President’s Blog May 2025
“Appreciation”
I apologize for the extreme tardiness of this month’s Blog. I have sat down several times but to no avail. I have been extremely excited about having our course open and all the great loyal members we have. We have a lot of plans for this spring and have accomplished many of them. In the past 2 weeks we have prepped and laid down over 13,000 square feet of bentgrass sod. The new 3rd green looks amazing and the 2 tee boxes on #16 are growing daily. I am praying that the patches on the greens will take. These are no excuses for the late blog but it’s all I can come up with.
The last couple weeks have been amazing on the course as well. We have had 2 holes in one. Dick Trapani got his first hole in one on the 5th hole and Jon Bartlett got his first in the Tuesday night Twilight League on the 7th. Congratulations to both these wonderful members and great guys!
I know that the weather has been less than perfect for golf so far. I watched the weather today and just northwest of us they are expecting 2–4 inches of snow tonight. That is crazy! I promise we will have better weather days ahead.
I had the pleasure of playing golf on Monday with a golf course GM from NH. The weather was horrible but we finished all 18 holes and had a great time afterwards. The charity made over 100k in 2 days and everyone was happy. The talk was all about golf and the state of golf in the northeast. We both felt that industry was very strong but shared the concern regarding inflation. We felt it was very important to be aware of “pricing yourself out of business”. I’m sure that my friend was aware that LKCC is still the least expensive 18 hole course in our area. (Maybe in all New England). In my opinion, it has never been more critical to try and control expenses but also be very proud that we are now debt free. Having a mortgage in a business that only takes in 6 months of income is an uphill battle that I do not want to fight.
I have been very fortunate this spring to be able to spend more time at the course. I have enjoyed every second of that time and I hope the maintenance department feels like I have helped some. It has always been my philosophy to “see what people are doing by working beside them.” As I look back on the last 6 weeks, I am truly amazed at all the work that gets done. There are so many jobs that go into making a golf course ready to play. If I started listing them all, I would run out of space and ink. The job that Mike does, coordinating and scheduling daily chores, is extraordinary! There is rarely a day that he is not stopping what he is doing and solving a problem somewhere. Those dam beavers! I have always had much appreciation for our maintenance staff but never more than I have today. I hope that they realize how important they are to the success of our course!
When 1300 rolls of sod show up to be installed it is a grueling task. I would be remiss if I did not thank the people that helped. Dan Woodward from Valley Lawn and Landscaping has always answered the call and brought his crew to help. My son, Kyle and the KRL Property Services crew have been there with great young men and laid down a ton of bentgrass sod. My building crew has also joined in and got their hands dirty whenever they were asked. Maybe it doesn’t take a village, but it certainly takes a bunch of strong backs to install 1300 rolls of bentgrass. Thank you gentlemen for your great help!!
The snow will pass, the rain will stop, and the golfing season will be underway very soon. I am truly looking forward to seeing how our new grass grows and maybe even doing a little more before it gets too hot. Thank you for your support!
Yours in golf,
Brad
