Sunday, July 03, 2005

Greensboro Jaycees Cancel Buy.Com Event

"After losing money two of three years and watching attendance sag this year, the Greensboro Jaycees have decided to cancel Greensboro's Buy.com Tour event.

The Jaycees said they have lost $178,000 in three years of the event and attendance dropped 25 percent from 1999 to 2000.

"With all of the projects we have, the Buy.com event wasn't producing the revenue we expected,'' said Jaycees president Leigh Anne Good. "With all of the projects we have and all of the charities we support, the tournament was costing us too much."

The Jaycees cited the tournament's dates as a big reason behind the decision.
The event was played at Sedgefield Country Club during the last weekend of June two of the three years and in July in 1999. With temperatures over 95 degrees and occasionally topping the century mark, the Jaycees said they could not build a substantial following.

"The date the tour allowed us, in my mind, was unrealistic if we wanted to be successful," said Tim Marion, the 2001 Buy.com event chairman. "If we had a fall date, everything would have been rosy."

Marion said he repeatedly asked Buy.com Tour officials to consider moving the tournament to a weekend in the fall. He said crowds would respond better to cooler weather and the event would not be so close to the PGA Tour's Greater Greensboro Chrysler Classic in April.

Buy.com officials declined to move the tournament and Marion said the Jaycees were left with no other choice.
"It was just a business decision,'' Marion said. "What we're trying to do now is put all of our efforts into the GGCC and all that trying to build with that tournament."

This excerpt was taken from the following link:
http://www.golftoday.co.uk/news/yeartodate/news00/greensboro.html

No comments: