebody in there setting up the settings on every person to play and tracking the scores?

Cliff: Whereas Trackman or some of these other third party software that are out there have some of that for you. They also get into scheduling the bays. Right?, making reservations to go use the bay and then setting up the system when you show up. That’s a big consideration in this space, unless you’re gonna have somebody there, running it and getting customers set up and showing them how to use it.

But that’s definitely, to me, one of the biggest things to think about.

Tyler: Yeah. Yeah. Click it. Hit the key one on just the pure golf simulator side, which is really the ease of use of the software. Right? You typically wanna go with a launch monitor that has a software, that’s super easy for anybody to come and click play and just jump right in versus, needing to change a bunch of settings. Especially in the commercial space, there’s, I won’t go into all the details, but there’s a ton of other technology considerations around in a similar vein, of the automation of turning the bay on, turning the lights on. Again, very simple for somebody to go click one button, and all of a sudden, bay boots up, and it’s ready to go along with the software. And then how all that’s handled. Right? So running that type of automation, the networking, potentially having other, especially in these locations, maybe having a screen that’s more of like a, marketing screen, or here’s what else is going on the in the hotel or at the resort, or here’s what’s going on in the office.

Tyler: There’s a variety of considerations to, home run that back to a central location and have software that’s, handling those banner ads, in addition to the launch monitor software, computer, those types of things. Again, there’s just a lot more to consider to keep those locations very clean, keep the wires out of the way, and keep the clients or office workers just focused on, okay. There’s a couple things I have to do in order to play. And then when I’m done, I can shut things down and not have to worry about all the nitty gritty specifics along the way.