Insights · The Field
Why guest days and member-guests are different products
One is a courtesy. The other is a week with a name. Do not sell them as the same event.
A guest day is a member bringing a player for a round and, if the club is generous, lunch. A member-guest is a week with a name, flights, a gift, a photo, and a dinner the guest will describe. Clubs that run both on the same ops sheet dilute both.
The tell in the field
ClubHost’s catalog is 1233 real member-guest weeks. 323 of those names already read as one-day, play day, 9-holer, or nine-and-dine. That is not a defect. It is a club being honest about the product. May One Day Member Guest at Wellesley Country Club and Ladies One Day Member-Guest at Fiddlesticks Country Club are one-day weeks. May One Day Member-Guest at Merion Golf Club sits on the same property as Annual 3-Day Member-Guest at Merion Golf Club. Merion did not pretend the May one-day was the three-day.
Price and ritual
A guest day can be a guest fee and a cart. A member-guest has an entry, a gift, a dinner, and a Saturday the membership already paid for. If the guest fee on the day is higher than the member-guest entry, the week is mispriced. If the one-day comes with a welcome bag and a trophy table, you built a week and called it a day — staff it like a week or cut the ritual.
Ladies and men’s one-days are still member-guests when they carry a name and a field. They are guest days when they are a round tacked onto a Wednesday. The name on the event page is the tell. If you would not put it on a pairings board, it is a day.
Do not steal Saturday for a day
A one-day that takes the prime Saturday in June is a yield mistake unless that Saturday is the member-guest. Put play days on the shoulder. Save the weekend for the week that has a dinner. More on that in the calendar as a yield tool.
From the field
- May One Day Member Guest Wellesley Country Club
- Ladies One Day Member-Guest Fiddlesticks Country Club
- May One Day Member-Guest Merion Golf Club
- Annual 3-Day Member-Guest Merion Golf Club
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