The nationwide average price of a gallon of gasoline is more than $1 more than at this time a year ago, according to the American Automobile Association, but even with the price of regular unleaded at $2.95 per gallon, many of the country's top golf resorts and destinations don't expect any serious impact on their fall and winter bookings.
"We're actually stabilizing compared to last year," Mark Vaughn, director of marketing at the Marco Island (Fla.) Marriott Resort, Golf Club & Spa, told PGA.com. "We're doing the same amount of business we did last year but (guests) are coming more from the state of Florida than they ever have."
A survey over Labor Day weekend, Vaughn said, showed that 87 percent of the resort's guests came from the Sunshine State.
"We generally get 75 percent on the same amount of room nights," Vaughn said.
A few miles north in Naples, Mark McMahon, hotel manager for the Ritz-Carlton Golf Resort, said projections for the fall and winter show consumer confidence "remains relatively strong."
"We haven't really seen any negative effect from fuel prices," McMahon said. "We're concerned about any scare with fuel availability but hopefully that's just a short-term reaction in the oil refining production around the gulf."
It helps his business, of course, that the average Ritz-Carlton customer is less sensitive to the price of fuel from a driving standpoint.
"The good news for us is that our major markets -- for a good part of the year -- are within a tank of gas. That's Tampa, Miami and Palm Beach County as well as Orlando," McMahon said. "Our winter customers all fly in here. They might rent a car but they're not going to do any long driving when they get here."
The wild card in fall and winter booking projections, however, is the price of airline tickets, which despite the staggering rise in crude oil prices the past several months, have stayed relatively low. That could change in the days and weeks ahead, particularly if Delta Airlines files for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection as expected and the mechanics strike continues at Northwest Airlines. But for now anyway, travel industry executives are confident that the fall and winter will be strong in most areas of the country.
"In the event fuel continues to climb then certainly airfares will reflect the increase and could pose a potential drop in visitation but not as severe as a major drive in destination like Orlando," said Eli G. White, Jr., corporate vice president of sales and marketing at the Biltmore Resort in Coral Gables, Fla. "Once in Miami, a rental car is used as a convenience around the immediate area and fuel is less of a concern for the limited mileage actually used."
In Orlando, Paul Pebley, director of marketing for the Omni Resort at ChampionsGate, said his property had a strong summer and so far this month is having solid business on its two Greg Norman-designed golf courses, "but October and November are still to be determined.?
"We had a few cancellations over Labor Day. That was at the height at the media frenzy over the hurricane (Katrina), at least in Orlando and in Central Florida," Pebley said. "There hasn't been any real indications of gasoline shortages but obviously the price at $3 per gallon (as it was at most stations in the Orlando attractions area this past weekend) is higher than we've ever had."
"Because our business in the fall comes from a shorter period and shorter distances, we really haven't seen where (gas prices) have had an effect one way or the other," Pebley said.
This time of year the leaves change in many parts of the country, including in Virginia, where Colonial Williamsburg is a staple of fall travel and golf for residents of Northeast and Mid-Atlantic regions of the U.S. Perry Goodbar, vice president of hospitality sales and business development for Colonial Williamsburg Company, said the resort, which owns courses designed by Robert Trent Jones, Sr. and Rees Jones, has seen a higher-than-anticipated lull in the business the past couple of weeks compared to last year.
"We believe gas prices and other issues had something to do with it. People decided to stay home and donate money to good causes and not take as many spur of the moment trips," Goodbar said.
To help attract more guests, particularly golfers, Colonial Williamsburg is now offering an unlimited golf package whereby a guest pays for one round of golf and can play a second round at no additional charge.
"We're really looking at things of value," Goodbar said. "It is a very popular time unless the gas prices continue to be a huge issue. We're just trying to be more flexible with some value-added offerings."
Aldo along the I-95 corridor, the Carl M. Freeman Companies last month opened the Jack Nicklaus-designed Bayside Resort Golf Club, a daily-fee facility just outside the popular resort area of Ocean City, Md. Bayside joined the Freeman Co.'s portfolio of courses that includes the Bear's Trap Dunes Golf Club in Ocean View, Del., and the Bay Club in Ocean City and Hell's Point Golf Club in Virginia Beach. Each of the courses depends strongly on the drive-in business from the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic.
"We concerned about gas prices, the economy and storms effecting the travel industry, especially being a drive-to destination in the Washington, D.C., Baltimore and Philadelphia area," said Tom Tipton, vice president for Freeman's Sports and Hospitality division. "There are two things that can happen. The guys who drive to their fall golf packages a lot of times come to us instead of going all the way to Myrtle Beach (S.C.). The real question for us is, 'Will you take a flight if airline prices go up?' So that tends to work in our favor, too. People will drive to us in a couple of hours instead of getting on a plane and going to Phoenix.
"All of that is the fear of what might happen. We're fortunate enough to be in a market where the fall and spring are mostly package (play) and those rounds are mostly booked already. So we already have a pretty good feel for what business looks like in the fall. We're not significantly up or down compared to last year. We could get burned if people decide at the last minute gas is too expensive and not go. But I'm not feeling much of that."
For the industry's sake, here's hoping Tipton's feelings are accurate.
