In March 2010 Urban Golf opened a new venue on Kensington High Street to complement their existing two venues in Soho and Smithfield.
“Urban golf” in this case being the purveyors of simulated golf rather than the game previously played on the streets of Shoreditch.
According to Christian Broughton in article for the Independent (Golf Goes Underground, 27 September 2004), Urban Golf began around 2002 when James Day, a golf professional at Stoke Park, discussed the idea with one his clients and playing parter, Simon Margolis.
At the time of opening its first venue on Great Pulteney Street, Soho in 2004, Urban Golf had five partners: James Day, Simon Margolis, Nicholas Lawson, Henry Squire and Martin Freeman.
The business of Urban Golf is the provision of indoor golf simulators, which clients pay to use by the hour. The current going rate is £40 per hour. Allied services at urban golf are golf coaching, golf club fitting, corporate events/venue hire, and refreshments. Which is more important for making the business successful I’m not sure. If I were to speculate, I’d guess that corporate events rather than individuals and small private groups are its bread and butter.
Urban Golf were not the first pioneers of this business. The company which sold the first six golf simulators to Urban Golf in 2004 first installed its simulators two years earlier at a venue in the Docklands trading as the Wright Swing Golf Ltd run by Ian Wright and Brian Harvey (directors with a background in electrical engineering). Quoted in an article in Golf Range News (www.golfrangenews.org) from December 2002 Ian Wright claimed he tried out a simulator whilst on holiday in California, then travelled to San Diego to find out more about the simulator business.
The company in San Diego was Golf Swing Inc. Its products are now sold and distributed in the UK by the Indoor Golf Company. Golf Swing claims the infrared beams used by its simulators can track a struck golf ball over a space of a couple of feet and record its ball speed, launch angle, direction, and spin. This data is then used to calculate the characteristics of the ball’s entire flight and to display this flight graphically on large screen electronic representations of golf courses from around the world. This same company also supplies simulators to more recent entrants to the market for providing indoor golf in London, which Urban Golf has done so much to develop.
I have played these simulators at Urban Golf in Soho and Urban Golf in Smithfield. From my recollection the venue supplies top quality golf clubs and golf balls and as a golf ball is struck towards the screen, a digital representation of its flight continues on the screen whilst the real ball drops to the floor. Putting, chipping and bunker play not being so accurately captured or enjoyably experienced. On the whole, simulated golf is not for me, but the growing number of indoor golf centres and the worldwide popularity of golf on simulators is a more reliable gauge of its appeal than my opinion.
What’s impressive for me about Urban Golf is the technology of the simulators, its successful marketing, the youth of its founder in 2002, and the company’s growth during a recession. I may not have personally enjoyed the slickness and cost of a visit to one of its basement London venues, but even I have to admit a grudging admiration for the artwork commissioned by Urban Golf for their latest venture in Kensington (see www.mammaldesign.com).
