The Board is pleased to advise that we have concluded successful negotiations with Yamaha to replace our now well used Golf Cart fleet. The current electrical carts have reached end of useful life status and are increasingly becoming unreliable and more expensive to maintain, particularly in respect of battery life.
The Club has purchased 43 new Yamaha petrol carts and rather than rent the carts and ‘hand back’ at changeover, we will purchase these carts over 5 years and at the end of term the Club will have 80% accumulated equity in the Cart fleet, enabling a future Board the option to either continue to utilise the carts beyond 5 years at a low cost of ownership or replace the fleet utilising the accumulated equity achieved at that time. After careful consideration and negotiations with a range of suppliers, the Board decided to purchase the Yamaha petrol carts as these carts have a proven ‘useful life’ of 10 years+ which will enable this longer term commercial strategy to be realised in optimising the club’s return from the Cart fleet over time.
However, in moving to a position where the Club will ultimately own the Carts, the Board has decided after due consideration, that there is a need to increase cart hire fee from $30 to $35 for member hire, and to $42 for non members upon the introduction of the new carts, which is expected to be from 1st December. This decision has not been taken lightly and is a reflection of the more strategic approach in respect of owning rather than renting the Carts, that we are now responsible for servicing the carts (whereas previously this was included in the rental arrangement), and also in part that cart hire fees have not increased for now a number of years.
As members are aware, over recent years the Board have been very focused on cost management and in developing other revenue streams for the club which has resulted in no changes in membership fees for 3 years whilst rebuilding the financial position of the Club.
We trust members will understand this decision and the longer term benefits which will flow to the club in future years arising from this approach.
Tony Bourke.
Secretary manager.
