TWO RIVERS COUNTRY CLUB
employees are limited in what they can do to
describe the club to newcomers.
“Job one for the staff is to serve the needs
of current members—that’s where our time
has to be concentrated,” he says. At the
same time, employees are not in the habit
of freely offering opinions about the club.
Thirdly, they don’t actually know the member
experience first-hand. “When a person who is
thinking about joining can play 9 or 18 with a
member, or sit down to dinner with them, it’s
the ultimate chance to get all their questions
answered,” says Warring.
One piece of data a visitor might ask about
is the cost of that major renovation, which
not only completely cored out and rebuilt
the greens, but renovated all bunkers and
overhauled footbridges. As a true feather in
the club’s cap, it managed the $1.7 million
outlay without calling for an assessment.
Club leaders found that, as the project went
forward, it was continually under budget
and ahead of schedule. That opened up the
possibility of adding previously unplanned
fixes like the bridge work, which was
a valuable late addition because it meant
avoiding interruptions down the road.
On that same note, the club can cite its
progressive policy on the vexing question of
the winter overseed. Tossing aside what it sees
as an outmoded idea, Two Rivers skipped that
disruptive, turf-injuring practice in favor of its
new solution—turf colorant. “We painted our
fairways this past winter and it was extremely
well received by our golfers,” reports Warring.
“The rough was brown, so they could see a
visual contrast, and the greens are bentgrass,
so they aren’t going to discolor. Now we’re
in a mode where our bermuda fairways will
get their best possible chance to come out of
dormancy in early spring—which they did
wonderfully this year.”
months of weekly session, he notes, before
the group plays its first three-hole scramble.
Like most country clubs inside the gates of
a golf community, this one measures success
partly on how many new residents opt to
take out a golf membership. In the go-go
days of 15 years ago, according to Warring,
developers could count on 60 percent
of residents buying golf memberships
after they bought their home—now that
percentage has been cut in half. In this club
community, the hit rate is on the low side, at
least initially. A review of 2014 shows there
were about 30 homes purchased inside The
Governor’s Land, yielding a half dozen new
members for the club.
“People take a wait-and-see approach,”
Warring explains. “If they have younger kids,
they know they will be using the non-golf
amenities, but they want to know there’s
room in their schedules for golf.” In response
to that concern, a new trial membership was
added to the menu of options. Creating new
membership categories is a valued tool in the
club market these days, and Two Rivers uses
it with enthusiasm. A Senior Membership
is now in place, to allow older members to
continue playing and enjoying the game.
PLAYING HOST
But visibility is the thread that runs through
the club’s strategic outlook going forward.
The two VSGA Stroke Play championships
“brought people out to the property who
wouldn’t otherwise know what we’ve got
here,” says Warring. “We consider that a
positive.” He adds that premier state events
can’t be an every-year occurrence—what
matters is just to stay active over the long haul.
That’s why having the men’s and women’s
golf teams from the College of William &
Mary play their home matches at Two Rivers
is a win-win for the club and the school.
The story is similar for a piece of
programming that’s been in place for six
years and continues to earn club support. It’s
the Two Rivers Invitational, held every year
in October and featuring Senior and Super
Senior divisions. The goal is to build those
fields up to a total of about 120 players, versus
the 60 to 70 entrants it currently tops out at.
“We’re making a consistent effort to build
our Invitational, and our commitment is longterm,” says Warring. “Sometimes it’s human
nature to launch an idea and then decide it
wasn’t any good because success doesn’t come
right away. For something to become really
well e