PGA of Alberta Golf Shows Go Live – Live Online, That Is
- Details
- Category: Inside Golf
- Published: 2020-03-30
By GORD MONTGOMERY, Inside Golf
CALGARY, Alberta — While no one physically could attend the PGA of Alberta Consumer Golf Shows in Calgary and Edmonton this year due to the novel coronavirus pandemic, don’t worry. The shows are now coming to you in the comfort of your own home.
Ashley Van Kroonenburg from the PGA of Alberta explained late last week that this was the provincial association’s way of making sure the golfing public still gets to see what golf courses and resorts in Alberta, B.C., and the U.S. had to offer and lets vendors display those products.
Van Kroonenburg put her talents to work in getting vendors to go along with this idea and present their products/services via the internet to the buying public.
“That’s the new norm right now, so we just changed the Alberta Golf Shows website into a virtual golf show,” she said of people being able to access hopefully all they would have seen at the actual shows.
With those events not running physically this year, there was disappointment on both sides of the counter, Van Kroonenburg agreed, saying she hoped this idea would ease that pain just a bit for all concerned because cancelling the shows was the proper thing to do.
“There was definitely a huge disappointment to people to have them cancelled but the government was going to shut them down anyway. On March 17, we were still ready to go forward (with the actual shows),” but then the escalation of the pandemic. not only in Alberta but across Canada, forced their hand and the wise decision to not proceed was made. “We didn’t want to put our staff and the public in danger. There was a lot of disappointment but people were very understanding.”
So Van Kroonenburg kicked her talents into gear and started contacting those businesses that had signed up to have their products on display at the shows, asking if they would be interested in promoting their properties/gear online. While that idea met with some early hesitation and skepticism there was enough interest to get things started. And that interest has been growing.
“It’s definitely small right now,” she commented on March 26. “People are ‘We’ll get things to you but we want to see how it’s going,’ ” before they committed, she explained of a different sort of sell on her part. One thing that likely did appeal to all the exhibitors is that the online show space is free (as of March 26 although that may change). “Over the next week or so I think we are definitely going to get a lot more traffic.”
The great thing about going online with these shows is that what’s on display is now travelling farther than just the greater-Calgary and -Edmonton areas. Since it’s on the web, the spread of the information is essentially worldwide and for vendors, that’s a winning solution to not physically being in contact with interested parties.
“I think it’s going to benefit them hugely. I don’t think they see it right now but in the weeks to come, they’ll be, ‘Yeah, okay, this is going to be huge for us,’ because of the reach of social media.”
The shows’ information and specials will be forwarded to the social media base the PGA of Alberta has, which sits at about 15,000 addresses at present. If even only a small percentage of that number takes a look, and then takes advantage of the green fee offers, the stay-and-play packages, the apparel offers, or any other specials that are teed up online, then perhaps the cancelled shows won’t have that dramatic a financial impact after all.
In closing, Van Kroonenburg stated, “Even though it is a virtual golf show, it’s as much as we could do for our clubs. It’s nothing spectacular but at least it’s something for them,” as well as something for those of us who feel we maybe missed out on some great Consumer Golf Shows’ discounts due to the coronavirus cancellations.
For access to the Alberta Golf Shows online, where consumers can see what is being offered from both Calgary, Edmonton, PEI, and U.S. courses, go to albertagolfshows.com and click on the DEALS icon.