Stay and play packages: 7 practical rules for pricing and partners

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Stay and play packages work when the bed carries the margin and the tee time supplies the reason to book. Bundling a room with a round is straightforward. Pricing that bundle so it still earns money in February, and putting it in front of the right buyer, is the part that takes work.

The market is already there. UK golfers spend around GBP 484m a year on accommodation, close to the GBP 526m spent on green fees, on Sheffield Hallam University research for The R&A. Golfers who travel are paying for beds regardless, and the venue that packages the two together captures spend that otherwise goes down the road.

Here is how to build stay and play packages that hold rate, from the components through the partnerships to the calendar.

What stay and play packages actually bundle

At minimum, a room night and a round. The versions that sell tend to include breakfast, an evening meal, a second round at a reduced rate and a plain statement of what is not included. The buyer, usually one organiser acting for a group of four to twelve, is paying for certainty: confirmed tee times, a known total and a single invoice.

That organiser is the customer, not the group. Make the package easy to explain in a message and easy to pay for in instalments. Society secretaries rebook the same trip year after year when the paperwork is light, which is why our guide to the society business matters here as much as any rate card.

Pricing stay and play packages without giving rate away

Build the price from components before discounting anything. Room, green fees, catering and extras each have a published rate, and the package should sit below that total for a reason you can name: a midweek arrival, two nights instead of one, an early or late slot, or a month you struggle to fill. A discount with no condition attached is simply a lower price.

Protect the room rate first, because it carries the best margin. Where a deal needs sweetening, add value instead: practice balls, an extra nine on the morning of departure, a bar credit, a buggy for the organiser. Published corporate and society golf packages start from around GBP 54 to GBP 55 per player at resort and members’ venues, which gives a useful floor for the golf and catering element before beds are added. Our notes on food and beverage profit explain why the meal is often the piece worth defending hardest.

Partnerships when the course has no beds

Most courses do not own a hotel, and most hotels do not own a course. Stay and play packages therefore rest on a partnership that has to survive a busy Saturday. Agree four things in writing: how many tee times are held and until when, who takes the booking and the deposit, whether the hotel pays a net rate or receives a commission, and who handles a cancellation.

Name a single contact on each side. The common failure is not price but communication: a hotel selling times the club has already given to a member competition, or a club releasing an allocation without telling the hotel it has stopped selling. A shared calendar, checked weekly, prevents most of it. Where several hotels are involved, keep the allocation policy identical across all of them or expect to be played off against yourself.

Distribution: direct, operator and the middle ground

Direct sales carry the best margin and the worst reach. Your own site has to accept a multi-night booking with a tee time attached, take a deposit and confirm the lot in one email, otherwise enquiries leak to the telephone and then to nowhere. Tour operators and specialist golf agents bring volume, foreign markets and shoulder-month business, but they expect net rates, allocations and release dates.

Neither channel is wrong. The mistake is letting the cheapest published price sit on somebody else’s website. Set a rate parity policy at the start, keep the most flexible terms for direct bookers, and cost each channel honestly, including commission, payment fees and staff time. The yield thinking used for single rounds, described in our guide to tee sheet yield management, applies to packages in the same way.

Seasonality: price the calendar, not the product

One package price for the whole year is a decision to lose money in July or sit empty in November. Publish a rate calendar with clear bands and let the shoulder months carry the value adds while peak weeks hold firm. Demand exists well outside high summer: general play rounds in England ran between 3.9m and 4.4m on England Golf figures reported through the GCMA, and much of that play sits outside the fortnight everyone fights over.

Be honest about winter conditions. Temporary greens and mats disclosed at the point of booking cost you one sale. Discovered on arrival, they cost you the group and the review. Our winter revenue playbook covers the alternatives, from short-format golf to indoor practice time, that keep something selling when the course cannot carry the trip alone.

Measure what stay and play packages actually earn

Gross package revenue tells you very little on its own. Split every booking into its components at cost, then look at what the group spent beyond the inclusions: bar, pro shop, buggies, extra rounds, breakfast for the ones who stayed up. A group that spends freely beyond the package is worth more than a group paying a higher headline price and drinking tap water.

Track repeat rate as the headline number. Stay and play packages earn their keep on the second and third visit, when acquisition costs nothing and the organiser books by email in January. If only a small share of last year’s groups come back, the problem is rarely price, and no amount of discounting will fix it. Ask the ones who did not return, in person if you can, and fix whatever they tell you before the next rate card is printed.

Frequently asked questions

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Sources: Sheffield Hallam University for The R&A; England Golf via GCMA; Macdonald Hotels and Burford Golf Club published rates.