The Baltimore Business Journal published the following article on April 7, 2016. Subscribers can view on the Baltimore Business Journal website here.

“Millennials are not golfing as much as the generation before them, and as a result the industry is suffering.

The 88 million millennials — those born between 1981 to 2000 — across the U.S. recently overtook the Baby Boomers as the generation with the largest population.

The National Golf Foundation estimates millennials account for about a quarter of the nation’s current golfers, and play 90 million rounds of golf annually. While these numbers are promising, millennials are still playing far less golf than the generations before them were at the same age.

I caught up with Bill Smith, executive director of the Maryland State Golf Association, to get his thoughts on how millennials are impacting the game locally and where he sees the industry headed over the next decade. The nonprofit is celebrating its 95th year. Smith joined the organization in 1985 as vice president and has held the title of executive director since 2002.

Editor’s note: The April 8 edition of the BBJ features a List of the 25 most challenging golf courses in the Baltimore area.

How would you describe the current health of Maryland’s golf scene?

Kinda flat. Through the 90s we built a crazy amount of golf courses. Now, we are losing golf courses. In the last 10 years, about 14 or 15 golf courses have closed — both public and private, but mostly public. (Wakefield Valley Golf Course, Chestnut Ridge Country Club, Beachtree Golf Club are among them.) The land has been more valuable to turn into housing. The number of golfers has decreased at about an average of 2 percent a year. When I say flat, I mean we bottomed out. 2015 saw a 2 percent increase in the number of rounds played. Another good sign is in the last five years, there has been a tremendous increase in youth golf participation (ages 6-17). There was an increase from 2.4 million young players in 2011 to 3.2 million in 2014. A lot of the credit goes to The First Tee program, the Drive, Chip, & Putt competition, and the Ladies Professional Golf Association (LPGA), which is a United States Golf Association (USGA) program.

So are you seeing more females entering the game at a younger age?

Yeah, we’ve had growth in our junior championship. Particularly, more with the boys and there has been a big improvement in quality of play. I often kid that when I first started, it was more like a babysitting service. Now, they have teachers and so much more instruction, and they are very good.

Have private courses rebounded from the recession?

It’s a similar situation as with the public courses, we’ve lost some private ones, but significantly more public courses. Our membership is roughly 1/3 private and 2/3 public. We have lost maybe one or two private courses. The great majority of private courses are still looking for members. They are surviving.

Are millennials playing a big role in the Maryland golf scene?

Not at all. They play far less golf than the previous generation. They just don’t have the time to play. You will find that both members of the families are workers and they delay certain situations like marriage and children, which results in a delay of getting into the game. It’s just a cultural change. They do everything in life later than we do. I’m not sure they will ever support country clubs to the degree that previous generations did.

What’s the biggest challenge in getting new faces on the course?

Making the game fun. The game has been too hard to learn and too hard to play. New architectural designs were designed for very hard golf courses and too many are too punishing. We need to make it easier. Most golfers today say they just want to have fun. We need to find ways to make the game a little quicker. We’re looking to promote nine holes of golf and ease course conditions for a faster pace of play. In the last four years, we developed Play Days — one-day tournaments which are open to any kind of golfer, anyone who can play. They are not the same competition we have for state championships and the events provide an opportunity to play courses that might not otherwise be accessible.

Where do you see Maryland’s golf scene in 10 years?

More golf just for fun. Less competitive golf.”

— Maria Sieron, Research Director, Baltimore Business Journal