The Golf Club of Houston will no longer be the site of the Houston Open.
HGA now must seek a new site as well as pursue a new sponsor
The Houston Open went forward this spring with neither a title sponsor nor a future date and now it’s also seeking a new venue after Escalante Golf Inc., which owns the Golf Club of Houston, has told the Houston Golf Association it’s no longer interested in playing host to the city’s PGA Tour stop, which dates to 1946.
The city-owned Memorial Park Golf Course is a complicated but doable option for 2019, although the issue could be moot if the HGA can’t go it alone for a second year without a major infusion of outside capital. The tournament is thought to require a minimum of $7 million annually to make the event viable, and its cash reserves were presumably depleted this spring.
A tough sell
Shell ended its 26-year sponsorship — dating to 1992 and, at the time, the third oldest on the PGA Tour — following the 2017 tournament after announcing massive layoffs the previous year due to falling prices and demand for oil and gas. Serious conversations are said to have ensued with the Texas Medical Center and Chevron, but nothing came of them. Chevron, of course, has been buffeted by the same market forces that forced Shell out, and its Houston operations also were seriously impacted by Hurricane Harvey last year.
“So many companies and their people have only recently been getting back into their offices and their homes,” Steve Timms, the HGA’s president/CEO and tournament director, said in an interview with the Chronicle in March. “Lots of their employees are still rebuilding and that’s where they’re focused now.
“The challenges we’re facing are unique to our market. All you have to do is look at what’s happened (in Houston) over the last 18 months.”
It’s believed that about half of the sponsorship revenue is allocated to onair advertising purchases, which further restricts the HGA’s options. Many firms the HGA would be inclined to target feel they already are sufficiently exposed on television, or see no value in having a media presence.
Chevron could be an example of the former. An example of the latter might be Crane Worldwide Logistics, the shipping company owned by Jim Crane, who also owns the Astros.
Crane, who is a scratch golfer, in 2011 purchased the Floridian, one of that state’s most highly regarded clubs, with a course that’s popular with many PGA pros. His equity in the Astros has increased significantly since they won the World Series, and he’s a major supporter of the First Tee, a life-skills program for children that’s one of the HGA’s most important beneficiaries.
Timms has not returned calls referencing Escalante’s decision, recent sponsorship conversations or about the possibility of Memorial Park becoming the new site. The HGA and the PGA Tour released a statement Thursday saying only that “the PGA Tour and the Houston Golf Association are collectively working toward securing a title sponsor and host facility starting in 2019. We are currently in discussions with a number of prospective companies and facilities with the end goal of securing the long-term future of a historic PGA Tour event.”
Timm previously has said he’ll be “worried” about the tournament’s future until a deal is done.
Houston mayor Sylvester Turner, of course, has been outspoken in his desire to get the tournament “back inside the city limits.” The Golf Club of Houston, south of Humble, is in the masterplanned Fallbrook community in unincorporated north Harris County, albeit only 20 minutes from downtown. The Houston Open has been played on two courses there since leaving The Woodlands in 2002.
Maybe Memorial Park
Memorial Park hosted the Houston Open from 1951 through 1963 and underwent a major renovation in the mid-1990s. But another significant makeover would be required to get it fully up to PGA Tour standards. Although the track is long enough at 7,164 yards — almost the same as the Golf Club of Houston — the greens aren’t nearly as pristine or challenging, and the wearand-tear from the 60,000plus rounds played there annually makes high-level upkeep difficult.
Other concerns, from area mobility to parking, also would have to be addressed. Turner has called the nearby Northwest Mall property an option for parking. A proposal from the city released last year said moving the tournament inside the Loop “would place the tournament on center stage in downtown Houston, creating a central location for the city to rally around. Houston Proud Partners of the Houston Open would have the opportunity to collaborate with the Houston Golf Association on this historic move and make a lasting statement that would be seen for generations.”
Pre-Master slot gone
The tourney has lost its prized pre-Master slot on the PGA Tour schedule. The Valero Texas Open in San Antonio now will serve as the prelude to the season’s first major, which brings a number of bigname international players into the mix who might not otherwise be predisposed to play.
Possible options for Houston include the week prior to the PGA Championship, to be played in mid-May instead of midAugust for the first time in 2019, or before the U.S. Open in mid-June. That week in the schedule is currently free with the FedEx St. Jude Classic in Memphis having been pushed back into August as a World Golf Championships tournament.
Although PGA commissioner Jay Monahan has said he hoped to announce next year’s schedule during the Players Championship on May 1013, that’s now believed to be unlikely to happen because of several uncertainties, the Houston tournament’s up-in-the-air status among them.