Sweetens Cove Golf Clubthe beloved nine-hole course in rural Tennessee faces a familiar question for punk-rock bands hitting commercial dirt: how do you appeal to a growing market without compromising what made you famous in the first place?
It’s a fine line, but Sweetens has been using it. Born in 2014 as a pitching operation west of Chattanooga, the course shed its underdog status fairly quickly. Instagram helped with that, flooding feeds with eye-catching posts from the game’s fledgling pool of influencers. When, three years later, New York Times fell with the coverage of the features of Rob Collins/Design by Tad King, Sweetens’ mainstream status was firmly sealed. Never mind that golfers — and golf writers — continued to refer to him as a “cult favorite.” The course had become a scam.
Today, Sweetens belongs to an ownership group that includes Peyton ManningAndy Roddick and Reef Capital Partners, a prominent real estate investment and development firm. It is a growing business. But its brass seem intent on staying true to the property’s original ethos, as recent expansion plans make clear.
The project, which was released earlier this month, calls for what might sound like familiar things: more golf, more gear, more merchandise, etc. However, look closer and you see that the line items are very much on brand. Topping the list is a new 13-hole short course, designed to overlap with the existing 9-hole course to allow play across the venue to choose your pleasure – a hallmark of the original Sweetens experience.
Other additions include what are described as a “random” collection of “collection sites”. A restaurant and bar are in the works, along with a bottle shop and micro-distillery, all the better to showcase the line of spirits that Sweetens launched in 2020.
Since it opened, Sweetens has been a day trip destination. That is set to change. Plans also call for the property’s first “hospitality experience” — the press release talks about accommodations in the form of one-bedroom cabins with single or double occupancy. They are scheduled to open in phases starting late next year, followed by a putting green, three golf simulators, clubhouse equipment and retail. Along the line, a fishing pier, a shooting range and an octagon-shaped barn and event space will also be built. You get the picture. Sweetens aims to be a stand-up and complete game. Or, as Collins puts it, “the ultimate 24-hour golf course.”
What won’t change is the operating model, which is built not on traditional reservations, but on all-day passes, with no weekend appointment times. In recent years, those passes have sold out for the season almost as soon as they were issued.
Early adopters — whether they discovered a group before anyone else or found a golf course before the Instagram crowd did — tend to be a proprietary group. They are the first to evangelize and the first to cry sell-out when they think the object of their affection has lost the plot. Apparently, Sweetens’ ownership understands what it’s sitting down for and is proceeding accordingly. The Dead Kennedys managed to build a strong following without softening their edges or alienating their original fans – no small feat for a band that made a point of being non-commercial. Sweetens strikes me as something closer to Golf Green Day, now more pop than punk, but still proud and protective of its roots.
3 things I’m thinking
Holding the line at Bandon: Many people build courses for the love of the game. But let’s be real – they’re also in it for the money, and there’s a lot of that on golf trips these days. Given the demand at major resorts, a place like Bandon Dunes can raise its rates significantly and sell out again in an instant. Which makes this news particularly refreshing. In an era when most bed and breakfast properties increase their prices every year, Bandon has decided to stay consistent. Green fees at the Oregon resort — currently ranging from $130 to $375 depending on the season — will remain unchanged in 2027.
Tiger funds: Private equity doesn’t own everything in golf. It just seems that way sometimes. If the name Reef Capital sounds familiar, for example, that’s because it keeps coming up. In addition to Sweetens, the firm’s portfolio includes Black Desert Resort in Utah (where expansion plans are also underway), Cornerstone Club in Colorado and Marcella Club (also in Utah), where a TGR Design course opens in July. Now comes word that Reef Capital’s Tributer Resort in central Virginia has tapped Woods for a second private layout — an 18-hole course that will join the existing Cutalong Golf Club. Construction is scheduled to begin in 2028.
East Lake and beyond: Practice times are a way to experience special courses. Tournaments are another. In that vein, ESPN is reporting that the Tour Championship — long held at East Lake Golf Club in Atlanta — will remain at that location until 2027, but that the Tour is exploring the possibility of moving the event to brighter quarters. Valley of the Pines, Cypress pointand Seminole are among the names being churned out by the fast-moving Internet rumor mill. It sounds far-fetched. Then again, you would have said the same thing if we had told you years ago that Augusta National would one day allow influencers to throw Frisbees around Amen Corner.
