The R&A might be steeped in hundreds of years of golf tradition, but one doesn't stay relevant for that long by doing the same thing over and over.
To help courses meet the economic and environmental challenges of the 21st century, the game's ruling body (outside the U.S. and Mexico) has developed an online tool that helps superintendents, owners, operators and other managers track facility revenue and expenses related to course management.
CourseTracker is a free tool that the R&A says securely helps managers track relevant course data and generate charts and reports suitable for use in meetings. The system was developed, according to the R&A, in response to growing environmental and economic challenges facing golf facilities around the world.
After establishing a free account, users are asked to enter data such as revenue and revenue type; rounds played; expenses related to items such as salary of green staff, fertilizers, pesticides, fungicides, seed and sod, equipment, fuel and electricity; and depreciation.
Once a course profile is complete, CourseTracker can produce executive summary, income and expenditure reports. Information is stored for easy updating in the future. All information is submitted subjectively, so the accuracy of reports and charts depends on the accuracy of the information entered into the system.
CourseTracker also can compare a property's performance against other facilities with a similar profile.
All information, according to the R&A, is kept confidential and anonymous.
The system can be utilized by managers of multi-course operations and can be customized for access by more than one user.