Monarch Beach Golf Links in Dana Point, California, walks a fine line in its accommodation of group events. Between the meal and reception demand it gets from corporate groups and weddings at the adjacent Monarch Beach Resort, plus the golf club’s own charity and association outings, general manager Eric Lohman must get creative in order to maximize the use of all possible gathering spaces at his facility.
One solution he found was to make use of the tee boxes on No. 1 as meal and reception space. “By tenting the long middle-tee area, we can seat 150 guests at eight-person rounds,” he notes. “The back tee area is tented and used for the serving stations, and a forward tee area is tented and hosts the bar.” This leaves one forward tee box open for play that day, making the hole an uphill 320-yarder that remains competitive.
“We do at least 25 or 30 meal events a year on the tee boxes,” Lohman says. “Even a few small weddings will use it, when the couple likes the elevated view.”
While most of the time the tee boxes are playing host to a dinner that follows a golf outing, some corporate groups use them as the starting and finishing point for a three-hole golf event that incorporates brief lessons, skills challenges and “goofy golf” contests on each hole. “We let guests walk a short loop on the course, and we put bar stations on each hole,” he adds. “It takes an hour, and both golfers and non-golfers really enjoy it.” One other enticement: taking a ride on one of the club’s GolfBoards.